Title: War on Terror: IRAQ
Description: News, updates
Description: News, updates
Iron Dragon - July 9, 2004 10:55 AM (GMT)
US military launch probe into mystery of marine's disappearance
BAGHDAD (AFP) Jul 09, 2004
The US military said Friday it was investigating what happened to a Lebanese-born marine who went missing in Iraq and was once feared to have been beheaded by his captors before resurfacing safely.
The State Department announced late Thursday that Marine Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun, 24, was at the US embassy in Beirut after making contact with US authorities to arrange a time to meet earlier in the day.
Hassoun was last seen on June 19 at a US military camp outside the insurgent bastion of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, and was reported missing a day later, the military said.
Following an initial inquiry, Hassoun was listed as a deserter but his status was changed to captured after a video was broadcast a week later showing a marine being held hostage by masked gunmen, the military said.
"The circumstances regarding his whereabouts between 19 June and 8 July are under investigation by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service."
On Monday, a statement attributed to the Islamic Retaliation Movement -- Armed Resistance Wing and read on Al-Jazeera television said Hassoun was safe and had been released. Another armed group on Saturday had made a subsequently discredited statement that he had been beheaded.
His presumed captors had said the marine had been set free because he had promised to take off his uniform. "Hassoun promised not to go back to the US army," their statement said.
Born in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli before emigrating to the United States, Hassoun, who is married and has no children, had served as an interpreter.
Link
BAGHDAD (AFP) Jul 09, 2004
The US military said Friday it was investigating what happened to a Lebanese-born marine who went missing in Iraq and was once feared to have been beheaded by his captors before resurfacing safely.
The State Department announced late Thursday that Marine Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun, 24, was at the US embassy in Beirut after making contact with US authorities to arrange a time to meet earlier in the day.
Hassoun was last seen on June 19 at a US military camp outside the insurgent bastion of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, and was reported missing a day later, the military said.
Following an initial inquiry, Hassoun was listed as a deserter but his status was changed to captured after a video was broadcast a week later showing a marine being held hostage by masked gunmen, the military said.
"The circumstances regarding his whereabouts between 19 June and 8 July are under investigation by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service."
On Monday, a statement attributed to the Islamic Retaliation Movement -- Armed Resistance Wing and read on Al-Jazeera television said Hassoun was safe and had been released. Another armed group on Saturday had made a subsequently discredited statement that he had been beheaded.
His presumed captors had said the marine had been set free because he had promised to take off his uniform. "Hassoun promised not to go back to the US army," their statement said.
Born in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli before emigrating to the United States, Hassoun, who is married and has no children, had served as an interpreter.
Link
AWOL Geek - July 9, 2004 01:27 PM (GMT)
That marine defected, he got shell shocked and couldn't hack it no longer as a US marine. :blink:
Duminus - July 10, 2004 03:45 AM (GMT)
There's talk that the marine wasn't kidnapped. He went out of the base on his own to go to Lebanon, his homeland. either he wanted to desert or he just wanted to visit his family.
Numbers - July 10, 2004 09:45 AM (GMT)
the terrs who kidnapped him are claiming that they set him free because he promised to desert the USMC and just go home... <_<
Numbers - July 11, 2004 06:39 AM (GMT)
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Four U.S. Marines were killed while conducting security operations in an area of western Iraq that has been a hotbed of anti-American resistance, the U.S. command said Sunday.
The Marines were killed Saturday in Anbar, a Sunni-dominated area west of the Iraqi capital that includes the cities of Fallujah, Ramadi and Qaim on the Syrian border.
They were assigned to the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force.
The military withheld the names of the slain Marines pending notification of their families.
More than 875 service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq last year, according to the U.S. Defense Department.
Link
The Marines were killed Saturday in Anbar, a Sunni-dominated area west of the Iraqi capital that includes the cities of Fallujah, Ramadi and Qaim on the Syrian border.
They were assigned to the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force.
The military withheld the names of the slain Marines pending notification of their families.
More than 875 service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq last year, according to the U.S. Defense Department.
Link
Numbers - July 13, 2004 03:29 AM (GMT)
Story
OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (AP) - Invading Iraq made America safer, President Bush said Monday, defending his war decision in the face of a Senate report debunking White House justifications for attacking Saddam Hussein's government.
Bush presented his case in a speech at Oak Ridge National Laboratory while Condoleezza Rice, his national security adviser, was made available for cable television interviews to defend the administration's decisions.
It was Bush's ninth trip to Tennessee, a state he won from Al Gore in 2000 and wants to win again in November. If listeners missed Bush's political message, they needed only to look at the red-white-and-blue sign posted behind the podium that read: "Protecting America." Underscoring his message, Bush said eight times in his speech that America was safer.
Three days ago, the Senate Intelligence Committee said the administration's belief that Saddam had chemical and biological weapons and was working to make nuclear weapons was wrong, based on false or overstated CIA analyses.
"Although we have not found stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, we were right to go into Iraq," Bush told lab employees assembled in an auditorium. "We removed a declared enemy of America who had the capability of producing weapons of mass murder and could have passed that capability to terrorists bent on acquiring them. In the world after September the 11th, that was a risk we could not afford to take."
It was Bush's first public reaction to the Senate panel's criticism
OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (AP) - Invading Iraq made America safer, President Bush said Monday, defending his war decision in the face of a Senate report debunking White House justifications for attacking Saddam Hussein's government.
Bush presented his case in a speech at Oak Ridge National Laboratory while Condoleezza Rice, his national security adviser, was made available for cable television interviews to defend the administration's decisions.
It was Bush's ninth trip to Tennessee, a state he won from Al Gore in 2000 and wants to win again in November. If listeners missed Bush's political message, they needed only to look at the red-white-and-blue sign posted behind the podium that read: "Protecting America." Underscoring his message, Bush said eight times in his speech that America was safer.
Three days ago, the Senate Intelligence Committee said the administration's belief that Saddam had chemical and biological weapons and was working to make nuclear weapons was wrong, based on false or overstated CIA analyses.
"Although we have not found stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, we were right to go into Iraq," Bush told lab employees assembled in an auditorium. "We removed a declared enemy of America who had the capability of producing weapons of mass murder and could have passed that capability to terrorists bent on acquiring them. In the world after September the 11th, that was a risk we could not afford to take."
It was Bush's first public reaction to the Senate panel's criticism
Isnayper - July 13, 2004 05:23 AM (GMT)
nadamay tuloy tayo sa giyerang ito wala naman palang wmd sa iraq
Switik - July 13, 2004 01:40 PM (GMT)
Fight for Ramadi exacts heavy toll on Marines
By Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY
RAMADI, Iraq — In this violent city where more Marines have died than anywhere else in Iraq, one was thought to be blessed with good fortune.
On April 6, Lance Cpl. Deshon Otey, 24, of Hardin, Ky., was the sole survivor of an attack on his Humvee that killed seven of his comrades in Echo Company. His only wounds were nightmares, Otey said later. "I always see these guys with turbans. They come up and just start slaughtering all of us," he said.
A few weeks ago, Otey and three other Marines manning a sniper post died in circumstances that cruelly mirrored his dream.
The Iraqi insurgency has never been more deadly than when it fought Marines in this city April 6. That fighting, all but overlooked in the swirl of violent events that month, may have been the most harrowing street combat since 1993, when U.S. soldiers were nearly overrun and 19 were killed in fighting that stunned America and led to the Clinton administration pulling forces out of Somalia.
In Ramadi, the Marines killed scores of fighters and prevailed. But a dozen Marines were killed and 25 wounded. At four different locations on April 6, Marines were ambushed in coordinated guerrilla attacks that showed a precision and skill never before seen in Iraq. (Related story: The most dangerous city in Iraq)
After learning so many of his fellow Marines had died, "I was in a state of denial," says Cpl. Travis Friedrichsen, 21, of Denison, Iowa. "I kept saying, 'What do you mean they're gone?' Because I had never heard of that many people getting lost in just one day."
