Iraqi guerillas getting "a little bit more lethal"

[Vympel]

U.S. General Says Iraq Guerrillas More Lethal
Thu October 2, 2003 10:13 AM ET

By Andrew Marshall

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The top American general in Iraq said on Thursday guerrillas fighting his troops were becoming deadlier, after the killing of three more soldiers added urgency to U.S. efforts to garner help stabilizing the country.

A military spokesman said a soldier from the 4th Infantry Division was killed on Wednesday evening in a rocket-propelled grenade attack on a convoy driving through the town of Samarra, in the heart of the turbulent "Sunni triangle" region.

A female soldier from the same division was killed earlier on Wednesday and three soldiers wounded when guerrillas detonated a remote-control bomb as a convoy passed in deposed dictator Saddam Hussein's home town of Tikrit.

In Baghdad, an attacker with a handgun ambushed soldiers after dark on Wednesday in the Mansur neighborhood, killing one and wounding another, the Army said.

The attacks brought to at least 84 the number of U.S. soldiers killed in action since Washington declared major combat over on May 1, according to Pentagon figures.

"The enemy has evolved. It is a little bit more lethal, little bit more complex, little bit more sophisticated and in some cases a little bit more tenacious, " said Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, commander of ground forces in Iraq.

"As long as we are here the coalition need to be prepared to take casualties," he told a news conference. "We should not be surprised if one of these days we wake up to find there's been a major firefight or a major terrorist attack."

In the town of Falluja, a center of resistance to U.S. forces, police said U.S. gunfire killed an Iraqi man and wounded a woman and a six-year-old girl after an American patrol was shot at on Thursday. Two police officers were also wounded.

DIPLOMATIC WRANGLES

Kurdish police said they had seized a large weapons cache, including anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, mortars, rocket- propelled grenades and machineguns. They also arrested three suspected arms traffickers in a raid near the northern town of Arbil.

Washington is seeking a new resolution giving the United Nations a broader mandate in Iraq and encouraging reluctant allies to provide more troops and cash to police and rebuild Iraq.

President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair face mounting political pressure over the failure to find any chemical, biological or nuclear weapons in Iraq.

David Kay, the CIA official directing the weapons search in Iraq, was scheduled to brief the House and Senate intelligence committees on Thursday. Officials suggest Kay will say no conclusive evidence has been found of weapons of mass destruction.

Efforts in New York to agree a wider role for the U.N. are in stark contrast to events on the ground in Baghdad, where many international U.N. staff have been pulled out following two suicide bomb attacks on their headquarters.

A revised U.S. draft of a Security Council resolution gives the United Nations a list of duties, similar to earlier versions. But it falls short of demands by France, Russia and Germany that the world body play a pivotal, independent role in overseeing Iraq's transition. Washington hopes a new U.N. resolution can be adopted before a crucial donors conference in Madrid on October 23-24.

U.N. sources said some $35 billion would be needed to rebuild Iraq over the next four years in contributions from governments and Iraq's own resources.

I heard a M2A2 Bradley was blown up by a home made mine the other day- no footage was available on the net, but it was on TV apparently (the wreck being towed). They seem to be reverting to Chechen tactics. Destroying armored vehicles are good because unless the troops are experienced, or the vehicle is empty, the troops in the compartment will break their necks from the force of the explosion (their heads striking the roof).

[Stuart Mackey]

Not unexpected..practice makes better.

[Howedar]

Destroying armored vehicles are good because unless the troops are experienced, or the vehicle is empty, the troops in the compartment will break their necks from the force of the explosion (their heads striking the roof).

What do experienced troops do to prevent this?

[Vympel]

What do experienced troops do to prevent this?

Wazzup:







Driving over an improvised bomb made from an old artillery shell is one situation where you absolutely want to be in a soft-skin vehicle, or on top of any vehicle, not packed into an armored tin can. Course, this makes you small arms/ RPG fodder, but them's the breaks.

[LadyTevar]

I thought CNN spoke with someone that suggested part of the problem is an influx of anti-America militants from Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other nations.
The outsiders are getting together with Iraqis to cause the damage.

[Darth Wong]

I thought CNN spoke with someone that suggested part of the problem is an influx of anti-America militants from Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other nations.
The outsiders are getting together with Iraqis to cause the damage.

Don't worry, this is all part of the Bush administration's plan to "stabilize" the region.

[LadyTevar]

I thought CNN spoke with someone that suggested part of the problem is an influx of anti-America militants from Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other nations.
The outsiders are getting together with Iraqis to cause the damage.

Don't worry, this is all part of the Bush administration's plan to "stabilize" the region.

How.. by having all the malcontents in one area?

[SirNitram]

I thought CNN spoke with someone that suggested part of the problem is an influx of anti-America militants from Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other nations.
The outsiders are getting together with Iraqis to cause the damage.

Don't worry, this is all part of the Bush administration's plan to "stabilize" the region.

How.. by having all the malcontents in one area?

That's what's been said, yes.

I'm starting to wonder if Shrubbery played the classic Red Alert one night and thought about the allied briefing where they talk about the atomic bomb a little too much(It's described as a weapon designed to be used by drawing all the Allied armor into one region, and making the region a glo-in-the-dark parking lot).

