Mosul: The Next 'Fallujah'

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 14:43

The investigation into the Mosul blast comes as the military reassessed security at bases across Iraq in light of the bomber's success in apparently slipping into the camp and entering a tent crowded with soldiers eating lunch Tuesday.

The suicide bomber believed to have carried out the attack was probably wearing an Iraqi military uniform, the U.S. military said Thursday.

On Thursday, U.S. Marines fought with insurgents in Fallujah as warplanes and tanks bombarded guerrilla positions in the heaviest fighting there in weeks. The clashes raged as nearly 1,000 residents returned to the devastated city for the first time since U.S. troops drove out most of the militants last month.

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 14:47

They can only dream of holidays at home
By Al Neuharth, USA TODAY Founder
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/columnist/neuharth/2004-12-22-holidays-troops_x.htm

"Support Our Troops" is a wonderful patriotic slogan. But the best way to support troops thrust by unwise commanders in chief into ill-advised adventures like Vietnam and Iraq is to bring them home. Sooner rather than later. That should be our New Year's resolution.

- - -

Neuharth Call for Pullout in Iraq Draws Massive Response

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000742016

Al Neuharth’s Thursday column for that newspaper has quickly drawn hundreds of emails. After an early surge against Neuharth, the response became equally divided.

Letters:

A.P. Oliver, commander USN (ret.): “To withdraw troops from Iraq would qualify as the greatest surrender in history and invite direct attacks here in this country and ultimately drastically change the way we live. No respectful American could agree with your illogical conclusion.”

J. Boke, Titusville, FL: “Al Neuharth's war experience crippled his brain, or he's just too old to have much left. War experience doesn't necessarily make one wise. It CAN have a negative effect on one's judgement. It sounds like Mr. Neuharth, as well John McCain, both suffered mentally via their strong emotional suffering.”

Douglas Wickenheiser: "My son served one tour at the time of the Iraq invasion and is slated to return for a 2nd tour in May after only 13 months back in the U.S. This war should never have happened. My son has a deep distrust of all in the goverment. As part of the 101st airborne he will have to serve up to 1 yr longer than he enlisted for due to the stop-loss program. A full and quick withdrawal is the only answer to this gross misuse of presidential power."

Michael Bustamente, Sterling Height, MI: “Tell you what. We leave and the sanctimonious jerks like you and your Free Press, you go there and stay after we leave.”

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 14:49

Sec Rumsfeld:
The tragic attack in Mosul, Iraq demonstrates again that the coalition and the Iraqi people face a vicious and a determined enemy. Freedom is at stake in Iraq and it's achievable. The only alternative to success would be to turn back to darkness -- to those who kill and terrorize innocent men, women and children -- and that must not happen.

General Myers:
This attack, of course, is the responsibility of insurgents, the same insurgents who attacked on 9/11, the same type of insurgents who attacked in Beirut, the same insurgents who -- type of insurgents who attacked the Cole, Khobar Towers, and the list goes on.

http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2004/tr20041222-secdef1861.html

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 14:52

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell told President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair last month that there were too few troops in Iraq, according to people familiar with official records of the meeting.

Powell made his assertion during one in a series of intense discussions on Iraq between Bush and Blair this fall. Those sessions, which have largely been kept secret, indicate that there was a tough debate behind closed doors as the Bush administration reexamined its handling of Iraq in the wake of Bush's reelection victory. Less than three weeks after the White House meeting, the Pentagon announced that it would boost the U.S. military presence in Iraq by 12,000 troops, to 150,000.

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 14:59

Families Come to Help Wounded Soldiers Recover and Go Home
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A21062-2004Dec22?language=printer

"What's Daddy getting for Christmas?" Belinda Beatty asked her 2-year-old son, Dustin, as he spun around the tree Tuesday evening, beyond tired after a long day.

"Legs!" the little boy answered.

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 15:03

The anti-war movement likes to think that, in the words of Britain's Stop the War Coalition, it 'kept the issue of Iraq alive' through 2004. In fact, the anti-war movement has all but fizzled out, certainly since its big march in February 2003, when an estimated million gathered in London's Hyde Park to say no to war. The most notable thing the British anti-war movement has done this year is support anti-war MP George Galloway in his libel trial against the Daily Telegraph (6). And now they're gearing up for the clash between Galloway and Labour's pro-war MP Oona King in Bethnal Green and Bow in next year's general election (a squalid battle if ever there was one).