Unlike fighting in April in Fallujah, 30 miles to the east, and in cities in southern Iraq where U.S. Marines and soldiers battled resistance fighters, the Marines were on the defensive in Ramadi.
"They had some moxie," says Capt. Kelly Royer, 36, of Orangeville, Calif., commander of Echo Company, which lost 10 men that day, including eight in one ambush. "They hit us in the far west, in the north of our AO (area of operation) and in the far southeast. ... Where did this organization come from? Were they always here? Did they come from outside Ramadi?"
The Marines learned later that in setting up the ambush that left eight Marines dead, insurgents warned away local residents that morning by telling them, "Today we are going to kill Americans."
In a letter to Marine families in April, the commander of the 1,000-man 2nd Battalion of the 4th Marine Regiment, Lt. Col. Paul Kennedy, said fighting in Ramadi was the hardest "this battalion faced in over 30 years. Within the blink of an eye, the situation went from relatively calm to a raging storm."
Golf Company
The battle began at midmorning when Marine patrols fanned out across Ramadi to provide security, meet and greet people and search for roadside bombs.
Three squads of Golf Company's 3rd Platoon set off on separate routes. They worked their way west from a base called Combat Outpost, headed to the government center, 2 miles away, where they would link up and stand guard.
Platoon Staff Sgt. Damien Rodriguez, 27, of Menifee, Calif., led a squad of 12 men. They moved on foot into the densely packed neighborhoods on the south side of town. That's when insurgents ambushed another squad northwest of their position. Rodriguez and his men came under fire as they raced through the streets to flank the attackers.
"All hell broke loose," he recalls. "They were all over these roofs shooting down."
Marines took up positions and began returning fire as Rodriguez led others into nearby buildings to clear out insurgents. Rebels manning machine guns began to fire from down the street.
"There's probably about 45 guys that hit us," Rodriguez says. "But after that, it just seemed like everybody in the neighborhood who had an AK-47, which almost all do, was shooting out their windows."
As the Marines radioed for assistance, they could see small groups of insurgents armed with AK-47s or rocket-propelled-grenade launchers moving to flank them. Ambulances and taxis dropped off rebel reinforcements and picked up dead or wounded.
Three Marines peeled off to attack fighters down the street. One of them, 6-foot-5 Pfc. Deryk Hallal, 24, of Indianapolis was struck in the right thigh by a bullet. Rodriguez sent two more Marines and a Navy corpsman to assist.
That's when things began to fall apart. "We started to lose the initiative," Rodriguez says.
As Marines began to carry the wounded Hallal into an alleyway, a bullet struck him in the back of the head. They could do little more than administer morphine and say a prayer as Hallal died in the street.
They had been fighting for 90 minutes. Another half hour would pass before a relief force fought through the streets to reach them. "We just kept throwing more Marines into the fight and just kept pushing and pushing and pushing," says Capt. Christopher Bronzi, 30, of Poughquag, N.Y., Golf Company Commander.
Pfc. Moises "Moy" Langhorst, 19, of Moose Lake, Minn., also was killed in the battle. He was found dead around a street corner, his weapon gone.
Echo Company
The sound of battle reached a four-man Marine sniper team from Echo Company more than a mile away where they lay in tall grass near the Euphrates River. Sgt. Romeo Santiago, 26, of Phoenix was joking about how bored they were watching for anyone trying to plant bombs.
Suddenly, 14 Iraqis armed with AK-47s and rocket-propelled-grenade launchers began moving toward them. The militants were in a straight-line formation. The four snipers, their backs to the river, had never seen anything like it.
"I told them (on the radio) we got beaucoup bad guys coming toward us," Santiago recalls.
A mile downriver, along the same road, 1st Lt. Vincent Valdes, 31, of Pasadena, Calif., and two squads of Marines were waiting for explosives experts to dispose of three mortar rounds they had found buried in the road.
When word arrived of the attack on Santiago's sniper team, Valdes took a squad of 10 Marines in the squad's only Humvee and barreled down the road to the rescue. They drove into a firefight.
Valdes' men poured out of the Humvee. With the Marine snipers, they charged across the road driving back the insurgents. Machine guns in nearby houses opened up, followed by mortar fire.
Pfc. Benjamin Carman, 20, of Jefferson, Iowa, lay dying from a shoulder wound. Cpl. Marcus Cherry, 18, of Imperial Calif., engaged to be married on Nov. 20, was struck in the face and killed instantly.
"They were biding their time," Valdes says of the rebels. "Waiting for the right time to strike."
The 10-man squad Valdes had left behind was now under attack. Eight were driven into a house. Insurgents lobbed hand grenades on the roof. One explosion took out Lance Cpl. Roy Thomas' left eye. The 21-year-old from Mount Pleasant, Miss., took a digital camera from his pocket and handed it to Lance Cpl. Chris MacIntosh, 22, of Scituate, Mass. Thomas asked MacIntosh to take a picture as a souvenir. "He looks at it and says, 'Holy (expletive)', " MacIntosh recalls.
Relief was still hours away.
As if on a signal, insurgents on rooftops and others at a T-intersection ahead began to fire.
Marines down the road could see Pfc. Ryan Jerabek, 18, of Oneida, Wis., firing the Humvee's machine gun. Struck several times, he literally went down fighting.
Otey jumped out of the Humvee and sprinted to the next nearest vehicle full of Marines. "I'm running as fast as I could," he recalled later. Bullets whizzing by him somehow missed.
All the others in his vehicle and another Marine farther back in the column died.
The insurgents had sealed off the ambush site. The group Otey reached remained pin down in a building for hours, unable to move before rescue arrived.
Otey said, "We never felt so much fear and anger at one time."
Marines killed an estimated 250 rebels on April 6, 7 and 10 in fighting that eventually shattered the enemy offensive. But Marines are still being threatened by snipers, rockets and roadside bombs. Otey was killed six weeks later. Another veteran of the fight, Sgt. Kenneth Conde, 23, of Orlando died in a roadside bomb blast last week. Combat in Ramadi goes on.
USA Today
By Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY
RAMADI, Iraq — In this violent city where more Marines have died than anywhere else in Iraq, one was thought to be blessed with good fortune.
On April 6, Lance Cpl. Deshon Otey, 24, of Hardin, Ky., was the sole survivor of an attack on his Humvee that killed seven of his comrades in Echo Company. His only wounds were nightmares, Otey said later. "I always see these guys with turbans. They come up and just start slaughtering all of us," he said.
A few weeks ago, Otey and three other Marines manning a sniper post died in circumstances that cruelly mirrored his dream.
The Iraqi insurgency has never been more deadly than when it fought Marines in this city April 6. That fighting, all but overlooked in the swirl of violent events that month, may have been the most harrowing street combat since 1993, when U.S. soldiers were nearly overrun and 19 were killed in fighting that stunned America and led to the Clinton administration pulling forces out of Somalia.
In Ramadi, the Marines killed scores of fighters and prevailed. But a dozen Marines were killed and 25 wounded. At four different locations on April 6, Marines were ambushed in coordinated guerrilla attacks that showed a precision and skill never before seen in Iraq. (Related story: The most dangerous city in Iraq)
After learning so many of his fellow Marines had died, "I was in a state of denial," says Cpl. Travis Friedrichsen, 21, of Denison, Iowa. "I kept saying, 'What do you mean they're gone?' Because I had never heard of that many people getting lost in just one day."
