← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Faust
Thread ID: 16198 | Posts: 25 | Started: 2005-01-05
2005-01-05 05:05 | User Profile
Nothing going on in Iraq ...
1340 U.S. Military Fatalities reported so far for Iraq invasion/occupation [url]http://icasualties.org/oif/[/url]
Baghdad Governor Assassinated; Bomber Kills 11 - [url]http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&ncid=578&e=2&u=/nm/20050104/ts_nm/iraq_dc[/url]
Five U.S. Soldiers Slain [url]http://www.wboc.com/Global/story.asp?S=2761850[/url]
This was the deadliest day for the U-S military since a suicide bomber killed 22 people, including 14 U-S soldiers and three American contractors December 21st.
2005-01-05 05:32 | User Profile
Do you guys remember when there were ONLY about 1,200 to 1,500 rebels?and they were giving the US forces such a hard time? well, now there are 200,000 and more every day.
Anyone care to predict the future of the US in Iraq? or what the US will have to do in Iraq if they want to stay there?
2005-01-05 05:56 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Ponce]Anyone care to predict the future of the US in Iraq? or what the US will have to do in Iraq if they want to stay there?[/QUOTE]
Iraqi forces, serving the US, are dying in exploding numbers (parden the pun). December saw the third highest level of US troops killed. The Iraqi resistance is only getting stronger.
The US can feign progress. Bush will point to the completed elections as progress, no matter what a joke they are. The US can sit back and let desperate (for jobs) Iraqi mercenaries die in the place of American troops, thus lowing the US casualties.
I think Bush is going to play cowboy for the next four years, and several thousand more Americans will be killed in Iraq before Bush leaves office, all the while Iraq will be sinking further into an Islamofascist state. The next president will scale back operations signficantly and between less US involvement and the age of the story, Iraq will mostly disappear from the headlines.
Eventually, there will be another major terrorist attack on US soil (if only because Bush is assuring that the whole Arab world hates America), but probably not as long as US troops are more inviting targets in Iraq. After the attack, the right-wing neocons will blame the last Democrat in office as well as claim that the US was not aggressive enough.
2005-01-05 06:17 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Ponce]Do you guys remember when there were ONLY about 1,200 to 1,500 rebels?and they were giving the US forces such a hard time? well, now there are 200,000 and more every day.
Anyone care to predict the future of the US in Iraq? or what the US will have to do in Iraq if they want to stay there?[/QUOTE] I still think the actual number of people engaged in an armed, organized insurgency is relatively small and localized. There does appear to be a more organized and sophisticated network that is behind targeted assassinations and attacks but they don't appear to be able to take on US forces in any capacity. So besides making more of a mess for their country I don't quite understand their goal. As much as I was against this war there does appear to be a point where further attacks no longer serve any purpose. The insurgents haven't won one battle and they won't win one in the future. At some point they need to take the lesson of the Confederate generals in the U.S. Civil War, who could have gone to the mountains in a guerrilla campaign and continued drawing casualties on the Union side, dragging that conflict on indefinitely. Thank God for all of us that men like Robert E. Lee were running the opposition and chose what would be in the best interest of everyone. But alas, I'm afraid there are no General Lee's in this Iraq insurgency, just alot of thugs.
2005-01-05 07:19 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Jack Cassidy]As much as I was against this war there does appear to be a point where further attacks no longer serve any purpose. The insurgents haven't won one battle and they won't win one in the future. At some point they need to take the lesson of the Confederate generals in the U.S. Civil War, who could have gone to the mountains in a guerrilla campaign and continued drawing casualties on the Union side, dragging that conflict on indefinitely.[/QUOTE]
I dunno. Maybe America would be a better place today if the South insisted more strongly on being free.
But, the civil war was brother against brother over a little excessive growth of the central government. The Iraqis are resisting an infidel invasion. If they stop now, the US will be building abortion clinics in Iraq, banning criticism of homosexuals, and giving immigrants more rights than the natives.
And, it isn't just a few Iraqis, either. Those doing the actual fighting could not be having the success they're having without a lot of support from the general population.
2005-01-05 14:48 | User Profile
America's war on Iraq is now a lost cause, as it was from the beginning. Many people predicted this disastrous outcome, including us on OD, but seeing it actually unfold is so heartbreaking that I can't imagine any American escaping the repercussions of such an evil action taken by choice by it's own government in attacking an innocent country and killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the process. God Almighty doesn't like it and His Wrath upon the American evildoers will make Iraq look like a little street fight. Remember, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Get right with God. And wait.