[Darth Wong]

Don't worry, this is all part of the Bush administration's plan to "stabilize" the region.

How.. by having all the malcontents in one area?

You can't make shit like this up. The Bush Administration's latest argument is that it's better to have all of the fanatics converging on Iraq to kill Americans there, because we least we now know where they all are, whereas before they were scattered all over the region. This way, they're still killing Americans but it's at a place of our choosing, not theirs.

Notice how this (already unconvincing) argument contains the hidden and rather important assumption that the number of fanatics is fixed, ie- that the invasion of Iraq did not create any new fanatics.

[MKSheppard]

The Bush Administration's latest argument is that it's better to have all of the fanatics converging on Iraq to kill Americans there, because we least we now know where they all are, whereas before they were scattered all over the region. This way, they're still killing Americans but it's at a place of our choosing, not theirs.

I agree with that. I'd rather have these guys attack soldiers who can shoot
back, rather than deciding to go and take their bomb making skills and blow
up apartment buildings elsewhere in the region.

[SirNitram]

The Bush Administration's latest argument is that it's better to have all of the fanatics converging on Iraq to kill Americans there, because we least we now know where they all are, whereas before they were scattered all over the region. This way, they're still killing Americans but it's at a place of our choosing, not theirs.

I agree with that. I'd rather have these guys attack soldiers who can shoot
back, rather than deciding to go and take their bomb making skills and blow
up apartment buildings elsewhere in the region.

You forget that this demands there be a fixed number of fanatics, as opposed to a potentially skyrocketing number.

[Sea Skimmer]

Driving over an improvised bomb made from an old artillery shell is one situation where you absolutely want to be in a soft-skin vehicle, or on top of any vehicle, not packed into an armored tin can. Course, this makes you small arms/ RPG fodder, but them's the breaks.

That's why you get five tons of sandbags and steel plate and build a fort on the roof, and remember to order lots of spare transmissions. It worked quite well in Vietnam when the threat of mines and bombs was combine with gasoline fueled vehicles, many of which had their fuel tanks under the floor..

[MKSheppard]

You forget that this demands there be a fixed number of fanatics, as opposed to a potentially skyrocketing number.

Even the most hardened fanatic will start to lose heart as people start
coming back from fighting the americans, like they did in Pakistan as
people trickled back from Afghanistan where they had gone in 2001
to fight Jihad against the Americans....

Kind of tends to be a dampener when people start coming back to your
village in body bags, minus eyes, legs, arms, hands etc.

[MKSheppard]

That was a very interesting WashPost article I read a while back,
about how all those maroons started coming back to their hometowns in
Pakistan...after following their Mullahs decrees to go and wage Jihad
against the evil Americans up north in Afghanistan.

It was so funny how they kept saying the Mullahs had betrayed them

[BoredShirtless]

I heard a M2A2 Bradley was blown up by a home made mine the other day- no footage was available on the net, but it was on TV apparently (the wreck being towed). They seem to be reverting to Chechen tactics. Destroying armored vehicles are good because unless the troops are experienced, or the vehicle is empty, the troops in the compartment will break their necks from the force of the explosion (their heads striking the roof).

What about those bars they use in roller coasters? I wonder if some sort of variation could be fitted to stop their heads hitting the roof.

[MKSheppard]

What about those bars they use in roller coasters? I wonder if some sort of variation could be fitted to stop their heads hitting the roof.

Problem - what if they jam and the track is on fire?

[Dahak]

Washington hopes a new U.N. resolution can be adopted before a crucial donors conference in Madrid on October 23-24.

U.N. sources said some $35 billion would be needed to rebuild Iraq over the next four years in contributions from governments and Iraq's own resources.

First they bomb it, and now expect others to pay for it just out of the good of their heart...
But I have quite strong doubts that they'll be getting that much money from other governments...

[BoredShirtless]

What about those bars they use in roller coasters? I wonder if some sort of variation could be fitted to stop their heads hitting the roof.

Problem - what if they jam and the track is on fire?

Solution - manual release.

[Howedar]

Problem: then you end up with a couple of broken femurs. Not good for combat effectiveness.

[BoredShirtless]

Problem: then you end up with a couple of broken femurs. Not good for combat effectiveness.

Nah, I said a variation. A restraint which would dissipate the force much more evenly around the body.

[Sea Skimmer]

What about those bars they use in roller coasters? I wonder if some sort of variation could be fitted to stop their heads hitting the roof.

You have no idea how cramped the inside of an APC or IFV is. Such a thing could not be fitted.

[Stuart Mackey]

I heard a M2A2 Bradley was blown up by a home made mine the other day- no footage was available on the net, but it was on TV apparently (the wreck being towed). They seem to be reverting to Chechen tactics. Destroying armored vehicles are good because unless the troops are experienced, or the vehicle is empty, the troops in the compartment will break their necks from the force of the explosion (their heads striking the roof).

The way to avoid breaking your neck when your APC/IFV goies over a mine is to wear your seat belt. I know this because of a chap I met who was in GW1. He was a REME and was with these Scots soldiers ina Warrior IFV, it went over a mine..the squaddies were ok cept for a bruises and a few broken anckles but our REME freind had his back broken..because he was not wearing his seat belt like the other guys. Naturally a lot depends on the mine and where it goes of.