Unlike fighting in April in Fallujah, 30 miles to the east, and in cities in southern Iraq where U.S. Marines and soldiers battled resistance fighters, the Marines were on the defensive in Ramadi.
"They had some moxie," says Capt. Kelly Royer, 36, of Orangeville, Calif., commander of Echo Company, which lost 10 men that day, including eight in one ambush. "They hit us in the far west, in the north of our AO (area of operation) and in the far southeast. ... Where did this organization come from? Were they always here? Did they come from outside Ramadi?"
The Marines learned later that in setting up the ambush that left eight Marines dead, insurgents warned away local residents that morning by telling them, "Today we are going to kill Americans."
In a letter to Marine families in April, the commander of the 1,000-man 2nd Battalion of the 4th Marine Regiment, Lt. Col. Paul Kennedy, said fighting in Ramadi was the hardest "this battalion faced in over 30 years. Within the blink of an eye, the situation went from relatively calm to a raging storm."
Golf Company
The battle began at midmorning when Marine patrols fanned out across Ramadi to provide security, meet and greet people and search for roadside bombs.
Three squads of Golf Company's 3rd Platoon set off on separate routes. They worked their way west from a base called Combat Outpost, headed to the government center, 2 miles away, where they would link up and stand guard.
Platoon Staff Sgt. Damien Rodriguez, 27, of Menifee, Calif., led a squad of 12 men. They moved on foot into the densely packed neighborhoods on the south side of town. That's when insurgents ambushed another squad northwest of their position. Rodriguez and his men came under fire as they raced through the streets to flank the attackers.
"All hell broke loose," he recalls. "They were all over these roofs shooting down."
Marines took up positions and began returning fire as Rodriguez led others into nearby buildings to clear out insurgents. Rebels manning machine guns began to fire from down the street.
"There's probably about 45 guys that hit us," Rodriguez says. "But after that, it just seemed like everybody in the neighborhood who had an AK-47, which almost all do, was shooting out their windows."
As the Marines radioed for assistance, they could see small groups of insurgents armed with AK-47s or rocket-propelled-grenade launchers moving to flank them. Ambulances and taxis dropped off rebel reinforcements and picked up dead or wounded.
Three Marines peeled off to attack fighters down the street. One of them, 6-foot-5 Pfc. Deryk Hallal, 24, of Indianapolis was struck in the right thigh by a bullet. Rodriguez sent two more Marines and a Navy corpsman to assist.
That's when things began to fall apart. "We started to lose the initiative," Rodriguez says.
As Marines began to carry the wounded Hallal into an alleyway, a bullet struck him in the back of the head. They could do little more than administer morphine and say a prayer as Hallal died in the street.
They had been fighting for 90 minutes. Another half hour would pass before a relief force fought through the streets to reach them. "We just kept throwing more Marines into the fight and just kept pushing and pushing and pushing," says Capt. Christopher Bronzi, 30, of Poughquag, N.Y., Golf Company Commander.
Pfc. Moises "Moy" Langhorst, 19, of Moose Lake, Minn., also was killed in the battle. He was found dead around a street corner, his weapon gone.
Echo Company
The sound of battle reached a four-man Marine sniper team from Echo Company more than a mile away where they lay in tall grass near the Euphrates River. Sgt. Romeo Santiago, 26, of Phoenix was joking about how bored they were watching for anyone trying to plant bombs.
Suddenly, 14 Iraqis armed with AK-47s and rocket-propelled-grenade launchers began moving toward them. The militants were in a straight-line formation. The four snipers, their backs to the river, had never seen anything like it.
"I told them (on the radio) we got beaucoup bad guys coming toward us," Santiago recalls.
A mile downriver, along the same road, 1st Lt. Vincent Valdes, 31, of Pasadena, Calif., and two squads of Marines were waiting for explosives experts to dispose of three mortar rounds they had found buried in the road.
When word arrived of the attack on Santiago's sniper team, Valdes took a squad of 10 Marines in the squad's only Humvee and barreled down the road to the rescue. They drove into a firefight.
Valdes' men poured out of the Humvee. With the Marine snipers, they charged across the road driving back the insurgents. Machine guns in nearby houses opened up, followed by mortar fire.
Pfc. Benjamin Carman, 20, of Jefferson, Iowa, lay dying from a shoulder wound. Cpl. Marcus Cherry, 18, of Imperial Calif., engaged to be married on Nov. 20, was struck in the face and killed instantly.
"They were biding their time," Valdes says of the rebels. "Waiting for the right time to strike."
The 10-man squad Valdes had left behind was now under attack. Eight were driven into a house. Insurgents lobbed hand grenades on the roof. One explosion took out Lance Cpl. Roy Thomas' left eye. The 21-year-old from Mount Pleasant, Miss., took a digital camera from his pocket and handed it to Lance Cpl. Chris MacIntosh, 22, of Scituate, Mass. Thomas asked MacIntosh to take a picture as a souvenir. "He looks at it and says, 'Holy (expletive)', " MacIntosh recalls.
Relief was still hours away.
As if on a signal, insurgents on rooftops and others at a T-intersection ahead began to fire.
Marines down the road could see Pfc. Ryan Jerabek, 18, of Oneida, Wis., firing the Humvee's machine gun. Struck several times, he literally went down fighting.
Otey jumped out of the Humvee and sprinted to the next nearest vehicle full of Marines. "I'm running as fast as I could," he recalled later. Bullets whizzing by him somehow missed.
All the others in his vehicle and another Marine farther back in the column died.
The insurgents had sealed off the ambush site. The group Otey reached remained pin down in a building for hours, unable to move before rescue arrived.
Otey said, "We never felt so much fear and anger at one time."
Marines killed an estimated 250 rebels on April 6, 7 and 10 in fighting that eventually shattered the enemy offensive. But Marines are still being threatened by snipers, rockets and roadside bombs. Otey was killed six weeks later. Another veteran of the fight, Sgt. Kenneth Conde, 23, of Orlando died in a roadside bomb blast last week. Combat in Ramadi goes on.
USA Today
Duminus - July 14, 2004 02:41 AM (GMT)
| QUOTE |
| The 10-man squad Valdes had left behind was now under attack. Eight were driven into a house. Insurgents lobbed hand grenades on the roof. One explosion took out Lance Cpl. Roy Thomas' left eye. The 21-year-old from Mount Pleasant, Miss., took a digital camera from his pocket and handed it to Lance Cpl. Chris MacIntosh, 22, of Scituate, Mass. Thomas asked MacIntosh to take a picture as a souvenir. "He looks at it and says, 'Holy (expletive)', " MacIntosh recalls. |
Balls of steel -- B)
Singa Lion - July 14, 2004 12:48 PM (GMT)
wow terrific firefight do you believe the marines killed that many rebel iraqis? :scared:
Alamid - July 30, 2004 06:26 AM (GMT)
Novinite News
DNA tests are being conducted to verify identity...
Politics: 29 July 2004, Thursday.
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, head of the group suspected of beheading two Bulgarian hostages, has reportedly been arrested in Western Iraq.
Al-Zarqawi has been arrested by Iraqi police and US military close to the border with Syria, Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported, citing information posted on the Internet.
Zarqawi was dressed in a white T-shirt and blue jeans. Reports claim that he didn't oppose the arrest.
A blood sample has been sent to Baghdad for DNA tests.
A group linked to Zarqawi is suspected of carrying out a wave of attacks in late June that killed more than 100 people and injured hundreds more in attacks in five Iraqi cities.
Zarqawi is also said to have been involved in the beheading of an American contractor, Nick Berg, shown on a video released on 11 May.
In 2003, he was named as the brains behind a series of lethal bombings - from Casablanca in Morocco to Istanbul in Turkey.