2005-01-06 08:50 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Jack Cassidy]I don't quite understand their goal. As much as I was against this war there does appear to be a point where further attacks no longer serve any purpose. The insurgents haven't won one battle and they won't win one in the future.[/QUOTE] I'm not sure that the insurgents have to win the battles to win the war....
2005-01-06 12:54 | User Profile
[QUOTE=xmetalhead]America's war on Iraq is now a lost cause, as it was from the beginning. Many people predicted this disastrous outcome, including us on OD, but seeing it actually unfold is so heartbreaking that I can't imagine any American escaping the repercussions of such an evil action taken by choice by it's own government in attacking an innocent country and killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the process. God Almighty doesn't like it and His Wrath upon the American evildoers will make Iraq look like a little street fight. Remember, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Get right with God. And wait.[/QUOTE]
Well put.
2005-01-07 06:26 | User Profile
We are all agreed this war is bogus. The evidence put forth to go to war was shakier than an Iraqi waiting in a queue on election day.That said, if you were given absolute full control to direct this war, what would you do?
2005-01-07 06:49 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Jack Cassidy]We are all agreed this war is bogus. The evidence put forth to go to war was shakier than an Iraqi waiting in a queue on election day.That said, if you were given absolute full control to direct this war, what would you do?[/QUOTE]
Assuming I want the Empire to win (I don't), then I'd split Iraq into three parts, Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish. I'd encourage ethnic cleansing within those borders. We then try to set up the best relations we can with the Sunnis and Shiite Arabs, understanding that it's mostly a lost cause.
Then I'd withdraw to the Kurdish areas where we're most loved, and then attack both Syria and Iran in order to unite the Kurdish populations with those areas (assuming that Iran hasn't gone nuke, if it has we'll need to re-tink it). If Turkey objects, first attempt to buy them off by allowing them to ethnically cleanse their Kurdish areas and by giving them Azerbiadzhan in northern Iran (the Azeris are a turkish people and would fit in pretty well, although they are Shiites and not Sunnis like the Turks). This would be very tempting for Turkey, since their greatest ambition is to push to the Caspian where they can unite all the turkic peoples of central Asia (the Kazakhs, Uzbeks, Turkmens, Kirghiz and Uighurs). If the Turks don't go for the deal, annex Turkish Kurdistan to the greater Kurdistan. If they resist, obliterate them. While we're at it we seize norther Syria and build a pipeline to carry Kurdish oil to the Mediterranean.
This will give us one good ally in the region - the Kurds - and secure for us control over strategic assets and trade routes. The Kurds will be so worried about losing what they have that they won't be attacking our supply lines at every turn.
2005-01-07 15:04 | User Profile
And meanwhile, US Troops are still being killed in Iraq......look.....
[IMG]http://www.estherwoodmanor.com/images/rescue_attempt.jpg[/IMG]
[URL=http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/1/7/94759/67920]Click here[/URL]
2005-01-07 17:38 | User Profile
Yesterday alone 10 US troops were killed and today three more.
I find it interesting that they don't post the dead mercenaries contractors or working civilian (non gun carriers)
The US also stopped posting the resistance fighters being killed or the Iraqi civilians now dead.
The US were smart enough to know when to get out of Viet Nam and they should know that is time to do the same in Iraq, actually it was time long ago.
We went to Iraq to "free" the people from death and destruction but now they are worse off than they were before.
May the US never go to Cuba in order to make it "free". :angry:
2005-01-08 05:50 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Walter Yannis]Assuming I want the Empire to win (I don't), then I'd split Iraq into three parts, Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish. I'd encourage ethnic cleansing within those borders. We then try to set up the best relations we can with the Sunnis and Shiite Arabs, understanding that it's mostly a lost cause.
Then I'd withdraw to the Kurdish areas where we're most loved, and then attack both Syria and Iran in order to unite the Kurdish populations with those areas (assuming that Iran hasn't gone nuke, if it has we'll need to re-tink it). If Turkey objects, first attempt to buy them off by allowing them to ethnically cleanse their Kurdish areas and by giving them Azerbiadzhan in northern Iran (the Azeris are a turkish people and would fit in pretty well, although they are Shiites and not Sunnis like the Turks). This would be very tempting for Turkey, since their greatest ambition is to push to the Caspian where they can unite all the turkic peoples of central Asia (the Kazakhs, Uzbeks, Turkmens, Kirghiz and Uighurs). If the Turks don't go for the deal, annex Turkish Kurdistan to the greater Kurdistan. If they resist, obliterate them. While we're at it we seize norther Syria and build a pipeline to carry Kurdish oil to the Mediterranean.
