US launches artillery barrage in southern Baghdad

Source: Reuters

BAGHDAD, April 29 (Reuters) - The U.S. military in Iraq launched an artillery barrage in southern Baghdad on Sunday against suspected insurgent targets, with two dozen loud explosions shaking the southern outskirts of the capital.

U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Christopher Garver said the morning blasts, which were heard across the city, were caused by U.S. artillery but declined to say what the target was.

Tens of thousands of U.S. and Iraqi troops have been deployed in Baghdad as part of a 10-week-old security crackdown to combat sectarian militias and insurgents.

The Iraqi police said the artillery was being fired from the U.S. Forward Operating Base Falcon in southern Baghdad into the al-Buaitha neighbourhood of Dora, a volatile district that is a Sunni insurgent stronghold.

Read more: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IBO922965.htm

the definition of "terrorism," just one more time?

Redstone

:(

that a lot of innocent civilians were killed by American artillery. Iraqi housing is not that sturdy. Landing a 155mm artillery shell on one house will destroy the houses next to it.

The surge's only accomplishment is more bloodletting. Each day we remain in Iraq is a day in which people will die needlessly just because Bush doesn't want our inevitable defeat to take place on his watch.

thinking about 155 rounds going off in crowded city neighborhoods just sickens me.

Redstone

An artillery barrage in a major city? How desperate are we? Hey, Mr Fuck You Cheney, who's in their death throes now?

FACTBOX-Security developments in Iraq, April 29
More April 29 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Iraq at 1100 GMT on Sunday:

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed three people and wounded eight others in the southern Baghdad Zaafaraniya district, police said.

BAGHDAD - Amal al-Mudarress, a well-known Iraqi journalist, was seriously wounded after gunmen shot her near her home in western Baghdad, police and hospital sources said.

BAGHDAD - At least seven Katyusha rockets landed near a Sunni mosque in the northern Baghdad Adhamiya district, killing two guards and wounding seven others on Saturday, police said.

NEAR SAMARRA - Gunmen set fire to 15 fuel trucks and kidnapped their drivers on a main road near the city of Samarra, 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.

sadly there is more:http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/KAM940394.htm

..in the northern Baghdad Adhamiya district.

and the US artillary was dialed into a southern Baghdad neighborhood. I wonder who called for the precise US artillary strike. I saw an article that suggested it was a joint Iraqi/US mission.



btw
WHo makes the Katyusha rockets?

I think I read about those rockets last summer



on edit I think the answer to who called in the strike was found in the article here;




The Iraqi police said the artillery was being fired from the U.S. Forward Operating Base ...

Source: Agence France-Presse

Well-known Iraqi TV journalist shot and wounded

53 minutes ago

BAGHDAD (AFP) - A well-known newsreader from Iraqi state
television was shot and wounded on Sunday outside her
Baghdad home, her network told AFP.

Amal al-Muderas was attacked by unidentified gunmen in the
mixed Khadraa district of western Baghdad, security sources
said, apparently the latest victim of attacks aimed at state-
run Al-Iraqiya television.

Muderas was comforted by colleagues as she lay bandaged
in a bed at the city's Yarmukh Hospital with head and chest
injuries.

At least 158 journalists and media professionals, the vast
majority of them Iraqis, have been killed in Iraq since the
US invasion of March 2003, including another female
presenter from Al-Iraqiya.


Link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070429/wl_mideast_afp/iraqunrestmedia_070429130452

Source: AP

U.S. fires artillery on southern Baghdad

By THOMAS WAGNER, Associated Press Writer 11 minutes ago

BAGHDAD - U.S. forces fired an artillery barrage in southern Baghdad Sunday morning, rocking the capital with loud explosions, while the death toll from a suicide car bomb attack in the Shiite holy city of Karbala rose to 68.

The blasts in Baghdad came a day after the U.S. military announced the deaths of nine American troops, including four killed in separate roadside bombings south of Baghdad and five in fighting in Anbar province, a Sunni insurgent stronghold west of the capital.

The size and the pattern of the explosions, which began after 9 a.m. and lasted for at least 15 minutes, suggested they were directed at Sunni militant neighborhoods along the city's southern rim. Such blasts have been heard in the evenings but are rare at that time of day.

In a brief statement to The Associated Press, the U.S. military said it fired the artillery from a forward operating base near Iraq's Rasheed military base southeast of Baghdad, but provided no other details.

more...