The US is now offering a USD 25 M reward for the capture of Zarqawi, the "wild card" in its pack of wanted men.
The remains of one of the Bulgarian hostages, Georgi Lazov, killed by the Zarqawi's terrorists have been transported back home early on Thursday.
The 30-year old Bulgarian truck driver Lazov and his colleague Ivaylo Kepov, 32, were abducted June 29 near the northern city of Mosul. A group affiliated with al-Zarqawi said it kidnapped the Bulgarians and demanded Iraqi detainees be released in exchange for their lives. The group later sent a tape to Al-Jazeera television that showed Lazov being killed. His death was officially confirmed July 22.
Kepov's fate is still not clear though Bulgarian media cited an Iraqi official who said that the Bulgarian is dead and his body has been found. Bulgaria's authorities have not been able to confirm Kepov's death.
DNA tests are being conducted to verify identity...
Politics: 29 July 2004, Thursday.
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, head of the group suspected of beheading two Bulgarian hostages, has reportedly been arrested in Western Iraq.
Al-Zarqawi has been arrested by Iraqi police and US military close to the border with Syria, Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported, citing information posted on the Internet.
Zarqawi was dressed in a white T-shirt and blue jeans. Reports claim that he didn't oppose the arrest.
A blood sample has been sent to Baghdad for DNA tests.
A group linked to Zarqawi is suspected of carrying out a wave of attacks in late June that killed more than 100 people and injured hundreds more in attacks in five Iraqi cities.
Zarqawi is also said to have been involved in the beheading of an American contractor, Nick Berg, shown on a video released on 11 May.
In 2003, he was named as the brains behind a series of lethal bombings - from Casablanca in Morocco to Istanbul in Turkey.
The US is now offering a USD 25 M reward for the capture of Zarqawi, the "wild card" in its pack of wanted men.
The remains of one of the Bulgarian hostages, Georgi Lazov, killed by the Zarqawi's terrorists have been transported back home early on Thursday.
The 30-year old Bulgarian truck driver Lazov and his colleague Ivaylo Kepov, 32, were abducted June 29 near the northern city of Mosul. A group affiliated with al-Zarqawi said it kidnapped the Bulgarians and demanded Iraqi detainees be released in exchange for their lives. The group later sent a tape to Al-Jazeera television that showed Lazov being killed. His death was officially confirmed July 22.
Kepov's fate is still not clear though Bulgarian media cited an Iraqi official who said that the Bulgarian is dead and his body has been found. Bulgaria's authorities have not been able to confirm Kepov's death.
FrodoFrog - July 30, 2004 07:26 AM (GMT)
Zarqawi should be beheade too - in public and broadcasted worldwide.
Boombanger - July 30, 2004 09:18 AM (GMT)
| QUOTE (FrodoFrog @ Jul 30 2004, 03:26 PM) |
| Zarqawi should be beheade too - in public and broadcasted worldwide. |
:agree:
and every terrorist captured after him!
Alamid - July 31, 2004 04:37 AM (GMT)
Novinite gave us a big boboo guys, I'm sorry :redface:
US denies Zarqawi captured
BAGHDAD, June 28: The US military denied reports on Monday that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant who Washington says is allied to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, had been captured in Iraq.
"It's not true, the reports are not true," Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, deputy director of operations for the US military in Iraq, told Reuters. "We've heard the reports about it, but they are not true."
Earlier, reports on a US-funded Iraqi radio station had suggested Zarqawi had been captured near the town of Hilla. -Reuters
Reuters
US denies Zarqawi captured
BAGHDAD, June 28: The US military denied reports on Monday that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant who Washington says is allied to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, had been captured in Iraq.
"It's not true, the reports are not true," Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, deputy director of operations for the US military in Iraq, told Reuters. "We've heard the reports about it, but they are not true."
Earlier, reports on a US-funded Iraqi radio station had suggested Zarqawi had been captured near the town of Hilla. -Reuters
Reuters
Gofart Demon - August 1, 2004 07:44 AM (GMT)
US Marine aviator killed
With his close-cropped dark hair, Lieutenant Colonel David S. Greene could have been on a Marine advertisement poster, a friend said.
''He was a great American, and a good-looking, handsome Marine," said Major Randy Parker, a spokesman for Greene's Marine Corps Reserve training detachment in Johnstown, Pa. ''He was a roll-up-your-sleeves, accomplish-the-mission kind of officer."
Greene, a career Marine and the father of two young children, was killed in Iraq Wednesday by enemy gunfire, the Pentagon said.
The 39-year-old helicopter pilot is among the Marines's highest-ranking officers to die since the US-led coalition invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
Small-arms fire from the ground killed Greene as he and another pilot were flying a Cobra helicopter in the Al Anbar Province in western Iraq, Parker said.
''This guy was a star, and he's going to be sorely missed," said Parker, who had served with Greene since 1989.
The copilot who landed the helicopter was not injured, Parker said. No information was available about what type of mission they were on.
Greene's military career began when he was young. He grew up in upstate New York, Parker said, and went to US Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. There, he studied physical science and played rugby from 1982 to 1986, said Laura Kurz, spokeswoman for the academy.
Greene flew Huey and Cobra helicopters in the North Carolina Area Marine Corps and worked as an air traffic controller until 1997 in the Mediterranean, and Indian oceans, as well as in Somalia, the Persian Gulf, and Kuwait shortly after Desert Storm, Parker said.
Greene later enrolled in the Marine Corps Reserve as a drill reservist. He was called for active duty in January and deployed to Iraq, Parker said.
Outside the Marines, Greene -- an affable man who wasn't afraid to crack a joke -- worked for Goodrich Corp. doing diagnostics work in its Vergennes, Vt., office. But more than that, Greene enjoyed spending time with his wife and children, said Goodrich co-worker Kip Freeman.
''He was a family man," Freeman said. ''He did the typical things: playing ball, taking them out hiking. And he loved being a Marine, loved flying his Cobras."
''Dave was not only a colleague to us -- he was truly a friend," Harry Arnold, president of Goodrich's fuel and utility systems division, said in a statement. ''His love for his family and our country will stay with us all."
Greene's wife, Sarah, could not be reached at the couple's Shelburne, Vt., home. She and the rest of the family are ''understandably devastated," Parker said.
Boston.com
:demon:
With his close-cropped dark hair, Lieutenant Colonel David S. Greene could have been on a Marine advertisement poster, a friend said.
''He was a great American, and a good-looking, handsome Marine," said Major Randy Parker, a spokesman for Greene's Marine Corps Reserve training detachment in Johnstown, Pa. ''He was a roll-up-your-sleeves, accomplish-the-mission kind of officer."
Greene, a career Marine and the father of two young children, was killed in Iraq Wednesday by enemy gunfire, the Pentagon said.
The 39-year-old helicopter pilot is among the Marines's highest-ranking officers to die since the US-led coalition invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
Small-arms fire from the ground killed Greene as he and another pilot were flying a Cobra helicopter in the Al Anbar Province in western Iraq, Parker said.
''This guy was a star, and he's going to be sorely missed," said Parker, who had served with Greene since 1989.
The copilot who landed the helicopter was not injured, Parker said. No information was available about what type of mission they were on.
Greene's military career began when he was young. He grew up in upstate New York, Parker said, and went to US Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. There, he studied physical science and played rugby from 1982 to 1986, said Laura Kurz, spokeswoman for the academy.
Greene flew Huey and Cobra helicopters in the North Carolina Area Marine Corps and worked as an air traffic controller until 1997 in the Mediterranean, and Indian oceans, as well as in Somalia, the Persian Gulf, and Kuwait shortly after Desert Storm, Parker said.
Greene later enrolled in the Marine Corps Reserve as a drill reservist. He was called for active duty in January and deployed to Iraq, Parker said.
