US Deaths 999 - Cost $200,000,000,000

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Registered: 03-25-2003
US Deaths 999 - Cost $200,000,000,000
33
Tue, 09-07-2004 - 1:54pm
The number of American deaths in the war is now OVER 1000 and the financial cost is now over $200,000,000,000. How can this administration describe this as a success?

C

Thirteen U.S. troops killed in latest Iraq fighting

Two Italian humanitarian workers kidnapped

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Thirteen U.S. troops have been killed in Iraq since Monday, U.S. military officials said, bringing the number of American deaths in the war to 999.

Six soldiers and seven Marines were killed in the fighting. The latest death came Tuesday morning when a soldier from the U.S. Army's 89th Military Police Brigade was killed as a patrol came under attack in western Baghdad. Another soldier was killed Tuesday in a rocket-propelled grenade attack in Baghdad's Sadr City.

Meanwhile, Iraqi police said two Italian women and three Iraqis were abducted by kidnappers dressed as Iraqi National Guard members.

An Italian intelligence source said the women worked for the humanitarian organization A Bridge for Baghdad.

Italian authorities identify the women as Simona Torretta and Simona Pari, both 29, according to media reports.

Fighting in Sadr City erupted between U.S. forces and insurgents in the teeming slum after a few days of calm.

Battles between U.S. troops and militants loyal to Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al-Sadr killed at least 33 Iraqis in the Baghdad slum district and wounded 200 others, Iraqi officials said.

A spokesman for the 1st Calvary Division -- which is in charge of patrolling Sadr City -- said there were numerous overnight operations, but the official wouldn't provide details.

Tanks, armored personnel carriers and Bradley Fighting Vehicles moved along city streets, and the U.S. military said Air Force F-15 and F-16 jets flew combat support but dropped no weapons.

The fighting erupted when militants attacked American forces carrying out routine patrols, said U.S. Army Capt. Brian O'Malley.

"We just kept coming under fire," The Associated Press reported O'Malley as saying.

U.S. and Iraqi authorities have been trying to hammer out a peace agreement there a week and a half after al-Sadr and Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani reached a cease-fire in the south central city of Najaf -- where fierce fighting raged between U.S. and Iraqi forces and the Mehdi Army militia for three weeks in August.

An al-Sadr spokesman in Baghdad, Sheik Raed al-Kadhimi, blamed the outbreak of fighting on what he described as hostile U.S. incursions into Sadr City and attempts to arrest the cleric's followers.

In addition, five U.S. soldiers were wounded in a combination of roadside bombings and rocket-propelled grenade attacks Tuesday.

The other U.S. deaths Monday included a Task Force Baghdad soldier killed by a roadside bomb in Baghdad.

A soldier with the 13th Corps Support Command was killed in the northern Iraq town of Qayarra when a roadside bomb exploded, the military said.

Another U.S. soldier was killed and one wounded Monday night when a roadside bomb exploded as their military convoy passed by on a road near Baghdad, according to the U.S. military. The soldiers, whose names have not been released, also were assigned to the 13th Corps Support Command.

A U.S. soldier wounded in a Baghdad attack Monday afternoon died a short time later in a hospital, a U.S. military official said.

Earlier Monday, seven U.S. Marines and three Iraqi National Guard members were killed by a suicide car bomb as they patrolled on the outskirts of Falluja, a city west of Baghdad that has been a hotbed of resistance.

It was the largest number of casualties U.S. forces have suffered in a single incident since fighting in the spring near Ramadi.

Cleanup in Najaf

Iraqi and U.S. authorities continue their cleanup in Najaf.

Large numbers of weapons and munitions have been found in the Wadi al-Salem cemetery and buildings near the Imam Ali Mosque since fighting ended August 28, the U.S. military said.

So far, 1,258 weapons have been found and 10,596 munitions recovered, the military said.

Iraqi officials attacked

The governor of Baghdad escaped an assassination attempt unhurt early Tuesday when his convoy was attacked in a western district of the capital.

The convoy of the governor, Ali Al-Haidary, was driving through the Al-Adil district when the attack began, Interior Ministry spokesman Col. Adnan Abdul Rahman said.

Video from the scene showed at least one body being placed in an ambulance.

Masked gunmen Tuesday assassinated a Baghdad hospital official, Iraqi officials said.

Abbas al-Husseiny, deputy director of Al-Karama Hospital, was assassinated when three gunmen entered a restaurant where he was eating breakfast, according to police Col. Riyadh Abraheem and Sa'ad Al-Amili, a Ministry of Health official.

The restaurant and hospital are in al-Thahab district, officials said.

In northern Iraq, unknown assailants shot and killed the son of Nineveh provincial Gov. Duraid Kashmoula, Mosul police said. Laith Duraid Kashmoula was driving to work when assailants pulled up next to his car and opened fire with small arms, police said.

He was an employee in the Iraqi government's anti-corruption office in Mosul, the largest city in the northern Iraqi province. The governor's cousin, Usama Kashmoula, was shot dead in an ambush two months ago.

CNN's Kevin Flower, Cal Perry, Faris Qasira, Walter Rodgers and Alessio Vinci contributed to this report.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/09/07/iraq.main/index.html


Edited 9/9/2004 7:58 am ET ET by car_al

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2004
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 1:05am
Well, they're still very much with us, is all I meant. And I guess China must be doing OKAY since they loaned us money to finance the war with Iraq!
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-06-2004
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 1:10am
Sorry, I don't really have a response to post, it's just that when I got to the "satan eats biscuits" part, I laughed so hard the tea I was drinking almost came out my nose....

Carry on!
Avatar for car_al
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2003
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 2:46am
Thanks! You've said it all for me.

C

Avatar for car_al
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2003
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 2:52am
<> Yes, I know and if it weren't so sad; it would be laughable.

C

Avatar for car_al
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Registered: 03-25-2003
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 3:58am
_ C
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Registered: 09-06-2004
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 11:26am
Avatar for car_al
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Registered: 03-25-2003
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 2:30pm
"There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction there is no doubt that he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies and against us," including "an aggressive nuclear weapons program." Ten days earlier, the president himself had said only that Hussein "desires" these weapons. Neither Bush nor the CIA had made any assertion comparable to Cheney's. Aug. 2002

Cheney also said that these weapons in the hands of a "murderous dictator" are "as great a threat as can be imagined. The risks of inaction are far greater than the risk of action." These remarks, just short of a declaration of war, were widely interpreted as administration policy.

Source: Plan of Attack, by Bob Woodward, adapted in Washington Post Apr 20, 2004

C

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Registered: 04-16-2004
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 2:53pm
I guess Abu Nidal was not a terrorist.
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 2:57pm
The inspections would have taked much more than one month as the size of the inspection team was limited by.....Hussein.

Also, Hussein could not produce any documentation to show where the weapons he claims to have destroyed were actually done so. (another part of the resolutions)

I dont see what is so hard to understand about the fact that Hussein was in violation of the UN resolutions for 11 years, and President Clinton allowed the withdrawal of the inspectors, even after the weapons inspector (cant remember his name....Ambassador something) requested MORE intesnsive inspections, and pressure on Hussein to comply with the UN resolutions which were drafted after he unconditionally surrendered after the Gulf War.

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Registered: 08-21-2004
Wed, 09-08-2004 - 3:58pm
CBS/AP)
Donna