In Iraq, it's time to face reality.
Posted on 06/03/2007 2:46:59 PM PDT by HitmanLV
The U.S. military said Sunday that 14 American soldiers were killed over the past three days, including four in a single roadside bombing and another who was struck by a suicide bomber while on a foot patrol.
The blast that killed the four U.S. soldiers occurred Sunday as the troops were conducting a cordon and search operation northwest of Baghdad, according to a statement. Two other soldiers were killed and five were wounded along with an Iraqi interpreter in two separate roadside bombings on Sunday, the military said.
In the boldest attack, a U.S. soldier was killed Friday after the patrol approached two suspicious men for questioning near a mosque southwest of Baghdad, and one of the suspects blew himself up. Military spokesman Maj. Webster Wright said U.S. troops also fired at the second suspect after he began acting aggressively, and the gunfire detonated his suicide vest.
"Our initial analysis is that these guys were al-Qaida and were planning to launch attacks into Baghdad," Wright said in an e-mailed statement.
Seven other soldiers were killed in a series of attacks across Iraq on Saturday.
Combined with the previously announced death of a U.S. soldier in central Baghdad on Friday, it was a deadly start for June. May was the third bloodiest month since the war began in March 2003, with 127 troops deaths reported.
A car bomb also exploded outside a U.S. base near the volatile city of Baqouba, leaving a number of troops gasping for air and suffering from eye irritations, the military said. It did not confirm a report in the Los Angeles Times that the car was carrying chlorine canisters and said the soldiers who were sickened had been treated and returned to duty.
The attacks came days after the Pentagon announced the completion of the troop buildup ordered by President Bush in January, raising the total number of troops in Iraq to about 150,000. That number may still climb as more support troops move in.
The Bush administration has warned that the buildup will result in more U.S. casualties as more American soldiers come into contact with enemy forces and concentrate on the streets of Baghdad and remote outposts.
Sectarian violence persisted against Iraqis as well, with a car parked near a police station by an open-air market exploding shortly after noon in the predominantly Shiite enclave of Balad Ruz, in volatile Diyala province of northeast of Baghdad. At least 10 people were killed.
Abu Hussein, a 35-year-old elementary school teacher, said the force of the explosion knocked a bag of vegetables out of his hands.
He was not injured so helped to evacuate those who were, flooding the local hospital because they were afraid to take them to facilities in nearby Baqouba, which has become an insurgent stronghold.
"I went back and forth many times to the site of the explosion to transfer the wounded with my private car," he said. "I saw men and women rushing to the scene searching for their relatives and loved ones. One was crying 'my brother,' one was saying 'my father' and a woman was crying 'my husband.' It was chaos."
Gunmen at a fake checkpoint in Baqouba, 35 miles north of Baghdad, also killed two passengers and wounded eight others when they opened fire on three minibuses that sought to flee from the highway trap.
At least 73 other Iraqis were killed or found dead nationwide, including 31 bullet-riddled bodies of men who were apparent victims of death squads usually believed to be run by Shiite militias.
Meanwhile, Mahdi Army militiamen loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr battled with Iraqi troops and local police searching for two militia leaders in the southern city of Diwaniyah as U.S. jets roared overhead. At least three people were killed and 24 wounded, Iraqi officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information.
The clashes in Diwaniyah erupted Saturday evening after Iraqi soldiers and police cordoned off a market in search of two senior Mahdi Army figures wanted by U.S.-led coalition forces in connection with sectarian killings.
Maj. Gen. Othman Ali, commander of the Iraq army's 8th Division, said his forces captured one of the men, but he escaped when fellow militiamen came to his aid.
The fighting on the east side of the city, 80 miles south of Baghdad, resumed about 9 a.m. Sunday with the support of U.S. jet fighters and helicopter gunships skimming over Diwaniyah's rooftops, police said.
Ali said his forces raided two locations in "fierce" fighting that lasted three hours. They didn't find their target suspects, but did find weapons caches at the site, he said.
Police and medical sources said 20 wounded Iraqis, including two policemen, were brought to the local hospital from Sunday morning's fighting. The clashes erupted anew around 1:30 p.m, and one soldier and two other people were killed, and three civilians wounded, an army officer said on condition of anonymity, since he was not authorized to speak with the media. The U.S. military had no immediate report on the action.
American helicopter gunships also attacked targets in Mahdi Army-dominated Shiite east Baghdad late Saturday, killing four suspected militants and destroying 10 rockets, the U.S. military reported. The radical Shiite militia is facing growing pressure to bow to central government authority.
The U.S. command said an Apache helicopter team was alerted to men setting up multiple rocket firing positions aimed at the Green Zone, home to the U.S. Embassy and Iraqi government offices. Six other suspects were captured by ground forces of the 82nd Airborne Division.
A recent increase in mortar and rocket attacks on the U.S.-controlled area has raised concern, especially because they come during the U.S.-led crackdown in Baghdad.
Separately, Kurdish leaders urged Turkey not to stage a military incursion into northern Iraq as it builds up its border forces amid debate about whether to attack separatist Kurdish rebels that stage raids in southeast Turkey after crossing over from hideouts in Iraq.
"The Iraqi political leadership wishes to enhance relations between Iraqi and Turkish people ... and to try to avoid tension and provocation or escalate the situation," said Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd. He said a Turkish delegation was in Baghdad to discuss the situation.