This will give us one good ally in the region - the Kurds - and secure for us control over strategic assets and trade routes. The Kurds will be so worried about losing what they have that they won't be attacking our supply lines at every turn.[/QUOTE]Man Walter, Richard Perle and David Frum got nuttin' on you. :-) But I'm at a loss to see how this is all in the strict interests of American-Israeli hegemony?!! While interesting, all the suggestions you put forth need decades, if not generations, to even attempt. And though all the neo-cons talk about dividing up Iraq I'm not sure this wouldn't be worse in the long run. If there were this three-way division, I'd certainly put my money on a Sunnite dominance with Saudi Arabia, Syria, Kuwait, and Turkey siding with it.
And if I'm Russia and I see this power play, I gotta see to it that some rogue generals make some nukes go missing.
But back to the immediate war in Iraq. Clearly the grandmasters at the Pentagon are clueless how to win this. Apparently the ideas given to them by Israel (e.g., isolate whole cities and set-up a prison-style cordon) haven't been very successful.
And Fallujah nows appears to a costly mistake-- in lives and the astronomical price it will take to rebuild it. Remember mere weeks ago all the experts on Fox News (e.g., John Gibson, Britt Hume, et al.) and Hannity and Limbaugh told us Fallujah was key to beating the "terrorists" once and for all. Now it's this bogus election. Before Fallujah the key to winning this once and for all was setting up a provisional government. Before that it was capturing Saddam. Before that it was rounding up the 'deck of cards'. Man, thinking back to when we were still looking for the 'deck of cards' and when Saddam was captured, think about the events since then and the downward spiral and the massive casualties the U.S. has suffered since then-- the majority of the roughly 1,400 US soldiers killed and 10,000 wounded have been since the capture of Saddam. Imagine this trend a year from now, how bad things will be. And now strain is setting in on the U.S. military in Iraq and the rotations of dwindling reserve and guard units. I heard on the local news about a Maryland national guard unit heading to Iraq and if all goes well returning June of 2006! Who in their right mind, save for super patriot mercenaries, would sign up for the guard or reserve now. Especially when you see healthy 20-somethings who signed up for the military full-time playing soldier in Guam or Okinawa or Korea, as some 50-year old steelworker, weekend warrior, from the Maine national guard is sent over to the Sunni Triangle. I see professional military men and women in their spotless uniforms everyday on the Metro heading into their Pentagon jobs. Many of these folks look fairly young and healthy. Then I think of all the poor slobs in these guard and reserve units in their 40's and 50's, leaving their real-paying job to drive fuel trucks through 'Ambush Alley'. It's beyond absurd.
2005-01-25 04:48 | User Profile
[SIZE=6][COLOR=Red]1373 U.S. Military Fatalities R.I.P.[/COLOR][/SIZE]
1373 U.S. Military Fatalities reported so far for Iraq invasion/occupation
[url]http://icasualties.org/oif/[/url]
British major denies abuse of Iraqis
[url]http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-01-21-britain-iraq-abuse_x.htm[/url]
British officer denies 'beasting' order [url]http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1397419,00.html[/url]
2005-01-25 06:50 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Faust][SIZE=6][COLOR=Red]1373 U.S. Military Fatalities R.I.P.[/COLOR][/SIZE] [/QUOTE] He died on a quiet day - so quiet that the offical headquarters report for the day read "All's Quiet on the Iraq (ehr Western) Front".
But lets not think we should blame the neo's. Remember Begin's famous phrase
Goy killing goy - and [I][B]we[/B][/I] have to be responsible?
2005-01-25 21:18 | User Profile
Okiereddust,
You mean:[SIZE=6][COLOR=Red]1380 U.S. Military Fatalities R.I.P.[/COLOR][/SIZE]
2005-01-25 22:41 | User Profile
[QUOTE]The insurgents haven't won one battle and they won't win one in the future.[/QUOTE]
Jack,
They don't have to win any battles. All they have to do is to keep up the hit and run attacks and survive. Eventually, the U.S. will go home.
2005-01-26 15:46 | User Profile
36 killed today.
God be with the friends and families.
