Many US casualties in Nassiriya battle; Footage of POWs, including woman, shown on Iraqi TV

Al Bawaba ^ | 23-03-2003, 16:47

[Lessismore]

On Sunday afternoon, the Qatar-based television al Jazeera broadcast Iraqi TV, showing a videotape of at least 10 US POWs, including one female soldier, and a room with some 15 bodies of US troops. The live broadcast included also a footage of a battle field area in the southern Iraqi city of Nassiriya with additional corpses of US soldiers as well as struck military equipment.

The videotape has also shown how the Iraqis investigate the American POWs. The prisoners were questioned on air and gave their names, military identification numbers and home towns.

The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Air Force conceded that there were American soldiers missing, but said that there were fewer than 10 troops unaccounted for in southern Iraq.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld warned Sunday it was possible that Iraqi forces had taken U.S. prisoners, saying there were unaccounted soldiers and journalists in the combat zone.

He noted that under the Geneva Conventions governing prisoners of war, "It's illegal to do things to POWs that are humiliating to those prisoners."

Earlier, it was reported that U.S. Marines battled for control of Nassiriya, taking "significant" casualties in a fight to open a route north to Baghdad, military officials said.

Reuters quoted military officials as saying the Marine battalion spearheading the fight had suffered significant casualties in the battle.

A total of 11 U.S. soldiers were captured after taking a wrong turn, and 50 military personnel have been wounded in the massive firefight in Nassiriya, ABCNEWS reported Sunday.

According to the report, 11 soldiers, maintenance workers, had taken a wrong turn outside the city on a mission to carry out repair work. They were traveling in a column of vehicles that came under heavy fire, including from an Iraqi tank. The capture was observed by other forces nearby.

The firefight at Nassiriya blocked an advance by U.S. forces, who had earlier reported securing two key bridgeheads to enable them to cross the Euphrates and strike northwards toward the Iraqi capital.

Reuters said there was heavy U.S. helicopter traffic over the area, and that hundreds of U.S. military trucks and armored personnel carriers had stopped their advance.

Iraqi Information Minister Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf told a news conference in Baghdad that foreign invaders headed to Nassiriya had been "taught a lesson they will never forget." "We have placed them in a quagmire from which they can never emerge except dead," he said. (Albawaba.com)

[Chancellor Palpatine]

Thanks, RW - I came on this kinda late, but good job.

[Chancellor Palpatine]

.

[Bitwhacker]

Make mine Painfully Dry, m'dear!!! ;-)

[RightWhale]

This will be pushed forward to completion no matter what. Trying to distract and slow down the war effort will only drag it out that much longer, and that means more tragedy on the battlefield and at protest rallies.

BTW it is Uday's irregulars [goons] who are liquidating prisoners and who captured the maintenance crew and are violating the war conventions. Not regular army and not under control of the gov't of Iraq. Geneva convention is moot for these goons.

[Neets]

Sure thing babe!!!!

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

Well, thank you. This is the wrong morning to be demonizing the good guys. She's done it before, but when American prisoners are treated so horribly, so brutally, it takes some kind of freaking nerve to try pulling that crap around here.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

OFFICIAL BUMP(TOPIC)LIST

[MadIvan]

We have to send special forces in to get those poor people out of prison - immediately - I doubt they will survive long otherwise.

We know how brutal Saddam's regime is, we can only expect it to get worse in its death throes.

Regards, Ivan

[Jimmy Valentine]

Not only that, we should hijack both the signal and content.

Agreed. Let's make them watch Sponge Bob reruns.

[F16Fighter]

"Let's make them watch Sponge Bob reruns."

Ok, but only after makin' 'em watch 'Patton,' over and over and over....

[the_doc]

See #31.

[rdb3]

This, from the woman who thinks the Taliban got a bad rap.

Are you serious? Who in their right mind would say such a thing?

Sure hate I missed that one. Do you have a link? I'd love to read it.

FWIW, I wouldn't be too surprised though that she would say it.

[cyncooper]

and whose combatants we DO NOT recognize as "prisoners of war"

As usual, you are wrong.

And it's Operation Iraqi Freedom and the innocent Iraqi people welcome us. In fact, they are begging for us.

[Black Agnes]

Nah, let's make them watch Wonder Woman. Over and over and over...LOL. Or, maybe Lifetime Movie Network.

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

Yes, that was her position. If I remember correctly, the thread was pulled - but I believe the exchange was with sinkspur, who can confirm.

(It was you, right sink? Pinging some witnesses.)

[Chancellor Palpatine]

It was ages upon ages ago, but it was so typically...askelian. I wish I'd bookmarked it.

[sinkspur]

Yep. Askel was on one of her abortion jihads, and said that the Taliban were "demonized" unfairly. After all, they opposed abortion, pornography, and eliminated drugs.

This woman had the gall to try to tie George W. Bush, his father, and, her eternal nemesis, Henry Kissinger to 9/11 while the towers were still burning!

She could turn a phrase, but she could turn your stomach too, as you've just witnessed.

She's a very angry human being. No wonder she has so much trouble finding a man.

[faithincowboys]

i think it is important for you to not be seeing everything through the lens of Vietnam. by my estimation, the people out in the street are stiffening the resistance of the iraqi regime.

i'm sure the footage of protests in san fran, nyc, and chicago make the iraqis believe if they hold out, we will retreat. the protesters like in vietnam are not for peace, and to say so is to delude oneself. they are hardcore anti-americans who want us to be humiliated and defeated and to pretend otherwise is not useful. peace through strength, not through surrender.

if we leave now without completing our mission, all those will have died in vain. i remember hearing someone say recently that we treat our sodldiers like ballerinas. having this tag makes us unsafe.

we must have optimism, courage, and support for our troops.
we lost 3,000 civilians in an hour on 9/11. we have not lost many soldiers, thank god, and already we have the usual suspects out spewing their bile. disgusting.

historically, had we been this squemish we would still be a british colony, slavery would be a practice, the Third Reich would be on the march, Eastern and Central Europe would still be Soviet satellites.

we need to take back America from the Sixties generation. I'm not going to take part in that bs that went on. Sorry, I am not going to join the self-loathing-cynical-America-hating-middle-aged-flower infants.

[xsmommy]

i am very happy to see that there is ZERO TOLERANCE for any BREATH of such anti-American sentiment in this most heartbreaking time. GOOD GRIEF, and she claims to be a Christian? whatever moral capital SHE had is long gone. I am sure she can seek succor and comfort in the arms of the DU crowd.