Outside the Marines, Greene -- an affable man who wasn't afraid to crack a joke -- worked for Goodrich Corp. doing diagnostics work in its Vergennes, Vt., office. But more than that, Greene enjoyed spending time with his wife and children, said Goodrich co-worker Kip Freeman.
''He was a family man," Freeman said. ''He did the typical things: playing ball, taking them out hiking. And he loved being a Marine, loved flying his Cobras."
''Dave was not only a colleague to us -- he was truly a friend," Harry Arnold, president of Goodrich's fuel and utility systems division, said in a statement. ''His love for his family and our country will stay with us all."
Greene's wife, Sarah, could not be reached at the couple's Shelburne, Vt., home. She and the rest of the family are ''understandably devastated," Parker said.
Boston.com
:demon:
Bb. Makati - August 1, 2004 11:40 AM (GMT)
o kitams, small arms fire lang dedbol na ang pilot , tagos sa plexi ang bala
Duminus - August 2, 2004 01:32 AM (GMT)
Iraqi commandos free Lebanese hostage
BAGHDAD - Iraqi commandos have freed a Lebanese hostage, a Lebanese Foreign Ministry source said Sunday, but there has been no word on another Lebanese seized in a growing wave of kidnappings of foreigners in Iraq.
In a separate hostage standoff, a Kuwaiti company and a top Iraqi mediator dismissed reports that a group of seven foreign truck drivers -- three Indians, three Kenyans and an Egyptian -- had been freed.
"Iraqi commando forces carried out a military operation on the kidnappers of Vlad Damaa and released him half an hour ago," the source said in Beirut on Sunday, declining to give any more details.
Damaa was seized at gunpoint on Friday from a construction concern he runs with a brother that sells prefabricated buildings to U.S. forces in Iraq, his family said.
No comment was available from Iraq's interim government, which is building up its own forces but remains heavily reliant on some 160,000 mostly U.S. foreign troops for security.
The second Lebanese hostage, Antoine Antoun, was seized from his Baghdad dairy along with a Syrian trucker, relatives said.
full story
BAGHDAD - Iraqi commandos have freed a Lebanese hostage, a Lebanese Foreign Ministry source said Sunday, but there has been no word on another Lebanese seized in a growing wave of kidnappings of foreigners in Iraq.
In a separate hostage standoff, a Kuwaiti company and a top Iraqi mediator dismissed reports that a group of seven foreign truck drivers -- three Indians, three Kenyans and an Egyptian -- had been freed.
"Iraqi commando forces carried out a military operation on the kidnappers of Vlad Damaa and released him half an hour ago," the source said in Beirut on Sunday, declining to give any more details.
Damaa was seized at gunpoint on Friday from a construction concern he runs with a brother that sells prefabricated buildings to U.S. forces in Iraq, his family said.
No comment was available from Iraq's interim government, which is building up its own forces but remains heavily reliant on some 160,000 mostly U.S. foreign troops for security.
The second Lebanese hostage, Antoine Antoun, was seized from his Baghdad dairy along with a Syrian trucker, relatives said.
full story
Tormentor - August 2, 2004 03:32 AM (GMT)
lucky shot lang yun :rifle:
Boombanger - August 2, 2004 08:50 AM (GMT)
ack, tough luck for this dude. rip :angel:
Duminus - August 22, 2004 11:42 AM (GMT)
Photo of Bradley penetrated by what is believed to be the new RPG round:
Duminus - August 22, 2004 11:47 AM (GMT)
Bradley spalled...
centurion - August 24, 2004 05:49 AM (GMT)
ouch bullseye - any casualties ??
SharFshuTzeN - August 25, 2004 02:57 AM (GMT)
I saw on tv the other night a footage of an insurgent in Najaf lugging what looks like an "armbrust type" of AT weapon.. could this be from an armbrust hit?
Duminus - August 27, 2004 10:23 AM (GMT)
Luckily, that Bradley had no troops on board when it was hit.
Numbers - August 28, 2004 05:40 AM (GMT)
7N strike?
mission (fuga) - September 1, 2004 07:00 AM (GMT)
What if this Bradley was hit with an AT14 Kornet antitank missile? there are speculations that iraqi insurgents still possess a number of this anti armor weapon.
Duminus - September 2, 2004 06:26 AM (GMT)
Possibly, there was a report sometime in March where at least 2 Abrams of the 3rd Infantry Division were immobilized by Kornet dual-warhead missiles.
dakuykuy - September 7, 2004 01:29 PM (GMT)
US Marines are learning guerilla warfare the hard way :rifle:
7 Marines Killed in Blast Near Fallujah
Seven U.S. Marines were killed on Monday in an apparent suicide attack when a car bomb exploded near their military convoy on the outskirts of Fallujah, the U.S. military reported. The attack, which also killed three Iraqi National Guardsmen, was the deadliest against U.S. troops in four months.
The American casualties were members of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, which is responsible for security in Anbar province, a stronghold for Sunni insurgents west of Baghdad. The names of the dead were withheld until their relatives could be notified.
The bomb detonated as the convoy traveled down a barren stretch of road nine miles from Fallujah, U.S. officials said. Two Humvees were reduced to smoldering wreckage, video footage from the Arab satellite channel al-Arabiya showed. U.S. forces removed the bodies and military helicopters flew in.
"This desperate act of inhumanity will only serve to strengthen our commitment to the Iraqi people," the U.S. military said in a statement. "Our forces will continue to stay the course in order to ensure Iraqi security forces have everything necessary to set the conditions required to foster rule of law and revitalization in Iraq
full story
7 Marines Killed in Blast Near Fallujah
Seven U.S. Marines were killed on Monday in an apparent suicide attack when a car bomb exploded near their military convoy on the outskirts of Fallujah, the U.S. military reported. The attack, which also killed three Iraqi National Guardsmen, was the deadliest against U.S. troops in four months.
The American casualties were members of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, which is responsible for security in Anbar province, a stronghold for Sunni insurgents west of Baghdad. The names of the dead were withheld until their relatives could be notified.
The bomb detonated as the convoy traveled down a barren stretch of road nine miles from Fallujah, U.S. officials said. Two Humvees were reduced to smoldering wreckage, video footage from the Arab satellite channel al-Arabiya showed. U.S. forces removed the bodies and military helicopters flew in.
"This desperate act of inhumanity will only serve to strengthen our commitment to the Iraqi people," the U.S. military said in a statement. "Our forces will continue to stay the course in order to ensure Iraqi security forces have everything necessary to set the conditions required to foster rule of law and revitalization in Iraq
full story
guerrero - September 11, 2004 06:35 AM (GMT)
i saw that video footage taken by the ambushers where a passing bradley was blasted by ied and the insurgents rejoicing ...
clueless tlaga ang mga kano - siguro 30 meters lang ang layo ng mga who took the film and controlled the detonation
:wow:
clueless tlaga ang mga kano - siguro 30 meters lang ang layo ng mga who took the film and controlled the detonation
:wow:
Alamid - September 13, 2004 10:03 AM (GMT)
| QUOTE (guerrero @ Sep 11 2004, 02:35 PM) |
| i saw that video footage taken by the ambushers where a passing bradley was blasted by ied and the insurgents rejoicing ... clueless tlaga ang mga kano - siguro 30 meters lang ang layo ng mga who took the film and controlled the detonation :wow: |
You mean this Bradley?
durandal - September 25, 2004 05:40 AM (GMT)
didu - October 31, 2004 01:31 AM (GMT)
ct 30, 2:41 PM (ET)
By RAWYA RAGEH
NEAR FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) - A car bomb killed eight U.S. Marines outside Fallujah on Saturday, the deadliest attack against the U.S. military in nearly six months. Marines pounded guerrilla positions out the outskirts of Fallujah, where American forces are gearing up for a major assault on the insurgent stronghold.