The leader of the autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq, Massoud Barzani, said Turkish troops had shelled Kurdish areas but no incursion had occurred.
"We reject any interference in Iraqi affairs and we do not accept any presence of Turkish forces on Iraqi lands," he said during a joint news conference with Talabani. "The Turkish army did not enter Iraqi territory yet but if they did, we would consult the Iraqi government and deal with it as an Iraqi issue."
384 U.S. drivers die in 3 days on American roads.
Big Media tries to strike again. Didn't the leftists warn us not to politicize the war?
“Rebuilding the GOP’s image isn’t going to be fast and easy, troops.”
At this point I am more concerned about winning in Iraq than rebuilding the GOP’s image.
384 U.S. drivers die in 3 days on American roads.
How many troops are there in Iraq?
How many drivers are there in America?
Total professionals in action? Enough to do the job properly.
How many drivers are there in America?
Please be specific. Experienced or non-experienced?
I do not understand why we are still patrolling their streets on foot like so many over dressed policemen. You would think by now the Iraq's could have at least taken over this part of the job.
You hit the nail on the head. The violence in Iraq is the number one reason why Bush’s poll numbers are way down. While Illegal immigration is the top priority to FReepers, it is a bottom priority for non-idealogical voters - the types that determine elections.
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MEL’s -PASSION- sparked by -WE WERE SOLDIERS-
http://www.Freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1085111/posts
http://www.lzxray.com/guyer_collection.htm
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Could ya all quit with the things are bleak and depressing...and the nation is going to hell in a hand basket posts? This is exactly what the U.S. media feeds us every day.
This nation WOULD NEVER HAVE SURVIVED WW II with our current media and loser Democrat politicians. During WW II we lost 300 soldiers on average EVERY SINGLE DAY of the war. We lost 3,000 at Tarawa in 72 hours; we lost 8,000 at Iwo Jima. WE ARE LOSING LESS THAN 3 PER DAY ON AVERAGE IN IRAQ. Please keep some perspective.
Here read this:
Gunmen kill Al-Qaeda leader in Fallujah
AFP ^ | June 2 2007
Posted on 06/02/2007 5:45:11 AM PDT by ASC2006
BAGHDAD (AFP) - Unidentified gunmen shot dead the Al-Qaeda militant group’s leader in the western Iraq city of Fallujah on Saturday, police said, as fighting between rival Sunni factions continued.
Colonel Tareq al-Dulaimi, a senior police intelligence officer with close ties to Anbar Province’s pro-US tribal coalition, confirmed reports that Muwaffaq al-Jugheifi had been killed but did not identify the attackers.
Dulaimi described the slain Al-Qaeda leader as an Iraqi from Fallujah.
A police capitain, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “Militants riding in two civilian cars opened fire on al-Jugheifi and his group on Saturday morning as they left the Abu Ayyub al-Ansari mosque.”
Fallujah is currently at the centre of a large-scale security operation in which Iraqi police and tribal levies, backed by US forces, are attempting to drive Al-Qaeda’s Islamist militants out of the town.
Saturday’s killing came after the Anbar Salvation Council, the armed wing of the province’s tribal coalition, announced that it was sending plainclothes “secret police” to Baghdad to kill Al-Qaeda leaders.
The council, whose fighters included thousands of former insurgents, has fallen out with Al-Qaeda and thrown its lot in with US forces. It has sent gunmen to join the Iraqi police and pro-US tribal levies.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
The coverage of violence in Iraq is the number one reason why Bush's poll numbers are way down.
The vast majority of Americans know squat, zero, nada about Iraq and the Middle East. They know what the TV media tells them. Since 99% of the coverage consists of Military and Civilian casualties, American "atrocities" and "expert commentaries" whining about how EVIL and BAD Bush is, an decisive number of Americans believes this.
In 1941, a Democrat with falling polls was dealt a similar bad hand. He fixed the problem in three years and eight months. Why can't we?
I was thinking more of his predacessor actually fixing the problem when he took office. Lets see how many Liberals support the Harry Truman option for the Middle East?
OK so Bush is doing the best he can within the contraints of the government we got.
It's safer for an American to live in Baghdad than it is to live in Philadelphia. Texas is no exception.
Very well said.. I call it mass hypnosis thanks to the media led by the liberals.
Because America then was still patriotic, united in the war effort and willing to sacrifice. The Government of course also took care this was so, by doing the usual wartime stuff, such as censorship, government controlled propaganda, the implementation of the draft and punishment of treason. In thost three years and eight months we lost almost 400,000 servicemen. We fought a total war by firebombing German and nuking Japanese cities indisrimantely. If you want the WoT to be finished faster, you should be willing to accept all the things mentioned above. I doubt the majority of Americans ever will be again.
That President could speak English. He could sit down and talk to the American people in fireside chats, sooth their anxieties and explain what the problems were and what we were going to do about them. This President can’t.
I wish you were in charge. The bush generals are doing just the opposite.
I wish you were in charge. The bush generals are doing just the opposite.
And the "surge" is exactly that: policing -- the soldiers are being retrained to be babysitters to Al Quida-minded nut cases.
In Iraq, it's time to face reality.
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