In the real world, the most heated controversies over Iraq have come from within the coalition itself, not from the anti-war movement without. Consider the WMD issue. Britain's biggest fallout over WMD involved a law lord (Hutton) investigating the suicide of a Ministry of Defence scientist (David Kelly) who gave interviews to the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) that cast doubt on the government's claims over Iraq. In America, the missing WMD became a sore point following the resignation of David Kay, a hardline Republican who supported Bush's policy of regime change in Iraq, as head of the Iraq Survey Group. After failing to find any weapons, Kay declared that 'We were all wrong' about Iraq.

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 15:36

This sign outside of Fallujah says: "Anybody who tries to enter Fallujah with any weapon will be killed."

from:
The Angry Arab News Service/????? ????? ?????? ??????
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2004/12/this-sign-outside-of-fallujah-says.html

→ http://angryarab.blogspot.com

by redjade Fri Dec 24, 2004 15:39

More than 200,000 people sought shelter in surrounding villages or tented camps nearBaghdad before the attack which began on 8 November, and have yet to return.

Bilal Sami Sabri, a 29-year-old living in a tented camp with nearly 1,000 other Fallujans near Baghdad University, is not going anywhere. "What can we do? What are we going to do except stay here until the Americans and Iraqi National Guard have left the city. Once they're gone we'll go back and rebuild Fallujah with our hands."

[....]

The once bustling city of 300,000 lies in ruins, its water and electricity networks badly damaged. There is still no clean water, a Red Cross official said after a visit this week. "Most of [the water treatment plants] have been bombed or damaged because of the military operations," said Ahmed Rawi, of the Red Cross.

[....]

The interim Iraqi government has launched its election campaign by trumpeting a multimillion-dollar reconstruction programme in Fallujah, offering up to US$10,000 per family. Each family that returns will be offered $100 in cash before they enter the city.

by Malcolm Xmas Fri Dec 24, 2004 19:10

The re-election of George Bush at least clarifies things. Within the strict confines of what passes for democracy in the United States today, the American electorate has affirmed the rogue imperialist policies of Bush and rejected the more traditional imperialism advocated by Kerry. This outcome reflects profound changes not only in the nature of America’s politics, but in its whole economic and social order. As such, it holds grave implications for Canada and the rest of the world. Within the United States, Bush’s re-election represents the consolidation of a right-wing plutocracy backed by the soldiers of God over American politics and society. Grave damage, or even the outright end of the corrupt American political democracy, can be expected. Regressive social and economic policies, including the gutting of the Social Security System, are likely.(...)

To put it bluntly, Canada’s choice is to throw in its lot with this monster or to resist alongside the rest of the world’s nations.

by Malcolm Xmas Fri Dec 24, 2004 19:24

U.S. Army war resister Jeremy Hinzman made his case Monday for Canada to give him refugee status. Hinzman fled to Canada in January after his application for Conscientious Objector status was rejected by the military. He is believed to be the first U.S. soldier to file for refugee status in Canada for refusing to fight in Iraq.

...

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the day you made your way up to Canada with your wife and child, what that meant for you? I mean, it was an enormous decision?

JEREMY HINZMAN: Well, it was definitely a big turning point in life, and I mean, when we made the decision, it -- I mean, when we left, the decision had been made for weeks, so we were pretty intent on what we were doing, but whether we succeed or fail, the consequences and repercussions will be lifelong in terms of either going to the States for jail or not being able to go to the States because we can remain in Canada.

by redjade Mon Dec 27, 2004 14:11

Foreign Team Will Watch Vote in Iraq From Jordan
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/23/politics/23elect.html?ex=1261458000&en=5dfd060e6bf5c421&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland

Representatives of seven nations met in Ottawa this week to recruit international observers for the Iraqi elections and agreed to watch the vote, but from the safety of Amman, Jordan.

They said it was too dangerous to monitor the voting in Iraq, meaning international observers are unlikely for the elections on Jan. 30 - making them the first significant vote of this sort recently with no foreign presence, United Nations officials say.

[....]

But after the two-day meeting ended Tuesday, Jean-Pierre Kingsley, Canada's chief electoral officer, said that the group would send few if any people into Iraq, due to the danger.

