This map, from The Washington Post, was created April 24. There is no estimate available on when the barrier will be completed.
Posted on 05/02/2008 8:56:51 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
This map, from The Washington Post, was created April 24. There is no estimate available on when the barrier will be completed.
The large majority of the direct attacks by the Mahdi Army against US and Iraqi forces in Sadr City are occurring on Qods Street, where a barrier is being erected to separate the Iraqi Army and US controlled sections in the south from the northern portion of the district, the US military told The Long War Journal. The Mahdi Army is attempting to stop the building of the barrier.
US Army engineers are in the process of emplacing tall concrete barriers along the length of Al Qods Street, a major route that runs approximately east to west in the southern portion of Sadr City. Al Qods Street divides the Ishbilyah and Habbibiyah neighborhoods, which are controlled by the US and Iraqi military, from the northern neighborhoods. US and Iraqi forces hope to restrict the movement of weapons and supplies into the southern neighborhoods, prevent the Mahdi Army from using these areas as launch sites for mortar and rocket attacks against the International Zone, establish the writ of the government, and provide humanitarian assistance to Iraqis living in these areas in order to wrest control from the Mahdi Army.
The Mahdi Army is desperately trying to stop the barrier from being built, and is focusing its attacks on US engineers and patrols as they work to complete it. The Mahdi Army has launched complex attacks and ambushes using small-arms, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades, and roadside bombs.
“[The barrier is] a magnet,” said Lieutenant Colonel Steven Stover, the chief Public Affairs Officer for Multinational Division Baghdad in response to email questions on the recent fighting in Sadr City.
(Excerpt) Read more at longwarjournal.org ...
Elsewhere, it's mostly IEDs [improvised explosive devices, or roadside bombs], IDF [indirect fire, or rockets and mortars] and harassment fire.”
Sadrcity Update ping!
The enemy is bottled up. Exits are through chokepoints and kill zones.
God, I can’t believe I’m actually saying this, but I sure hope McCain wins in November.
BUMP!
What chokepoints & kill zones? Just build a very tall, impermeable barrier around the entire place where these scumbags live, and fill the thing with water (or, since water may be scarce in the desert, gasoline).
Enough fornicating around with these savages - kill them, kill them all, and let the vast majority of average Iraqis get on with their lives.
Oh, and speaking of gasoline, we should gift some (a HUGE amount, actually) to Iran as a reward for helping the Mahdi "army" folks. I mean, its only right to help them out, since they've been so helpful to some of the citizens of our ally, Iraq. That Iran has a shortage of gasoline makes this an even better choice. Of course, my sources inform me that the best way to deliver gasoline to Iran, given certain transportation difficulties, is in jellied form and air-dropped. Delivering the gasoline directly to Iran's refineries will be advantageous, and also to lots of their government and military HQs, preferably simultaneously (we wouldn't want to hurt anyone's feelings by making them wait for a delivery, would we?).
That’s odd. Why aren’t the army building a virtual wall? Don’t those work just as well?
My thoughts exactly.
No, no. The difference is that this wall really has to work. The other one was never ever intended to work; it was just political pablum for the conservatives. If we make the proper noises and wave our hands just so, those bitter, gun-loving, religious whiners won’t ever even notice that it isn’t being built.
< /sarcasm>
US and Iraqi forces hope to restrict the movement of weapons and supplies into the southern neighborhoods, prevent the Mahdi Army from using these areas as launch sites for mortar and rocket attacks against the International Zone, establish the writ of the government, and provide humanitarian assistance to Iraqis living in these areas in order to wrest control from the Mahdi Army. The Mahdi Army is desperately trying to stop the barrier from being builtThe Mahdi Army should use the "Final Jeopardy" music for its theme song. Thanks Ernest.
God, I can't believe I'm actually saying this, but I sure hope McCain wins in November.Hey, it's short enough for a tagline...
Sadr City has no infidels so to maximize their eternal reward, they must get out so they can died while destroying infidels.
>>
“[The barrier is] a magnet,”
<<
More flypaper in the kill zone. The more we kill there, the fewer will attempt to engage us elsewhere.
"... on April 28. The Mahdi Army took advantage of the lack of US air cover due to a sand storm to launch an ambush against US forces ... The US soldiers counterattacked and killed 28 Mahdi Army fighters while taking six wounded."
So they thought we wouldn't kick their a$$ without air cover and over extended their forces. Great job by our guys!
"The next day, The Associated Press ran an article on the engagement titled “Militiamen ambush drives back US patrol in Sadr City.” But (LTC)Stover said the ambush failed to force the US soldiers to withdraw. “The barrier emplacement never stopped,”
No surprise that AP lied, I guess I must have missed their retraction...
Chopping the area up into manageable chunks. Why can’t this be done with Gaza?
Probably could, but that is Israel's problem.
Maybe all the IDF needs is some Predator UAV’s with Hellfire missiles.
AP to label it an “Apartied Wall” within the week.
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