Ooooooh, now that our entire country's armed forces have been destroyed, we're going to frighten you evil Americans with really tough talk!
< /MOCKING >
Posted on 05/01/2003 7:41:25 PM PDT by blam
Iraqis vow revenge as hatred of US grows
By Alan Philps in Falluja
(Filed: 02/05/2003)
Hatred of the Americans is boiling on the streets of Falluja, where Iraqis lobbed grenades into the US military compound yesterday, wounding seven and damaging vehicles.
All over the town were banners calling on the Americans to go, while local people shook their fists at foreigners, vowing to take revenge.
Outside the mayor's office, which is next to the American compound, staff had hung an uncompromising banner: "Sooner or later, US killers, we will kick you out."
According to the mayor, Taha Bedeiwi, who is recognised by the US forces, 20 people have been shot dead by the Americans so far - 16 in a late-night incident on Monday and four more when a US convoy clashed with stone-throwing demonstrators on Wednesday.
The Americans insist that gunmen among the demonstrators fired first both times. Iraqis support this in the first incident but all the evidence for Wednesday's shooting is that it came in response only to some stone throwing. Witnesses said that the gunner of a Humvee fired his machinegun at the crowd, while ducking down inside the vehicle.
The Americans now find themselves in a blood feud with much of the city, which under Islamic law can be ended only by the payment of compensation.
"We demand compensation from the Americans, but we also demand our town back," said Sheikh Khalaf Abed el-Shebib, leader of one of the 35 clans that make up the town.
Searching for the ugliest comparison he could find, he said: "Even in Israel they do not shoot children in such numbers when they throw stones in a demonstration."
After appeals from the US military, the tribal and religious leaders ordered a break from demonstrations yesterday, but the town was braced for more trouble after Friday prayers today.
The town has offered peace with the Americans if they pull out of the centre and set up a post at the railway station from where they can mount patrols.
But the crisis seems beyond such a simple solution, now that religious and social passions have been inflamed.
The soldiers, in their helmets, body armour and gadgetry slung from neck, belt and thigh, look like warriors from a video game. Unlike the British troops in Basra, they have made no attempt to establish eye contact with the local people or talk to anyone except the mayor and his officials.
The 82nd Airborne - one of the toughest elements in the US military - is ill-equipped to control crowds. The soldiers have no tear gas, and to disperse the first demonstration outside a school they were occupying they fired smoke grenades - a dangerous weapon in a country where everyone knows that the Saddam regime used poison gas.
The 82nd Airborne is now moving out, to be replaced by other units.
It is a deeply confusing situation and nowhere is the split personality of the Iraqis after the fall of Saddam more visible than in the mayor's office.
During a news conference the mayor admitted that there were "bad elements" in the crowds, a phrase his interpreter chose to translate as "patriots". After the mayor had finished speaking, an aide emerged to tell journalists to ignore everything the interpreter had said.
The mayor is a mystery to the Americans. He was chosen by the local tribal and religious leaders after the fall of the Saddam regime, claiming he had been persecuted and driven into exile.
However, local people say that he is a rich man who spent five months in the United Arab Emirates, not a political exile. Getting to the bottom of this will be a learning experience for the Americans.
A British officer commented: "They rely too much on technology and hide behind their defences. They have to get out and meet the people and really find out what is going on."
Let me guess. They are going to roast our stomachs in the pits of hell.
Huh? This whole article is very confused. Here the author implies that tear gas (which would produce poison gas-like symptoms) would have been better than a smoke grenade.
The title is also wrong. It should read something like this: "Saddam Sympathizers Vow Revenge".
They are a minority who want to screw up the new Iraq. Americans will weed them out with the help of other Iraqis.
Here's a suggestion: DON'T THROW ROCKS AT PEOPLE CARRYING GUNS! Sheesh, I'm always amazed at how Arab types love to bring rocks to a gunfight.
I'm also getting tired of the ingratitude that many of these people who we liberated have shown. Maybe it's time we leave them to the next piss-ant dictator who will come along and kill them. In fact, as we leave we should distribute flyers stating that we believe Saddam Hussein is alive and waiting to re-enter Iraq from a safe location.
Ooooooh, now that our entire country's armed forces have been destroyed, we're going to frighten you evil Americans with really tough talk!
< /MOCKING >
True, but that's also precisely what the Left-wing reporters want us to do, so that they can then claim that we're no better than Saddam (something that even the accomplished liars of the Left can't even manage so far).
True enough, but what else can we do? A too passive approach to the situation would encourage more of the same, and the leftists would then claim that they were right all along -- that we never should've gone in there in the first place, and that the administration was presumptuous to believe that the Iraqi people would accept us as liberators.
Was the Brit who said this in Falluja? If so, he sure gets around. I saw this same quote a week ago in another article talking about the situation in Basra.
Seems to be an agenda at work here.
Actually, you can always rest assured that we are already doing precisely the right thing if the reporters are going out of their way to criticize it.
In this case, our troops are ignoring the vain, blusterous words of the Iraqi provacatuers, while simultaneously shooting the trouble-makers (without "mowing down" entire crowds of protesters).
And after a while, the reporters will move on to an entirely different attack (I mean, now that half of the Iraqi treasures have been recovered, you sure don't hear much about the looting of that museum, know what I mean).
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