2005-01-26 15:58 | User Profile
[QUOTE=xmetalhead]America's war on Iraq is now a lost cause, as it was from the beginning. Many people predicted this disastrous outcome, including us on OD, but seeing it actually unfold is so heartbreaking that I can't imagine any American escaping the repercussions of such an evil action taken by choice by it's own government in attacking an innocent country and killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the process.[/QUOTE] Indeed. I often feel like the Trojan girl, Cassandra, who was cursed by Apollo to accurately predict the future but to never be believed. This damnable war, the neocons, the apostasy of much of Christendom -- all things that are clear as day to me and others here at OD, but of which the masses are completely oblivious.
2005-01-26 16:21 | User Profile
Another day, another obscene headline so like the ones before it they are beginning to blur into the same story.
Why? Why are they there? Why should they die this way? Why should these kids be fed into Charles Krauthammer and Bill Kristol's meat-grinder? For what? Yet another abstract concept like 'freedom' in a hellhole that's never had it and doesn't want it? Why are American kids expendable... but a Danny Pearl embodies what we're fighting for?
And why is [I]asking [/I] 'why' like an all-access pass giving every court Jew and shabgoy lickspittle in America tacit permission to shout you down while saluting the flag with their best side facing the camera?
Why did America make this fatal turn in the road of history 100 years ago - from a prosperous land of plenty envied by the whole world for the oceans seperating us from the unending squabbles and skirmishes of Old Europe and her time-bomb colonies - to the global SWAT team that mobilizes for action every time World Jewry blows their police whistle?
Are our kids [I]ever [/I] going to be worth more than cannon-fodder, bleeding to death thousands of miles from home to make the counting-houses safe for Hymie?
[QUOTE][B]Marine Helicopter Crashes in Iraq, Killing 31[/B]
By SAMEER N. YACOUB, AP
BAGHDAD, Iraq (Jan. 26) - A U.S. military transport helicopter crashed in bad weather in Iraq's western desert Wednesday, killing 31 people, all believed to be Marines, in the deadliest incident for U.S. troops since the war began, officials said. Insurgents killed four American troops in an ambush and carried out a flurry of attacks on sites linked to this weekend's elections.
A Bush administration official said there were no survivors from the crash and that the cause was not immediately known.
The CH-53 Sea Stallion, which was carrying personnel from the 1st Marine Division, went down about 1:20 a.m. near the town of Rutbah, about 220 miles west of Baghdad, while conducting security operations, the military said in a statement.
A search and rescue team has reached the site and an investigation into what caused the crash was under way. The administration official said there was bad weather at the time.
The official said Wednesday that all 31 people killed in the crash were believed to be U.S. Marines - the most American servicemembers to die in a single incident in Iraq. It was also the deadliest day for U.S. forces since the March 2003 invasion.
''We are saddened anytime there is loss of life of our troops in harm's way,'' White House press secretary Scott McClellan said.
In Iraq's Anbar province, four U.S. Marines were killed in fighting, the military said in a statement.
The statement gave no further details, but WABC reporter Jim Dolan, who was embedded with the troops who were attacked, said the deaths came when insurgents ambushed a Marine convoy leaving the town of Haditha, west of Baghdad, hitting a vehicle with a rocket-propelled grenade.
With the four Marines' deaths, at least 1,376 members of the U.S. military have died in Iraq, according to an Associated Press count. If all 31 dead in the crash are confirmed to be military personnel, the count would rise to 1,407.
The previous single deadliest incident for U.S. troops was also a helicopter crash: a November 2004 collision of two Black Hawk helicopters that were trying to avoid ground fire, killing 17 servicemembers. Earlier that month, a Chinook transport helicopter was shot down by shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missile near Fallujah, killing 16 American soldiers and wounding 26.
The U.S. military has lost at least 33 helicopters since the start of the war, including at least 20 brought down by hostile fire, according to a study by the Brookings Institution.
The deadliest day for American troops during the initial invasion of Iraq was March 23, 2003, when 26 Americans were killed in a number of separate incidents. President Bush declared major combat over on May 1, 2003, but fighting has continued.
Last month, a suicide bomb exploded at a mess tent in a base near Mosul, killing 22 people including 14 U.S. soldiers and three American contractors.
Meanwhile, insurgents carried out a string of five car bombs across the country Wednesday, including three that exploded in rapid succession in Riyadh, a tense town north of Baghdad. At least five people, including three policemen, were killed. One of the bombs targeted a U.S. convoy but there was no report of casualties, police said.
