Baghdad water supply secured

News 24 ^ | April 12, 2003 | News24

[FairOpinion]

Geneva - Baghdad's main water supply station, threatened by looters, has been secured by US forces, a spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Saturday.

The spokesperson, Antonella Notari, also said the capital's Medical City hospital complex was partly under the control of US forces.

"These are very concrete, very useful measures, but the entire infrastructure serving the civilian population also has to be secured," she told AFP.

The ICRC on Friday urged the occupying US and British forces to re-establish order in the areas under their control, as looters went on the rampage after Saddam Hussein's authority crumbled, hampering aid and medical efforts.

Notari said the reigning "chaos had created huge difficulties in hospital services and a threat to installations including those providing water."

Calling it a "very positive" development, she said Iraqi water and hygiene authorities had held a meeting late Friday with the US forces' Civil Affairs Unit at the ICRC offices in Baghdad.

"Immediately after the meeting, urgent steps were taken to secure Baghdad's large water supply station, which was under threat from a band of armed looters.

"The coalition forces managed to prevent them from attacking," she said.

The Medical City complex, which stayed partly operational while other hospitals were ransacked by looters and forced to shut down, has now also been partly "secured" by US forces, Notari said.

The four-hospital complex, which has thousands of beds, has been deprived of clean water and was relying on a few back-up generators for partial electricity supply.

Medical City "has already suffered considerable damage from looting on Thursday and Friday. It will need emergency repairs, new equipment and a new system for transporting patients," Notari said.

In the southern city of Basra, Notari said the situation was less chaotic, thanks in part to steps taken by British forces, the population itself and initiatives by local imams.

The ICRC team visited several hospitals in Basra which appeared to be working, although water supply remained the greatest concern for the city, after looters pulled up water pipes.

[FairOpinion]

Order IS being restored.

Just as some were shrieking 'quagmire" after about 10 days, the same were talking about nothing but the looting, when it was taking place for a couple of days.

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[RightWhale]

talking about nothing but the looting

Big problem. Not just some overenthusiastic souvenir hunters, professional looters were ripping off important and expensive publically-owned items. The citizens of Bagdad are soon going to take control of their own city's infrastructure, and they won't be kind to looters. Everything shall be returned.

[FairOpinion]

I think there were two kinds of "looters":
-- some were just ordinary citizens, who took home a couch or chair, and so one peacefully from government buildings, to get "something". These, while providing "good TV", they aren't dangerous or bad people.

-- the second type of looters are the "professional" looters, the criminal element, who used the lack of law to loot from hospitals, museums and so on.

The Iraqi people are already restoring order.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/891909/posts

[ExSES]

In the southern city of Basra, Notari said the situation was less chaotic, thanks in part to steps taken by British forces, the population itself and initiatives by local imams.

Gee..., since things seem to be going well..., let's give the Brits a "Break" and just bash the U.S.!

Anyone out there with half a brain should remember that Basra's "Liberation" came a while before Baghdad's "Liberation"!

In addition, the larger the population center..., the less social cohesion... (Remember the LA Riots? Remember the extensive looting and chaos in the South Florida area following Hurricane Andrew?...).

[Dog Gone]

If we had secured the museums first, and then thought about the water supply, the critics would be rightfully upset.

[geedee]

"The sky is falling" feel-gooders, you know those who blame America first, last, and always -- known in the U.S. as Democrats and/or liberals and known everywhere else as the French whether they have any French blood or not -- have to project one catastrophe after another so long as a Republican sits in the White House. 99% of the Earth's inhabitants have a terminal case of the teenie-weenie complex and the only way they can feel good about themselves is to sling mud at us "war-mongering" Americans.

But they'd do well to be careful, very careful. There's a new Sheriff in town and he doesn't suffer fools easily.

[DannyTN]

"Baghdad's main water supply station, threatened by looters..."

How do you loot a water supply??? "I need this 2 foot diameter pipe at my shack to grow vegetables in!!!"

I have a suspicision that a lot of the looters are Saddam's crowd, just trying to run up the cost to America of reconstruction.

[FairOpinion]

"I have a suspicion that a lot of the looters are Saddam's crowd, just trying to run up the cost to America of reconstruction. "
---

EXCELLENT point and observation. Funny, I haven't heard anyone else even raise this possibility.

I think you are right, these are not "looters" but saboteurs, trying to sabotage us and make the US look bad, as well as get revenge on the Iraqi people for not resisting the US and being happy about Saddam's regime's demise. After all, we actually captured some foreign nationals ( Syria, Egypt, etc.) who were imported by Saddam to wage guerilla warfare against us.

And Al Qaeda said they will wage guerilla warfare against us in Iraq.

I think you just turned on the light!

[FairOpinion]

Here is the AQ statement --and sabotage would be part of it, blaming it on the Iraqi people and make it harder for the US to establish a new regime.

http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD49303


"We expected that the method of defense of regular or semi-regular [forces] would collapse, and it would be impossible to withstand. From the beginning of this series of articles, we have focused on the modus operandi of guerilla warfare. This is the most powerful weapon Muslims have, and it is the best method to continue the conflict with the Crusader enemy who has stripped the nation of all the meanings of [military] might, and there is no chance that in the years to come we will be allowed to possess the elements of strength. Thus, the best method of struggle for the weak against the strong is guerilla warfare."

"With guerilla warfare, the Americans were defeated in Vietnam and the Soviets were defeated in Afghanistan. This is the method that expelled the direct Crusader colonialism from most of the Muslim lands, with Algeria the most well known. We still see how this method stopped Jewish immigration to Palestine, and caused reverse immigration of Jews from Palestine. The successful attempts of dealing defeat to invaders using guerilla warfare are many, and we will not expound on them. However, these attempts have proven that the most effective method for the materially weak against the strong is guerilla warfare…

[Techster]

I too believe there may be a considerable amount of Saddam's crowd involved in the more malicious looting.

[CedarDave]

If we had secured the museums first, and then thought about the water supply, the critics would be rightfully upset.

Oh, but don't you know we are the bad guys for not securing the museums. ABC news just said so (sort of) by interviewing the archeological director who lamented "where were the Americans" and ABC also noted that the US military was "warned" nine-months ago about the importance of that collection. Blah, blah, blah.

IMHO, the museum looters were the criminal element who recognized the monetary value of the relics and will either smuggle them out of the country for private collectors or hold them for ransom from a new Iraqi government.

[katana]

The Brits have done a good job, but they've been there for more than a week longer than the US forces in Baghdad, a city that is more than three times bigger with a more diverse population. The UK in Basra has, however, set a good example to follow and where applicable I'm confident we will.

[Dog Gone]

I took a lot of crap on a different thread for pointing out that protecting pottery was not our highest priority when American soldiers are still being shot elsewhere.

Most of this stuff has been looted dozens of times by dozens of civilizations. Most of it will turn back up. It ain't food.