In Baghdad, another car bomb exploded outside an Arabic television network's offices, killing seven people and injuring 19 in the biggest attack against a news organization since the occupation began last year.
South of the capital, witnesses said a U.S. convoy came under attack, prompting Iraqi forces to open fire randomly and throw hand grenades, hitting three minibuses and three vans. Hospital officials said at least 14 people were killed.
The Marine deaths came when a car bomb went off next to a truck southwest of Baghdad, between the capital and Fallujah, said Maj. Clark Watson, with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. Nine other Marines were wounded in the attack in western Anbar province, which includes Fallujah and other insurgent strongholds, the military said.
It was the biggest number of American military deaths in a single day since May 2, when nine U.S. troops were killed in separate mortar attacks and roadside bombings in Baghdad, Ramadi and Kirkuk.
American forces are preparing for a major assault on the rebel bastion of Fallujah in an effort to restore control to a swath of Sunni Muslim towns north and west of the capital ahead of crucial national elections due by Jan. 31.
On Saturday, insurgents fired mortars at Marine positions outside Fallujah. U.S. troops responded with "the strongest artillery barrage in recent weeks," according to Marine spokesman 1st Lt. Lyle Gilbert.
Later in the afternoon, a Marine Harrier jet bombed a guerrilla mortar position inside Fallujah, then strafed it with machine-gun fire, Gilbert said. He had no reports of insurgent casualties.
Crowds of Iraqis peered skyward as a pair of warplanes circled over the rebel-held city, where large explosions rumbled Saturday afternoon. Insurgents fired rockets and mortars toward U.S. Marine positions.
source
By RAWYA RAGEH
NEAR FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) - A car bomb killed eight U.S. Marines outside Fallujah on Saturday, the deadliest attack against the U.S. military in nearly six months. Marines pounded guerrilla positions out the outskirts of Fallujah, where American forces are gearing up for a major assault on the insurgent stronghold.
In Baghdad, another car bomb exploded outside an Arabic television network's offices, killing seven people and injuring 19 in the biggest attack against a news organization since the occupation began last year.
South of the capital, witnesses said a U.S. convoy came under attack, prompting Iraqi forces to open fire randomly and throw hand grenades, hitting three minibuses and three vans. Hospital officials said at least 14 people were killed.
The Marine deaths came when a car bomb went off next to a truck southwest of Baghdad, between the capital and Fallujah, said Maj. Clark Watson, with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. Nine other Marines were wounded in the attack in western Anbar province, which includes Fallujah and other insurgent strongholds, the military said.
It was the biggest number of American military deaths in a single day since May 2, when nine U.S. troops were killed in separate mortar attacks and roadside bombings in Baghdad, Ramadi and Kirkuk.
American forces are preparing for a major assault on the rebel bastion of Fallujah in an effort to restore control to a swath of Sunni Muslim towns north and west of the capital ahead of crucial national elections due by Jan. 31.
On Saturday, insurgents fired mortars at Marine positions outside Fallujah. U.S. troops responded with "the strongest artillery barrage in recent weeks," according to Marine spokesman 1st Lt. Lyle Gilbert.
Later in the afternoon, a Marine Harrier jet bombed a guerrilla mortar position inside Fallujah, then strafed it with machine-gun fire, Gilbert said. He had no reports of insurgent casualties.
Crowds of Iraqis peered skyward as a pair of warplanes circled over the rebel-held city, where large explosions rumbled Saturday afternoon. Insurgents fired rockets and mortars toward U.S. Marine positions.
source
Singa Lion - November 1, 2004 05:38 AM (GMT)
hahaha funny but most powerful army gets clobberred by car bombs only.. :demon:
adroth - November 1, 2004 05:51 PM (GMT)
| QUOTE (Singa Lion @ Nov 1 2004, 01:38 PM) |
| hahaha funny but most powerful army gets clobberred by car bombs only.. :demon: |
Which goes to show that hi-tech is meaningless in a counter-insurgency campaign.
Singa Lion - November 2, 2004 03:22 AM (GMT)
not what i mean about equipment...its bec the us soldiers always use humvees in patrolling with limited dismounted patrol they are so reluctant to conduct foot patrols where the chance of a bomb killing a whole patrol at the same time is lesser compared to riding around in humvees
adroth - November 2, 2004 06:43 PM (GMT)
| QUOTE (Singa Lion @ Nov 2 2004, 11:22 AM) |
| not what i mean about equipment...its bec the us soldiers always use humvees in patrolling with limited dismounted patrol they are so reluctant to conduct foot patrols where the chance of a bomb killing a whole patrol at the same time is lesser compared to riding around in humvees |
Wow. When did you conduct your inspection of US operations in Iraq? How was the trip?
. . . or was that another arm chair assessment?
Singa Lion - November 3, 2004 02:27 AM (GMT)
funny adroth but you shouldn't become emotional, its not good...you should look into posts objectively and without emotion...
ok its just armchair assesment but i read a lot and visit military boards to familiarize myself with military matters at least before i join singapore national service..
i read in one article by usmc gen. zinni about the need for us soldiers in iraq to dismount from their vehicles and conduct more foot patrols..like the british soldiers do in their areas...
l
ok its just armchair assesment but i read a lot and visit military boards to familiarize myself with military matters at least before i join singapore national service..
i read in one article by usmc gen. zinni about the need for us soldiers in iraq to dismount from their vehicles and conduct more foot patrols..like the british soldiers do in their areas...
l
adroth - November 3, 2004 04:01 AM (GMT)
| QUOTE (Singa Lion @ Nov 3 2004, 10:27 AM) |
| funny adroth but you shouldn't become emotional, its not good...you should look into posts objectively and without emotion... l |
Temper temper :funnypost:
ColdDeadFish - November 3, 2004 08:08 AM (GMT)
| QUOTE (Singa Lion @ Nov 3 2004, 10:27 AM) |
| i read in one article by usmc gen. zinni about the need for us soldiers in iraq to dismount from their vehicles and conduct more foot patrols..like the british soldiers do in their areas... l |
That is one of the lessons we learned 30 years ago, the AFP/PC-INP used to conduct mounted patrols and are easily ambushed by command deto mines and recoiless rifles. So the Army and the SR change the tactic a bit in the mid 80s, they assigned riders and walkers along armored columns. There was two-fold intent in doing so
1. The walkers scour the lateral area where the armored/mechanized columns traverse. Ambush sites are reconed and lateral security is provided on low speed transit areas.
2. If there is immediate contact, walkers detach from Armor/mechanized elements and quickly implement their infrantry tactics of choice, armored/mechanized units is treated as if they are a solid infantry sub unit, their riders dismount they become their integrated walkers.
Key point there is coordination and the reversal of roles. In the past, normally, when in contact walkers stick to the armor as it becomes a static pillbox/firing bunker but in the advent of anti armor weapons and techniques this a sure way to die. Static armor is an RPG magnet, armor and mechnized units whould be used what they are best at maneuver and and volume of fire at a faster speed of delivery. If armor coordinates its movement with infantry (not the other way around) armor and mechanized units is the fastest way to mount a counter attack.
I attribute most of the US casualties of Iraq to poor employment of armor and mechanized units. The US forces obviously have poor mechanized unit transit planning. Most CNN videos shown have infantry units protecting armor instead of the other way around. The british is good using these tactics, which they copied from the Germans in North Africa in 42 and polished it in Aden & North Borneo in the 50s.
