Fallujah braces for US reprisal

The Age ^ | April 3, 2004 | Paul McGeough

[Piefloater]

The predominantly Sunni city of Fallujah is braced for what US leaders, from the White House down, promise will be an "overwhelming" response to the brutal deaths of four US security contractors in the city on Wednesday.

There were sporadic attacks across Iraq yesterday, but in the aftermath of scenes reminiscent of a horror film - in which the bodies of the four were incinerated and dragged around the city behind vehicles before being dismembered or left hanging from a bridge - an eerie and shocked silence descended on the country.

Internationally, particularly in the US, there was outrage.

Brigadier-General Mark Kimmitt, the main spokesman for the US military in Baghdad, warned that 4000 US marines stationed near Fallujah would respond. "They are going to hunt down the people responsible for this bestial act," he said. "It will be at a time and a place of our choosing. It will be methodical, it will be precise and it will be overwhelming."

Pressed on the decision by the marines not to intervene in Wednesday's mayhem, Colonel Michael Walker, a civil affairs commander for the marines, said: "Should we have sent in a tank so we could have gotten, with all due respect, four dead bodies back?

"What good would that have done? A mob is a mob. We would have just provoked them. The smart play was to let this thing fade out."

US administrator Paul Bremer, who on Thursday was watched over by a 10-strong private security detail from Blackwater USA, the company that employed the four dead men, described the killers as human jackals, and their work as "an example of the ongoing struggle between human dignity and barbarism".

Lieutenant-Colonel Saad Jasim, head of the 900-strong Iraqi military unit in Fallujah, explained the failure of his men and the local police to respond: "We were only told about it when it had finished. By the time we arrived there was no one there."

But there seemed to be unanimity across the US political and military establishment that Fallujah would not be a repeat of Mogadishu in 1993 - the Somali capital from which the Americans retreated in shock after the dead crew of a downed Black Hawk helicopter were subjected to similar mutilation.

In Fallujah, the bodies of the four Americans were not retrieved until late on Wednesday, when local clerics and policemen handed them, wrapped in blankets, to US officials.

The attack that preceded the desecration was similar to many of the insurgency assaults on US occupation forces in Iraq, few of which have been claimed by any particular group. But on Thursday, leaflets were distributed in Fallujah claiming the attack on behalf of the Group of Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, saying it was retribution for the controversial Israeli assassination last month of the spiritual leader of Hamas.

The reaction of Iraqis was mixed. Local television treated the deaths as major news, but many of Baghdad's new newspapers gave it secondary treatment. Some Iraqis wanted to separate pride in the success of the initial attack on the two US vehicles in Fallujah from revulsion at the treatment of the dead.

[Piefloater]

They are going to hunt down the people responsible for this bestial act. It will be . . . precise and it will be overwhelming. MARK KIMMITT, US military spokesman

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[Blood of Tyrants]

To the savages in Fallujah:

When you least expect it, expect it.

[Blood of Tyrants]

You don't think I gave anything away, do you? ;^)

[Packer Pete]

I hope that instead of sending in that tank we concentrated on sealing off potential escape routes from Falluja. Can't wait for our overwhelming response.

[Eurotwit]

Hi there Piefloater..

You are Australian right?

I am a Norwegian (one of the many), who completed their education in Australia. Let me just say this. You have one of the best, if not the very best, country on the planet.

Keep up the good work :-)

I'm seriously thinking of emigrating in a few years, if your government allows me that is.

Cheers.

[anniegetyourgun]

No doubt man of the so-called men in this town are sweating big ones, as they hide behind women's skirts.

[marlon]

What are they bracing for? They are brave muslim fighters, Jihadists, the most fearless fighters in the world. To boot they have Allah on their side and they are happy to die for Allah and destroy the evil empire and all infidels.

Come on all you towel heads, don't brace yoursleves behind your women's bhurkas meet the USMC out in your dust covered streets and show us all what REAL MEN you muslim fanatic scum really are.

[thoughtomator]

We could always simply lay seige, not allow anything in or out - including food - until the Fallujans hand over the perps.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Spray em down with DDT.

[MizSterious]

Many of us wanted to see quick retribution. However, I think letting them sweat for awhile might be better. I pray that it comes when they least expect it, and that it's much harsher than they imagined possible.

[CatoRenasci]

Nahhh, these poor excuses for fetid toe chees are still in the bragging stage. Like most Arabs, they'll talk big and bluster as long as they can, before turning tail and running like whinny girly men.

[Dogbert41]

If every living thing were put to the torch today in that cursed city, I would lift a drink in the air to our Marines.

[TexasCajun]

Fallujah Freedom Fighter, "allah damn!, Was that my MY face on CNN! ...and I don't even own a camel!"

[caisson71]

There was a recommendation from a caller to Rush yesterday that made a lot of sense. He says the US should inform mullah's and clerics that they have days to deliver the murders and in the meantime, no more water, no more food, no more travel, electricity, fuel, etc. until ALL responsible killers are delivered. In the meantime, I'd park about 100 of CAT D-10s at the city gates and move them forward a foot each day for five days at which time all would crank up their engines, lower their blades and start dozing until they run out of fuel.

[Alberta's Child]

We could always simply lay seige, not allow anything in or out - including food - until the Fallujans hand over the perps.

That was my suggestion yesterday. Stop all food shipments and shut down the water supply for nine weeks -- one week for each American killed in Fallujah the other day.

When the people of Fallujah are tired of drinking their own stale urine and gnawing the flesh off their dead, you will have the most docile, cooperative population on the face of the earth.

[GrandEagle]

What good would that have done? A mob is a mob.
Hogwash!!! Had most of the perpetrators all assembled in one place! A couple of Apache's could have taken care of it!

[Rodney King]

You really ought to google the word "Lidice". That's what you are proposing.

[CatoRenasci]

The city is too big for 100 CATs to level it. The idea of surrounding the city and cutting off all food, water, electricty, fuel, etc. and not allowing anyone in or out -- a traditional cordon sanitarie -- is sound.

Giving the local leaders the option of turning ALL of the miscreants over to us within a relatively short time is also sound.

The problem is what to do when they don't. You'll need at least a couple of DIVISIONS to surround and subdue the city thoroughly. Street by street, block by block, house by house. Think Stalingrad, if they're really up for a fight. I don't think they will be, but if we start getting that kind of resistance, then we give them 24 hours to get the women and children out, and any innocent men who are willing to be thoroughly interrogated, I suppose, and then we hit them hard. A Carthegenian peace, if necessary.

[wasp69]

I think maybe the animals that did this have just figured out that bill ain't in office anymore. I can only hope that as the life drains from their bodies, their last image being one of America's Finest, they finally understand that they should have stayed home and not shot at the contractors. I personally hope Uncle Sams Misguided Children take their time with this scum.