Let us know what to do here, Father, to get those soldiers to safety! God Bless and protect them. God Bless their famiies.
Posted on 05/13/2007 5:18:54 AM PDT by jern
Edited on 05/13/2007 9:40:51 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
Thousands of U.S. soldiers searched Sunday for three Americans who were missing after their patrol came under attack in an explosion that killed four of their comrades and an Iraqi army translator. Two bombings — one in northern Iraq and another at a market in Baghdad — killed at least 67 Iraqis.
The Islamic State in Iraq, an al-Qaida front group, said it had captured several soldiers in the attack, but offered no proof to back up its claim, posted on an Islamic Web site.
The search for the missing Americans began after insurgents attacked a patrol of seven U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi interpreter before dawn Saturday near Mahmoudiya.
The U.S. military said Saturday that five people were dead and three were missing.
On Sunday, U.S. spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell confirmed that the Iraqi interpreter was among the dead — and that all the missing were Americans. He said about 4,000 U.S. troops were involved in the search.
Caldwell said the bodies of the three slain soldiers and the Iraqi interpreter had been identified, but the military was still working to identify the fifth.
"Everybody is fully engaged, the commanders are intimately focused on this, every asset we have from national assets to tactical assets ... are being used ... to locate these three missing soldiers," Caldwell said.
Mahmoudiya is about 20 miles south of Baghdad in an al-Qaida-dominated area known as the "triangle of death." Two U.S. soldiers were massacred there last year after they disappeared at a checkpoint.
President Bush has been getting regular updates on the missing soldiers, Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the White House's National Security Council, said in Washington.
Meanwhile, a suicide truck bomber crashed into the offices of a Kurdish political party, killing at least 50 people, including the police chief, and wounding scores, officials said. It was the second suicide attack in Kurdish areas of the north in four days.
The suicide truck bombing in Makhmur, 30 miles south of Irbil, badly damaged the office of the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Massoud Barzani, leader of the autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq. Makhmur is just south of the autonomous Kurdish-controlled areas, but it has a substantial Kurdish population.
The blast also killed the police chief and damaged the mayor's office, officials said.
Ziryan Othman, the health minister of the Kurdish regional government, said at least 50 people were killed and 115 were wounded, including the city's mayor.
Cars were charred and crushed by the blast, with some flipped over. The tires of one appeared to have been incinerated. Most of the small KDP building appeared to have been destroyed, reduced to a pile of bricks. Other buildings had walls blown out.
A group of people hurriedly pulled a body from a demolished car.
Outside the hospital in Irbil, security guards closed the hospital to visitors and read a list containing the names of the wounded who had been admitted.
Hearing the names of his son and daughter, Qassim Amin, 61, a Kurd, thanked God that they had not been killed. Both are employees at the KDP party office, he said.
"Makhmur is an open, peaceful area, and al-Qaida is trying to destabilize it by causing fighting between Arabs and Kurds," Amin said.
In Baghdad, a parked car exploded near the popular Sadriyah market, killing at least 17 people and wounding 46, police said. The area has been hit by several blasts usually blamed on suspected Sunni insurgents, including a car bombing on April 18 that killed 127 people.
AP Television News footage showed a crater in the ground filled with debris, splintered wood, metal and a tire. A white truck appeared to be crumpled by the blast.
With violence on the rise, Caldwell also announced that an additional 3,000 forces have been sent to Diyala province, scene of heavy fighting.
Last week, the top U.S. commander in the north, Maj. Gen. Benjamin Mixon, said the U.S. didn't have enough troops to restore order in Diyala but more had been promised.
"There is a recognition clearly that up in Diyala there has been an uptick in the violence," Caldwell said at a news conference in Baghdad.
On Sunday, Iraqi gunmen drove into the Diyala capital of Baqouba, pulled two handcuffed men out of the trunk and shot them to death — one in view of a bustling market and the other near a movie theater, police and witnesses said.
"This is the destiny of traitors," the gunmen yelled as they shot their victims.
Three other civilians also were killed execution-style in a market in the city center, police said.