Four American soldiers were injured in a car bombing Wednesday in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, the U.S. command said. Another car bomb targeted a multinational forces convoy on the road to Baghdad's international airport, injuring four soldiers, the command said.
The attack temporarily closed the airport road, one of the country's most dangerous. Up to four mortar shells exploded Wednesday near a police station in the northern Baghdad suburb of Sabaa al-Bor, injuring at least one Iraqi.
A Web site statement, purportedly from al-Qaida in Iraq, said it carried out the attack on the airport road, claiming that the targets were Americans.
The group also warned Iraqis to stay away from the polls in Sunday's election.
''Here are the Americans calling for the fraudulent elections and here are the soldiers of (interim Prime Minister Ayad) Allawi competing to protect their brothers of the Jews and the Christians,'' a separate Web statement signed by the group said. ''The enemies of God will see that death is their destiny and failure their ally.''
''Oh people, be careful. Be careful not to be near the centers of infidelity and vice, the polling centers,'' it said, ''Don't blame us but blame yourselves'' if harmed.
The statement's authenticity could not be verified, but it was the second in two days purportedly by Islamic militants in Iraq to warn of deadly attacks surrounding the election.
In new attacks, two schools slated to be used as polling stations were bombed overnight, and a bomb was found in a third school but defused.
A ground floor classroom in one of the buildings, a preparatory school for girls, was littered with broken glass and its main entrance was blackened and clogged with debris.
Al-Arabiya television broadcast a videotape showing three men identified by insurgents as election workers who were kidnapped in the northern city of Mosul. The satellite station said the three were abducted by the Nineveh Mujahedeen, which threatened to attack polling stations on election day.
In other election-related attacks, gunmen opened fire on the local headquarters of the Communist Party and a major Kurdish party north of Baghdad, a police official said.
Assailants blasted the two buildings with heavy machine gun fire and killed a traffic policeman in the city of Baqouba, said police 1st Lt. Hassan Ahmed. The buildings house the city's offices of the communists and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. There was no word on casualties in those shootings.
Residents of the insurgent-filled city of Ramadi, 70 miles west of Baghdad, reported clashes there Wednesday between U.S. troops and rebels. The fighting erupted when militants attacked a U.S. patrol with rocket-propelled grenades, the residents said. One Iraqi was killed and two were wounded, doctors said.
U.S. troops found at least six bombs at different locations around Baghdad, the military said. Police discovered two more bombs in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, where turnout in Sunday's national elections is expected to be high.
Iraqis will choose a 275-member National Assembly and regional legislatures. Sunni Muslim extremists have threatened to sabotage the election and many Sunni clerics have called for a boycott because of the presence of 170,000 U.S. and other foreign troops.
In Baghdad's Sadr City district, Iraqi forces backed by U.S. troops raided a Shiite mosque, detaining up to 25 followers of a radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, police and the cleric's supporters said.
[I]AP correspondent Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.[/I][/QUOTE]
2005-01-26 16:47 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Jack Cassidy]I still think the actual number of people engaged in an armed, organized insurgency is relatively small and localized. Maybe that was true a year ago, but it is not true now.
There does appear to be a more organized and sophisticated network that is behind targeted assassinations and attacks but they don't appear to be able to take on US forces in any capacity. They don't have to, and they don't need to. So besides making more of a mess for their country I don't quite understand their goal. It's simple: they will bleed us until we get tired of it, and leave. As much as I was against this war there does appear to be a point where further attacks no longer serve any purpose.
That's because you are thinking like a comfortable American whose home has not been invaded and occupied by a strange and incomprensible army, composed of people of a different, and hostile, race, language, religion, and culture.
The insurgents haven't won one battle and they won't win one in the future. True, but besides the point. The Vietnamese didn't win any battles, either, but they won the war. Like many Americans, you focus too much on the material and the technical aspects of war, and completely lose sight of the moral and political aspects of war.
A thorough reading of Lind's writings on 4th generation war would be very enlightening for you, I think. Well worth your time.
At some point they need to take the lesson of the Confederate generals in the U.S. Civil War, who could have gone to the mountains in a guerrilla campaign and continued drawing casualties on the Union side, dragging that conflict on indefinitely. Given what happened to the South both under Reconstruction, and since, I think many Iraqis would be thankful they are not taking that option. There are other important things besides peace and material welling being. Thank God for all of us that men like Robert E. Lee were running the opposition and chose what would be in the best interest of everyone. Even he had second thoughts when he saw what Reconstruction was doing to the South. But alas, I'm afraid there are no General Lee's in this Iraq insurgency, just alot of thugs.[/QUOTE]Iraq is a highly tribalized and sectarian society. The South - Southern Whites that is - were highly homogenized and modern by comparison. They were merely fightly over a question of tarrifs, economic issues touching on slavery, and Constitutional issues regarding precisely what level of Federal/State centralization or decentralization were best.