Even better, the Isrealis employed mechanized units against armored units by just utilizing accurate fire, speed and maneuver. Just imagine recoiless rifles mounted on armor reinforced jeeps tangling with tanks, They were more worried about small arms fire than the tank guns. I think this is the single biggest innovation made by the IDF and made Ariel Sharon one of the brightest thinkers of the IDF in its early days.
COIN is a very different scenario, RP has learned their lessons and has duly adapted to them. The current testament is that most COIN engagements where the insurgents engage AFP forces are on non built up areas and mountains as they have no chance in engaging the AFP units once they have employed armor. The US forces have a thing to learn from the RP.
fieldmouse - May 12, 2005 10:27 AM (GMT)
Insurgents prove fierce in firefight
Marines recount harrowing attack as offensive rages on
By ELLEN KNICKMEYER
The Washington Post
May 11. 2005 8:00AM
J
ARAMI, Iraq - Screaming "Allahu Akbar" to the end, the foreign fighters lay on their backs in a narrow crawl space under a house and blasted their machine guns up through the concrete floor with bullets designed to penetrate tanks. They fired at U.S. Marines, driving back wave after wave as the Americans tried to retrieve a fallen comrade.
Through Sunday night and into Monday morning, the foreign fighters fired on, their screaming voices gradually fading to just one. In the end, it took five Marine assaults, grenades, a tank firing bunker-busting artillery rounds, 500-pound bombs unleashed by an F/A-18 attack plane and a point-blank attack by a rocket launcher to quell them.
The Marines got their fallen man, suffering one more dead and at least five wounded in the process. And according to survivors of the battle, the foreign fighters near the Syrian border proved to be everything their reputation had suggested: fierce, determined and lethal to the last.
"They came here to die," said Gunnery Sgt. Chuck Hurley, commander of the team from the 1st Platoon, Lima Company, of the Marines' 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment, that battled the insurgents in the one-story house in Ubaydi, about 15 miles east of the Syrian border.
"They were willing to stay in place and die with no hope," Hurley said yesterday. "All they wanted was to take us with them."
The fighting that began Sunday in Ubaydi was an unplanned opening phase of a massive Marine offensive in Iraq's far northwest against the foreign fighters who U.S. and Iraqi commanders say are crossing the Syrian border to join the Iraqi insurgency. By Monday, more than 1,000 Marines backed by Cobra helicopters and Hornet warplanes were pouring into an area north of the Euphrates River where few American troops and no Iraqi forces have been for at least a year.
U.S. commanders say they believe that foreigner leaders of the insurgency have established a refuge north of the Euphrates they use to channel incoming fighters, arms and support to insurgents in the rest of Iraq.
"We're taking down an enemy safe haven," said Lt. Col. Tim Mundy, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Regiment, which along with the 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment, did the bulk of the fighting at Ubaydi.
U.S. officers say the most-wanted insurgent leader in Iraq, Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, is being sheltered among tribal leaders in Haditha and Hit, two towns 80 and 110 miles downriver. The Americans say al-Zarqawi was almost caught in February at a checkpoint between the towns. Other sightings since have placed him in other towns on the south side of the Euphrates. In Haqlaniyah, al-Zarqawi felt bold enough to preach a sermon at a mosque, according to at least one report to U.S. forces.
U.S and Iraqi officials blame al-Zarqawi and other foreign fighters for many of the insurgency's bloodiest attacks, including suicide bombings that are claiming dozens of lives almost daily in Iraq.
Fighting continued yesterday north of the Euphrates, where the Marines' heavy-caliber weapons, mortars and artillery could be heard booming across the green river at dusk.
At least three Marines have been killed in the offensive. Marine Col. Stephen Davis, commander of Marine Regimental Combat Team 2, said he believed at least 75 foreign fighters were killed Sunday alone, after the offensive opened prematurely with the clash at Ubaydi.
At noon Sunday, Marines were waiting on the bank of the Euphrates for U.S. Army engineers to finish erecting a temporary bridge when insurgents opened fire from Ubaydi, less than a mile away. They fired AK-47 assault rifles at helicopter gunships overhead and pounded the waiting Marines with mortar rounds - including one that landed yards from a Humvee carrying the commanding officers of the operation.
The Marines pressed against the walls of a ruined home for protection and waited for the mortars to stop. When they did, one officer said: "Let's go to Ubaydi."
Lima Company and a company from the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Regiment, entered the town. Insurgents - dozens of them, Marines said later - met them with AK-47 fire and rocket-propelled grenades. In the first hours, one Marine was killed and at least seven were wounded.
Lima Company battled its way through town, at one point exchanging fire with fighters on a mosque rooftop and forcing them down. The mosque loudspeakers screamed Arabic that the Marines could not understand, but they said that since it was past time for prayers, they assumed the loudspeakers were rallying forces for attack.
According to Hurley and others who recounted the fighting that followed, Lima Company's Marines searched each house they passed. They turned up weapons cache after weapons cache: bombs made to be dropped from airplanes, a bicycle with a seat made of explosives and an antenna for remote-control triggering, a vest rigged with explosives, a car rigged with bombs, mortar tubes, rocket launchers with new backpacks full of rockets, artillery shells.
The costly equipment, as well as body armor later recovered from the bodies of dead insurgents, suggested that the fighters were foreigners, the military said. Though the level of foreigners' involvement in the insurgency has been disputed for nearly two years, Muslim men have come to Iraq from neighboring countries such as Saudi Arabia and from as far away as Chechnya and Indonesia to fight the United States and its allies.
The Marines also found Soviet-designed PKM machine guns and belts of armor-piercing ammunition. In contrast, Lima Company was armed with M-16 assault rifles and carried nothing comparable -nothing that could penetrate walls and floors and still pack enough force to kill.
That was what awaited the Marines on the last block they cleared, at the last house. The first Marine there found the gate in the high walls around the house open; the front door was locked.
"As soon as he kicks the door, the machine-gun fire cuts him down," said Hurley, a Dayton, Ohio, police officer serving in the Marine reserves. The Marine survived, but a second fell as well, fatally wounded. From inside, a foreign fighter fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the door.
At some point, the screamed prayers began: "Allahu Akbar!"-"God is great!"
Marines fell, unable to tell the source of the screams or the shots. They fired blindly, as machine-gun rounds cratered the walls and floors around them.
"Our rounds couldn't get through the walls," Hurley said.
Survivors crawled out of the house under fire, unable to take the fatally wounded Marine with them. In the back of the house, Marines spotted two men running out. They fired. The two - whose thick curly hair, olive skin and delicate features indicated they were not Iraqis, Marines said - died at the back door, still holding their weapons.
Thinking the barrage had come from the two men they had just killed, the Marines re-entered the walled compound. Sgt. Dennis Woullard, a Marine reservist on the Biloxi, Miss., police force, dragged out the first fallen Marine.
Farther inside, other Marines searched the house. One reached for the door of a storage closet under a stairwell. "As soon as he touches the door, the machine gun fires and cuts him down," Hurley said.
The Marines retreated, unable to bring their wounded colleague with them. Another wave went in to try to retrieve him, not realizing he was already beyond help. Machine-gun fire drove them out.
The Marines began to suspect that the insurgents were firing from a bunker somewhere in the house, Hurley said. They called in a tank, as other armored vehicles ferried the wounded away for evacuation by helicopter.
The tank fired, one round hitting a propane tank inside the compound and engulfing part of the house in a ball of orange flame. Tank cannon fired seven rounds in all, some of them meant to destroy bunkers.
The Marines went in a fourth time. Bullets, and one chanting voice, met them.
"Nobody should have survived"the tank assault, Hurley later said in amazement.
"The whole scene, it was just pure evil inside the house," said Woullard, who came out of the first foray into the house with a frayed helmet and bruised temple from one machine-gun round and a pierced water bag on his back from another.
