U.S. Marines Wall in Iraqi City With Sand

U.S. Marines used to patrol the streets of this city near the volatile Syrian border. Now they've penned it in with a wall of sand, leaving only three ways in or out. While causing discomfort to the townspeople, the military says it is an effective barrier to insurgents and frees up troops for use in other parts of restive Anbar province in western Iraq.
The Marines ringed Rutbah with a 10.5-mile-long berm, seven feet high and 20 feet wide, in mid-January and reduced their presence to checkpoints at the three entrances that also are manned by a few dozen Iraqi soldiers.

The move was forced by a major U.S. effort to make the former insurgent stronghold of Fallujah a showplace of American-Iraqi cooperation. That leaves fewer Marines to patrol a region with close tribal and economic ties to neighboring Syria, which Washington has accused of letting militants slip over the border. The sand wall is only ``an intermediate solution,'' said Marine Lt. Col. Robert Kosid, whose 1st Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion is responsible for Rutbah and several thousand square miles of desert around it.

``I think the long-term success of Rutbah involves a permanent presence in the city,'' said Kosid, who was also based here on his previous tour in Iraq. But there aren't any Iraqi forces available now. Rutbah's corrupt police force was disbanded last year, and hundreds of Iraqi soldiers that had been in the area were moved north in November for a joint U.S.-Iraqi operation around Qaim.


(snip)
In response to civilian complaints, the Marines moved the berm to put a local gas station within the wall. They also regularly usher water trucks and medical vehicles to the front of inspection lines. A U.S.-funded hospital for the city is just weeks from completion. Marines survey people entering town to find out about their needs, and to ask for tips on local insurgents.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-5664641,00.html

sound like spreading democracy to me.

...undemocratic about this image?





PB

Maps like that are very handy in explaining to
the newbies how the world turns.

wall either. Funny how their side includes all the best land, all the water resources. Somehow the Palestinian land doesn't include these amenities.

Don't think that doesn't occur to plenty of people. But right now the topic was a city in Iraq and a wall built by U S Military.

Or does leaving 3 passageways make it legal, since the people are not totally cut off, and not necessarily condemned to starvation? Does anyone know?