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070429/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq;_ylt=A0WTcVixnDRGiJMAUQys0NUE

In our name these mindless fuckers dare to fire indiscriminate killing devices into NEIGHBORHOODS in a crowded city because they are frustrated at the slow process of more precise killing methods.

As an old combat F.O. and artillery fire direction officer, I am mortified! The thing that turned me against the Vietnam war was learning we had dropped B-52 bombs on the city of Ben Tre. This is the practical equivalent.

God Help Us!

(on edit) These are weapons designed for use against enemy combat troops, not rebellious civilians. Let us hope the outrage over this signals the beginning of the end of this historic debacle.

they were "militant" neighborhoods, so it is okay to blow these people into red mist. After all, we must trust our noble media in framing these events in as truthful a manner as possible. What red-blooded American would think any differently?

:sarcasm:

My old CO used to say as he got his combat ticket punched on his way to the top.

"Men there's plenty of Glory here, for everyone."

"Son, it's not a very nice war. But it's the only war we've got!"

We have the shells, I guess we have to shoot at something.

OMFG, what have we come to. :grr:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070429/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq;_ylt=AliLQlsxVpQQ3.6r7P5jBL.s0NUE

Baghdad hit with blasts; Karbala toll up

By THOMAS WAGNER, Associated Press Writer 8 minutes ago

BAGHDAD - U.S. forces fired an artillery barrage in southern Baghdad Sunday morning, rocking the capital with loud explosions. The death toll from a suicide car bomb attack in the Shiite holy city of Karbala rose to 68 as residents dug through the debris of heavily damaged shops.

The blasts in Baghdad came a day after the U.S. military announced the deaths of nine American troops, including four killed in separate roadside bombings south of Baghdad and five in fighting in Anbar province, a Sunni insurgent stronghold west of the capital.

American troops also detained 72 suspected insurgents and seized nitric acid and other bomb-making materials during raids on Sunday targeting al-Qaida in
Iraq in Anbar province, a Sunni insurgent stronghold west of the capital, and Salahuddin province, a volatile Sunni area northwest of the capital, the U.S. military said.

The size and the pattern of the explosions, which began after 9 a.m. and lasted for at least 15 minutes, suggested they were directed at Sunni militant neighborhoods along the city's southern rim. Such blasts have been heard in the evenings but are rare at that time of day.

In a brief statement to The Associated Press, the U.S. military said it fired the artillery from a forward operating base near Iraq's Rasheed military base southeast of Baghdad, but provided no other details.

more...

Walls and artillery barrages.

Iraqi's taking back their country in the Sunni Triangle. Being reported by the Arab MSM


Last year, Iraq’s western Anbar province was the most dangerous in the war-torn country.
snip

But last summer, Sunni tribal leader Sheikh Abdulsattar Abu Risha gathered his fellow tribal chiefs and formed a strong police force in an attempt to restore security in the province. Under the umbrella of the Anbar Salvation Council, Abu Risha’s initiative showed early signs of success. About 200 young men from Abu Risha’s tribe first signed up as police recruits last year, and after two months of basic training in Jordan, they took to the streets.

"The situation (in Anbar) was unbearable before, people were tortured, shot dead, bodies littered the streets. We couldn't even leave our homes to bury the dead," Abu Risha told Reuters.

About 20,000 police are now deployed in the province, where 15 large police stations have been revived and are being controlled by the provincial police chief.

"I joined the police force so that we can protect ourselves, and defend our tribes from the terrorist groups,” said Nizar Mahmoud, 30.

U.S. military commanders say the number of car bombings in Anbar, especially Ramadi, has fallen. And for the first time since the war began, U.S. military deaths in the province are fewer than in Baghdad, where a two-month security crackdown involving extra U.S. troops failed to halt violence or reduce the civilian death toll.

snip
http://www.aljazeera.com/cgi-bin/review/article_full_story.asp?service_ID=13477

If stories are true about Syrian border control and the western provinces turning on the 'fighters' then maybe the freedom fighters are being squeezed out of the triangle and the Sunni's may be taking back their provinces.

I say we only need to get out of ALL the cities and redeploy into the no shit desert wastelands.

Out of sight.....

Let the Iraqi's sort em out the way the Sunni triangle is ( at least being reported by al Jazeera. Go figger )

Artillery barrages are normal for safe places, right McCain?