"I've never seen anything like this in my life," said Woullard, who fought at Nasiriyah in the first days of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. "It was an all-out ambush."
The insurgents' armor-piercing bullets were penetrating the house's interior and external walls and the outer walls of the compound.
http://www.concordmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dl...373/1013/NEWS03
Marines recount harrowing attack as offensive rages on
By ELLEN KNICKMEYER
The Washington Post
May 11. 2005 8:00AM
J
ARAMI, Iraq - Screaming "Allahu Akbar" to the end, the foreign fighters lay on their backs in a narrow crawl space under a house and blasted their machine guns up through the concrete floor with bullets designed to penetrate tanks. They fired at U.S. Marines, driving back wave after wave as the Americans tried to retrieve a fallen comrade.
Through Sunday night and into Monday morning, the foreign fighters fired on, their screaming voices gradually fading to just one. In the end, it took five Marine assaults, grenades, a tank firing bunker-busting artillery rounds, 500-pound bombs unleashed by an F/A-18 attack plane and a point-blank attack by a rocket launcher to quell them.
The Marines got their fallen man, suffering one more dead and at least five wounded in the process. And according to survivors of the battle, the foreign fighters near the Syrian border proved to be everything their reputation had suggested: fierce, determined and lethal to the last.
"They came here to die," said Gunnery Sgt. Chuck Hurley, commander of the team from the 1st Platoon, Lima Company, of the Marines' 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment, that battled the insurgents in the one-story house in Ubaydi, about 15 miles east of the Syrian border.
"They were willing to stay in place and die with no hope," Hurley said yesterday. "All they wanted was to take us with them."
The fighting that began Sunday in Ubaydi was an unplanned opening phase of a massive Marine offensive in Iraq's far northwest against the foreign fighters who U.S. and Iraqi commanders say are crossing the Syrian border to join the Iraqi insurgency. By Monday, more than 1,000 Marines backed by Cobra helicopters and Hornet warplanes were pouring into an area north of the Euphrates River where few American troops and no Iraqi forces have been for at least a year.
U.S. commanders say they believe that foreigner leaders of the insurgency have established a refuge north of the Euphrates they use to channel incoming fighters, arms and support to insurgents in the rest of Iraq.
"We're taking down an enemy safe haven," said Lt. Col. Tim Mundy, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Regiment, which along with the 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment, did the bulk of the fighting at Ubaydi.
U.S. officers say the most-wanted insurgent leader in Iraq, Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, is being sheltered among tribal leaders in Haditha and Hit, two towns 80 and 110 miles downriver. The Americans say al-Zarqawi was almost caught in February at a checkpoint between the towns. Other sightings since have placed him in other towns on the south side of the Euphrates. In Haqlaniyah, al-Zarqawi felt bold enough to preach a sermon at a mosque, according to at least one report to U.S. forces.
U.S and Iraqi officials blame al-Zarqawi and other foreign fighters for many of the insurgency's bloodiest attacks, including suicide bombings that are claiming dozens of lives almost daily in Iraq.
Fighting continued yesterday north of the Euphrates, where the Marines' heavy-caliber weapons, mortars and artillery could be heard booming across the green river at dusk.
At least three Marines have been killed in the offensive. Marine Col. Stephen Davis, commander of Marine Regimental Combat Team 2, said he believed at least 75 foreign fighters were killed Sunday alone, after the offensive opened prematurely with the clash at Ubaydi.
At noon Sunday, Marines were waiting on the bank of the Euphrates for U.S. Army engineers to finish erecting a temporary bridge when insurgents opened fire from Ubaydi, less than a mile away. They fired AK-47 assault rifles at helicopter gunships overhead and pounded the waiting Marines with mortar rounds - including one that landed yards from a Humvee carrying the commanding officers of the operation.
The Marines pressed against the walls of a ruined home for protection and waited for the mortars to stop. When they did, one officer said: "Let's go to Ubaydi."
Lima Company and a company from the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Regiment, entered the town. Insurgents - dozens of them, Marines said later - met them with AK-47 fire and rocket-propelled grenades. In the first hours, one Marine was killed and at least seven were wounded.
Lima Company battled its way through town, at one point exchanging fire with fighters on a mosque rooftop and forcing them down. The mosque loudspeakers screamed Arabic that the Marines could not understand, but they said that since it was past time for prayers, they assumed the loudspeakers were rallying forces for attack.
According to Hurley and others who recounted the fighting that followed, Lima Company's Marines searched each house they passed. They turned up weapons cache after weapons cache: bombs made to be dropped from airplanes, a bicycle with a seat made of explosives and an antenna for remote-control triggering, a vest rigged with explosives, a car rigged with bombs, mortar tubes, rocket launchers with new backpacks full of rockets, artillery shells.
The costly equipment, as well as body armor later recovered from the bodies of dead insurgents, suggested that the fighters were foreigners, the military said. Though the level of foreigners' involvement in the insurgency has been disputed for nearly two years, Muslim men have come to Iraq from neighboring countries such as Saudi Arabia and from as far away as Chechnya and Indonesia to fight the United States and its allies.
The Marines also found Soviet-designed PKM machine guns and belts of armor-piercing ammunition. In contrast, Lima Company was armed with M-16 assault rifles and carried nothing comparable -nothing that could penetrate walls and floors and still pack enough force to kill.
That was what awaited the Marines on the last block they cleared, at the last house. The first Marine there found the gate in the high walls around the house open; the front door was locked.
"As soon as he kicks the door, the machine-gun fire cuts him down," said Hurley, a Dayton, Ohio, police officer serving in the Marine reserves. The Marine survived, but a second fell as well, fatally wounded. From inside, a foreign fighter fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the door.
At some point, the screamed prayers began: "Allahu Akbar!"-"God is great!"
Marines fell, unable to tell the source of the screams or the shots. They fired blindly, as machine-gun rounds cratered the walls and floors around them.
"Our rounds couldn't get through the walls," Hurley said.
Survivors crawled out of the house under fire, unable to take the fatally wounded Marine with them. In the back of the house, Marines spotted two men running out. They fired. The two - whose thick curly hair, olive skin and delicate features indicated they were not Iraqis, Marines said - died at the back door, still holding their weapons.
Thinking the barrage had come from the two men they had just killed, the Marines re-entered the walled compound. Sgt. Dennis Woullard, a Marine reservist on the Biloxi, Miss., police force, dragged out the first fallen Marine.
Farther inside, other Marines searched the house. One reached for the door of a storage closet under a stairwell. "As soon as he touches the door, the machine gun fires and cuts him down," Hurley said.
The Marines retreated, unable to bring their wounded colleague with them. Another wave went in to try to retrieve him, not realizing he was already beyond help. Machine-gun fire drove them out.
The Marines began to suspect that the insurgents were firing from a bunker somewhere in the house, Hurley said. They called in a tank, as other armored vehicles ferried the wounded away for evacuation by helicopter.
The tank fired, one round hitting a propane tank inside the compound and engulfing part of the house in a ball of orange flame. Tank cannon fired seven rounds in all, some of them meant to destroy bunkers.
The Marines went in a fourth time. Bullets, and one chanting voice, met them.
"Nobody should have survived"the tank assault, Hurley later said in amazement.
"The whole scene, it was just pure evil inside the house," said Woullard, who came out of the first foray into the house with a frayed helmet and bruised temple from one machine-gun round and a pierced water bag on his back from another.
"I've never seen anything like this in my life," said Woullard, who fought at Nasiriyah in the first days of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. "It was an all-out ambush."
The insurgents' armor-piercing bullets were penetrating the house's interior and external walls and the outer walls of the compound.
http://www.concordmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dl...373/1013/NEWS03