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Attack May Signal the Future Use of Guerilla Tactics
NYTimes ^ | March 29, 2003 | STEVEN LEE MYERS

Posted on 03/29/2003 6:01:56 AM PST by RJCogburn

WITH THE THIRD INFANTRY, Central Iraq, Saturday, March 29 — A Iraqi suicide bomber killed five U.S. soldiers today by luring them to his taxi cab at a checkpoint north of Najaf and then detonating an explosive, an army spokesman in the region said.

The attack occurred north of Najaf on a road west of the Euphrates River. The victims were all members of the division's First Brigade, which has been involved in significant fighting around the city since last weekend.

Capt. Andrew J. Valles, the civil affairs officer for the First Brigade, said the attack occurred just after noon when the taxi pulled up to the checkpoint and called to the soldiers, who approached the car cautiously in a security drill that put two of them in front of the car and three on the side.

"As they approached the vehicle the driver detonated a bomb killing all five of the soldiers and himself," Capt. Valles said.

It was the first suicide bomb attack on United States soldiers fighting in Iraq, and signaled a potentially disturbing turn of events as irregular forces loyal to Saddam Hussein have been seeking to employ guerrilla tactics to slow the advance of an 80,000 member army on Baghdad.

An earlier suicide car bombing occurred this week in northern Iraq at a civilian checkpoint at Girdi Go, in the Kurdish controlled region. That blast killed four people, including an Australian television cameraman. It followed American military attacks on Ansar al-Islam, an extremist group allied with Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda organization.

The checkpoint near Najaf was part of the cordon that the Third Infantry has been enforcing around the holy city, where Ali, the spiritual leader Shiite Muslims is buried in a major shrine visited by pilgrims from around the world.

"I don't know what motivated this guy to kill himself. To me this is not an act of war," said Capt. Valles. "It's terrorism -- a man in a civilian vehicle killing himself at a checkpoint."


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: 3rdid; alqaeda; ansaralislam; embeddedreport; guerrillatactics; homocidebombings; operationpause; terroristtactics
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To: Geist Krieger
"Question: how do you tell an "innocent" Iraqi civilian, from and "non-innocent" Iraqi civilian?"

Answer: On 9/11/2001 the terms of the war were given: women and children are not safe from deliberate attack; there are no innocents, no civilians, no non-combatants. None. Not one.

Every citizen of a terror-supporting state must be considered a combatant and dealt with as such.

You are welcome.

--Boris

41 posted on 03/29/2003 8:26:38 AM PST by boris (Education is always painful; pain is always educational)
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To: Right Brother
>What are we bombing? The same places over and over?

If we are bombing the same place over and over it is because they are digging out a bunker. The bunker busters can be dropped within one meter so that they can dig out a bunker over a period of time.

42 posted on 03/29/2003 8:59:22 AM PST by Dialup Llama
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To: RJCogburn
IF this is true, and I am SURE it is, we MUST change tactics. I see many many more of our troops dying like this IF we don't. To hell with the media, to hell with world opinion.
43 posted on 03/29/2003 9:02:29 AM PST by PISANO
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To: The Ghost of Richard Nixon
Islam must be destroyed as a religio-political philosophy

The destruction of a philosophy is done with something other than force.

44 posted on 03/29/2003 10:16:32 AM PST by RJCogburn (Yes, it is pretty bold talk....)
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To: Geist Krieger
Well, Spirit Warrior, it looks like we got a real problem on our hands now. I hope you are right that these guys are mostly homicidal, not suicidal and they will soon run out of warriors of their own.
45 posted on 03/29/2003 10:46:02 AM PST by nathanbedford
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To: goldstategop
NYT idiots. Not Guerilla but rather terrorist tactics. One would think the NYT was smart enough to figure out the difference between the two.

The NYT makes this distinction because to do otherwise would be to admit that the Palestinians, who use the same tactic, are terrorists.  The policy of the NYT is that Israel should surrender herself up to Arafat and commit national suicide.  Ergo, Palis are victims, not terrorists.
46 posted on 03/29/2003 11:01:06 AM PST by gcruse (If they truly are God's laws, he can enforce them himself.)
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