These are important issues, but not, probably, worth a bitter-ender, never ending, fight to the last man, death struggle - at least not in their opinion at that time.
The situation in Iraq is vastly different, the issues causing the resistance are not comparable.
2005-01-26 17:24 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Quantrill]Indeed. I often feel like the Trojan girl, Cassandra, who was cursed by Apollo to accurately predict the future but to never be believed. This damnable war, the neocons, the apostasy of much of Christendom -- all things that are clear as day to me and others here at OD, but of which the masses are completely oblivious.[/QUOTE]
Q, to me, the obliviousness of the American masses is far more frightening than the war itself. As for the growing apostasy of the Chrisitan churches: Christ said this was going to happen. Just keep believing in Jesus' saving grace and mercy and you and I and the rest will be just fine.
[QUOTE=Il Ragno]Why? Why are they there? Why should they die this way? Why should these kids be fed into Charles Krauthammer and Bill Kristol's meat-grinder? For what? Yet another abstract concept like 'freedom' in a hellhole that's never had it and doesn't want it? Why are American kids expendable... but a Danny Pearl embodies what we're fighting for?[/QUOTE]
The war, IR, is not about "freedom" but about instituting slavery and calling it democracy. Sleight-of-hand is the black magic of the Krauthammers, Kristols, and Podhoretzs. That's why we're in Iraq.
[QUOTE=Il Ragno]And why is asking 'why' like an all-access pass giving every court Jew and shabgoy lickspittle in America tacit permission to shout you down while saluting the flag with their best side facing the camera?[/QUOTE]
Because Facists always need scapegoats.
[QUOTE]Why did America make this fatal turn in the road of history 100 years ago - from a prosperous land of plenty envied by the whole world for the oceans seperating us from the unending squabbles and skirmishes of Old Europe and her time-bomb colonies - to the global SWAT team that mobilizes for action every time World Jewry blows their police whistle?[/QUOTE]
Why did America take this fatal turn 100 years ago? Because it was easier to laugh with the sinners than to cry with the saints.
2005-01-28 04:35 | User Profile
[SIZE=6][COLOR=Red]1420 U.S. Military Fatalities R.I.P.[/COLOR][/SIZE]
2005-01-28 18:39 | User Profile
[SIZE=4][COLOR=DarkRed]5 U.S. soldiers killed, terror arrests announced[/COLOR][/SIZE] [B]U.S. helicopter crashes in Baghdad; cause unknown[/B]
BAGHDAD, Iraq - A U.S. helicopter crashed in Baghdad Friday night, the latest development after a day that saw insurgents kill five U.S. soldiers and attack polling centers ahead of Sunday's elections, while the Iraqi government trumpeted the arrests of three men it says are top aides to terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
The Army helicopter crashed in southwestern Baghdad and the fate of the crew was not immediately known, a U.S. military official said.
Military officials do not think the helicopter was hit by hostile fire, but are still investigating, said Lt. Col. James Hutton.
The OH-58 Kiowa copter usually carries a crew of three and is unlikely to carry large numbers of passengers. On Wednesday, a Marine helicopter crashed in western Iraq, killing 31 soldiers. Bad weather was cited as the cause.
Ground units were at the scene, but the status of the crew was not immediately known, Hutton told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. Kiowas are used mostly for surveillance purposes. Other helicopters were flying over the crash site in southwest Baghdad to provide cover for the ground search and rescue units, Hutton said.
Earlier Friday, three U.S. soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in southwestern Baghdad, military officials said.
Two other soldiers were killed in separate attacks. A roadside bomb killed one soldier and injured three others in southern Baghdad. Another soldier was shot dead about 15 minutes later in the cityââ¬â¢s north, the military said.
In another attack, a suicide car bomb killed four Iraqi policemen in Baghdad on Friday.
The rest of the story[url= http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6874656/]here.[/url]
2005-02-03 02:55 | User Profile
[SIZE=5][COLOR=Red]1438 U.S. military dead
U.S. Troop Deaths Hit 100 for Month[/COLOR][/SIZE]