"We are not calling this an observation mission," he said. "It is an assessment mission."

by redjade Mon Dec 27, 2004 14:13

"I've been expecting it," said Wayne Downing , a retired four-star Army general who headed the inquiry into the bombing at the Khobar Towers housing complex in Saudi Arabia in 1996. "They're trying to get in. We have a terrible problem. We have all this indigenous labor. We don't wash our dishes, cook our own food. When you bring indigenous laborers into camps, you immediately have a security problem."

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/23/international/middleeast/23iraq.html?ex=1261458000&en=307e5e02d2a000ab&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland

by redjade Mon Dec 27, 2004 14:34

An Iraqi Health Ministry official said his greatest concern was the resentment Falluja's people were likely to feel when they saw how much damage had been done to their homes.

That was certainly the case Friday. While those who fled were at pains to say they had nothing to do with the rebels who made Falluja their stronghold, many of them have since become angry and militant as a result of the offensive.

``Would Allah want us to return to a city that animals can't live in?'' said Yasser Satar as he saw his destroyed home.

``Even animals who have no human sense and feelings can not live here,'' he said, crying.

``What do they want from Falluja? This is the crime of the century. They want to destroy Islam and Muslims. But our anger and resistance will increase.''

by redjade Mon Dec 27, 2004 14:37

Antiwar forces have also failed to offer concrete support for the political demands coming out of Iraq. For instance, when the Iraqi National Assembly forcefully condemned the Paris Club deal for forcing the Iraqi people to pay Saddam's "odious" debts and robbing them of their economic sovereignty, the antiwar movement was virtually silent, save the dogged but undersupported Jubilee Iraq. And while US soldiers aren't protecting Iraqis from starvation, the food rations certainly are--so why isn't safeguarding this desperately needed program one of our central demands?

The failure to develop a credible platform beyond "troops out" may be one reason the antiwar movement remains stalled, even as opposition to the war deepens.

by Empire Notes Mon Dec 27, 2004 16:14

Rahul Mahajan says
http://www.empirenotes.org/december04.html#21dec041

There are several attitudes toward the resistance that one finds among the antiwar left:

1. Reject them and express support for marginal secular “civil society” groups that oppose the occupation.
2. Express unconditional adulation for them as opponents of U.S. imperialism.
3. Ignore them as much as possible while expressing opposition to the occupation.

by redjade Mon Dec 27, 2004 17:13

"It basically [expletive] being here Christmas," said Lt. Anderson, a native of Griffith, Ind. "But now I feel good."

A few minutes into the mission, their hopes for an easy afternoon were dashed. Headquarters radioed in with a new order: head to Route Irish, the deadly road leading to Baghdad International Airport, and secure it for an hour.

The mood soured. The conversation ended. Two of the battalion's men had already been killed on the road and nearly two dozen injured. Sgt. Shaw, 23, a State College, Pa., native sitting behind the wheel, sullenly made his way toward the airport. He turned off the Metallica.

by redjade Mon Dec 27, 2004 17:56

Washington Post:
The largest Sunni Muslim political party in the country announced Monday that it was withdrawing from the ballot. The withdrawal of the Iraqi Islamic Party leaves the interim government and its U.S. backers unable to point to a single major, established Sunni entity on the Jan. 30 ballot.

"We are convinced that the election will not be general, honest and will not be held in all parts of Iraq," the party's chairman Mohsen Abdul Hamid told a news conference. "First, we have the security issues, which is getting worse and must be solved first. Second, the electoral commission's program and work is not clear to us. . . .  "Third, Iraqis don't understand the elections yet."

more quotes and discussion at
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/12/27/103325/44

by Ark Mon Dec 27, 2004 22:44

The "rogue states" of this world like the USA can do whatever they like as consistently pointed out by the academic Noam Chomsky significantly since the Vietnam war. Although it is painflully obvious that they (The lads)break every international agreemnt like the Geneva Convention, they still play off global law when they deem that its "necessary".

Article 51 of the UN charter gives them (superior nation states) the right to self-defence.The stipulations of this agreement are completely "subjective" to the despotic governemntal administrations of the past and present. Hence,direct US and British interference in Iran during the 50s to Iraq in the noughties.

Thanks guys.

by redjade Tue Dec 28, 2004 12:31

Osama B L:
An audiotape message said to be made by the terrorist leader Osama bin Laden called for Muslims to boycott elections [in Iraq] next month and endorsed the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as Mr. bin Laden's deputy in Iraq.