I’m with you. I’ve about had it with this pansy *ss pussy-footing around the politicians and risk-averse senior commanders have been making our guys do. We’ve employed some of our finest minds and billions of dollars developing an arsenal of deadly weapons systems, and yet we’re fighting this war with infantry guys with M-4s.
Here’s an idea. Find out what town the al Qaeda animals are holing up in and Moab it. Then when they move to the next town, Moab it. Wouldn’t take long before there wouldn’t be a spider hole in the desert for al Qaeda to hide in. And if the Iraqis don’t like it, tough. They and the rest of the Islamic world need to learn there’s a harsh penalty for harboring terrorists. Making nicey-nice isn’t getting us anywhere. Neither is this ridiculous idea of creating an “Islamic republic,” and oxymoron if I ever heard one.
I’ve had it with us losing one or two or five of the finest young men of their generation day after day while we prosecute this war in a half-assed way. Fight it to win or bring ‘em home. This is ridiculous!
...and I hope they don’t put underwear on their heads.
We should seal off the area and let noone leave or enter until they are returned (hopefully alive and in good health).
And if they wind up in Iran; let the bombing commence NONSTOP until they are returned.
Actually, we should be assuming that the Iranians are behind this. There is overwhelming evidence that the “insurgents” have been getting aid from Iran. Rather than buying into the “Sunni - Shiite violence” story (Iran has no problem cooperating with Syria), we should follow the money: Iran wants control of Iraqi oil. But only the US ever gets accused of “blood for oil”.
“But, how do you defeat an enemy who glories in death and destruction?”
Easy...Kill ‘em all.
Lake Afghanistan, and Iran and Iraq= fields of green glass.
I like your thinking. Not one more soldier should have to die in order to pacify these barbarians and their death cult.
Its time the gloves came off. Mecca Medina are a good place to finish this crap, once and for all.
I agree with you. I'm not sure that the Iranians will be bold enough to parade these guys in Iran, but I think they were behind it, too. It is well known that they have been looking for ways to kidnap US troops, and that some Iranian agents even tried to do so in the past in one of those border areas.
“Bushs fault!”
It might be if the rules of engaggement being followed led to the destruction of the group.
F-n PC War! Kill-em ALL!!!!!!!!
Bad things happen, even to good soldiers.
I'm willing to bet that the men and women of the US army aren’t too impressed with your opinion of them, either.
Michael Frazier
http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/paul-williams051107.htm
It's worse than you think.
We must pray hard for our soldiers! God bless them and protect them. If they do anything to them or if Iran is involved we have to bring the hammer down hard on their stinking rag heads.
“But, how do you defeat an enemy who glories in death and destruction?”
Appease them, just as we did for Japan. Give them complete destruction. Leave no building standing.
First of all, we don’t know if they have them. What better way to demoralize the troops then to grab 3 dead bodies and claim they are alive.
BS
One year ago they did the same thing in the same area, they set off a bomb to incapacitate half the patrol then can easily kidnap the rest. in counterinsurgency warfare you have to learn and adapt.
no backup, no overwatch.
Let us know what to do here, Father, to get those soldiers to safety! God Bless and protect them. God Bless their famiies.
It is certainly possible that AQ is bluffing.
We have a couple of Freepers who have family members in that area and possibly that unit (information is scanty), so we should be praying for them. They posted on other threads yesterday, just after this happened, trying to get more information about it, but I don’t think a lot is known or has been announced so far.
I sure hope they don’t make our soldiers wear panties on their head, God wouldn’t that be awful. SARC
Like our fight with the NAZI’s it’s time for the heavy bombers and a little dirty Sunnicide. Bring on Plan B. A little more rubble, a lot less trouble.
Check with Omega dude. He's already written the after-action report, criticized the tactics and chastised the troops.
Are you kidding, we aren’t allowed to even keep known al-Qaeda members in jail without significant evidence. We are running a catch and release program in Iraq that as Bing West said Sweden would find too liberal.
We should be doing much more to fund and equip the force willing unless us to kill these people the Anbar Salvation Council.
Nothing we do is going to get the military to relax its ROEs or stop its catch and release program.
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