The tape, broadcast Monday by the Arab news network Al Jazeera, condemned the American-backed Iraqi elections for a constitutional assembly, scheduled for Jan. 30, saying, "In the balance of Islam, this constitution is infidel and therefore everyone who participates in this election will be considered infidels."

- - -
W Bush:
"I don't know where bin Laden is. I have no idea and really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority."
- G.W. Bush, 3/13/02

"I am truly not that concerned about him."
- G.W. Bush, responding to a question about bin Laden's whereabouts, 3/13/02

by redjade Wed Dec 29, 2004 14:20

Twenty-eight people were killed in an explosion that flattened several houses in Baghdad overnight, apparently when a police unit was lured into a trap laid by insurgents, officials said on Wednesday.

[....]

Seven weeks after a U.S. offensive on the guerrilla bastion of Falluja in a bid to quell the revolt before the Jan. 30 vote, there are signs the insurgency has recovered much of its vigor.

by redjade Wed Dec 29, 2004 14:25

Over 350 foreigners are among about 10,000 detainees being held in US-run prisons in Iraq, Iraq's Human Rights Minister Bakhtiar Amin Over says.

"US forces told us on December 23 that they are holding 353 foreign terrorists," Mr Amin said.

by redjade Thu Dec 30, 2004 13:09

French journalists held hostage for four months in Iraq said their militant captors told them they wanted President Bush to win re-election.

In a four-page account of their ordeal, one of the reporters, Georges Malbrunot, also wrote that they saw several other hostages who were later decapitated. The journalists said their captors viewed foreign businessmen working in Iraq as their enemies.

One of the captors from the group calling itself the Islamic Army in Iraq said Bush's re-election would boost their cause, Malbrunot wrote in Friday's edition of Le Figaro, the French daily he works for.

"We want Bush because with him the American troops will stay in Iraq and that way we will be able to develop," Malbrunot cited the captor as saying.

by redjade Fri Dec 31, 2004 14:39

''Sorry about the picture, I know it is too graphic.

But...

This is one of many pictures that show how some people in Fallujah were killed by chemical weapons. You can see how these two men were sleeping on the floor, covered by blankets, and dead.

These two men died while they were sleeping, there is no blood any where that can indicate they were shot.

Rana, my friend, came to Amman with the parents for peace delegation, and she brought the pictures with her from Fallujah.

I am going to Iran tomorrow, I will try to blog from there!''

-Raed in the Middle
http://raedinthemiddle.blogspot.com/2004_12_29_raedinthemiddle_archive.html

Raed: ''there is no blood any where that can indicate they were shot.''

by redjade Wed Jan 05, 2005 13:46

The number of U.S. troops wounded in Iraq since the start of the war in March 2003 has surpassed 10,000, the Pentagon said Tuesday in a delayed update of its casualty data.

Of the 10,252 total wounded, the Pentagon said 5,396 were unable to return to duty and 4,856 sustained injuries that were light enough to allow them to resume their duties. The total is normally reported each week, but the Pentagon had not updated the figures since Dec. 22, when the number of wounded stood at 9,981.

The number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq stood at 1,335 on Tuesday, according to the Pentagon.

by eeekkk Thu Jan 06, 2005 19:33

In other news, Qasim Daoud, the Iraqi national security advisor, just said an operation to clear out Mosul will begin “soon.”

by redjade Sat Jan 15, 2005 16:11

A star from Mosul
Monday, January 10, 2005
http://astarfrommosul.blogspot.com/2005/01/still-alive.html

It seems like the Americans are losing control on everything.. They seem to be shooting everyone in their way. The guard of our school (An old man who has a difficulty hearing, and who has 9 children, and who has managed to work as a driver in his free time) got killed by the Americans with everyone who was in the car with him.. My friend's aunt got killed by the Americans too..

Also, the soldiers are still breaking into the houses of civilians. They entered some neighbors of my friend' houses and then cut all the phone lines in the street... I got worried sick about her, especially that she was too late today at school, and when we called her, the phone was ringing ad nobody answered!

I stopped taking my mobile to school, they told us that we're not allowed to bring it with us, and if we did, they won't let us have the exams. And this is just stupidity since it's really needed in such situations!