WP: Soldiers in Sunni Town Run Into Wall of Silence

[kskiska]

Residents of Samarra Fear Reprisals for Informing on Rebels

SAMARRA, Iraq, Dec. 22 -- The soldiers kicked the wooden doors open and swarmed through the houses, rolling up rugs, looking through cabinets, searching boxes, pushing aside couches. Within minutes, they had lined up the Iraqi men they had found inside. The men were taken outside and made to squat in the late-night darkness, their breath streaming out in faint, wispy clouds as their hands pushed flat against a concrete wall.

The soldiers were from the U.S. Army Special Forces, the Iraqi National Guard and Apache Company of the 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment. They were looking for a suspected insurgent, but the insurgent was not there.

The Sunday night raid was what soldiers here call a "dry hole." They received an intelligence tip, and it led to nothing. They broke down doors and interrogated people who appeared to have no connection to the war the United States is waging. The soldiers paid the families in U.S. dollars for the broken door jambs and the splintered cabinet doors that hung askew.

The frustrating dead end was a symptom of what officers here agree is a virtual intelligence meltdown in Samarra, a city 65 miles north of Baghdad in the Sunni Triangle, an area where the insurgency runs deep. Rebels have intimidated the local population, launching attacks from neighborhoods where residents now fear the consequences of helping the American occupiers.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20723-2004Dec22.html

[impeach the gop]

1. When will we ever learn

n/t

[NYC]

2. How slender is this specific insurgent?

The soldiers kicked the wooden doors open and swarmed through the houses, rolling up rugs, looking through cabinets, searching boxes, pushing aside couches...

They were looking for a suspected insurgent, but the insurgent was not there.

[truthisfreedom]

8. might have been looking for trap-doors. like in the movies. diary of anne

frank? 8^) what a screwed-up nightmare for these people. threatened by everyone, with apparently nobody on their side.

[NYC]

21. I thought about the trap doors later.

You're right. There is nobody on their side. How desperately sad.

[DS1]

3. on a side note

I find it particularly offensive to see an Army unit calling itself Apache Co and doing this sort of crusading bullshit

[Stinky The Clown]

12. Yeah, I noticed that, too. But in DC you have the Redskins so clearly

nobody gives a shit.

[DS1]

20. And the Braves in Atlanta, and the Indians in Cleveland ( I think)

but these orgs don't kill anyone in the name of the Neocon Manifest Destiny

[VegasWolf]

4. How to win friends and influence people. not! n/t

[Robbien]

5. This is blamed on insurgent intimidation. I have my doubts

It couldn't possibly be Iraqii are silent because of patriotism or national pride. Would you tell the people who attacked your city just two months ago where your rebel fighters were? But of course Rummy doesn't believe Iraqii would have anything so human as patriotism.

[Disturbed]

6. MIlitary is creating Insurgents and sympathizers.

The more of these raids the more insurgents are created.

[BUSHOUT]

7. Good Christ, they don't even have an interpreter for a few days....

the one they "sometimes" hire in Samarra is on vacation!

"Soldiers, in the meantime, do their best to find people who speak broken English or use improvised sign language."

Can you friggin' believe it?

Iraq is a complete failure. On balance of all the good vs. the bad and considering the folly in action we see, it is a complete failure.

There is nothing "un-American" about admitting the truth. What we say is not going to become a self-fulfilled prophecy or something. Iraq is what it is, and that's a total policy failure.

[Erika]

9. We've put villagers between a rock and a hard place

Just like we did in Nam. We burnt villages down if we felt they were sympathetic to "insurgents". The insurgents burnt down the villages if they thought the villagers were sympathetic to us.

How sad that we've learned nothing.

[nashville_brook]

14. what are we doing to these men and women having to carry out

these *criminal* orders (on the whole and specifically RE prisoner abuse)? these were normal people before they went to Iraq. they are going to come back mained, traumatized and pissed off when they find out what bushitler did with their VA money.

[TahitiNut]

10. "Rebels have intimidated the local population" (blatant propaganda)

The Washington Post betrays yet again its role as a conduit for Regime propaganda. Just what person with even the remnants of sanity doesn't regard a squad of foreign troops, armed to the teeth, raiding a family home in the middle of the night, kicking down doors, frog-marching the men, manhandling the women and children, turning over furniture, and breaking open the cabinetry as intimidating to the point of terrorizing??

[number6]

11. winning hearts and minds .....NOT

:(

[Stinky The Clown]

13. "Rebels" and "Insurgents"?

How about fucking "PATRIOTS"????????????

We invaded THEIR FUCKING COUNTRY. Why are the insurgents? Why are they rebels? They want us the fuck out of THEIR country. They never asked us in to "help".

US to Iraqis: You WILL be democratic and you WILL love us ..... or we'll kill you.

Sure some of these people are outside agitators and opportunists, but many of them are just plain old ordinary Eye-rack-ees who want us to be fucking GONE.

Who coined the use of these two terms ... Insurgent and Rebel? Leslie Fucking Blitzer?

Gawd I get so jaw-clenched pissed off sometimes I can't stand me ......

[Erika]

15. It's their country and they didn't ask us to invade and occupy

nor did they threaten us. So why are we there?

[Robbien]

16. They call themselves Freedom Fighters

Very appropriate.

The media is slowly replacing the word insurgent with rebel. Not too long ago instead of insurgent the media used the label terrorist.

This war of words pisses me off something terrible also.

[NIGHT TRIPPER]

18. yep, they are defending their country from occupiers = RESISTANCE

I hope the public stands up and demands our troops get out now before any more on either side are senslessly killed.
Spineless public --
The majority of American people all know that we do not belong there but they think if they say something against the "war" then it will hurt the chances of survival for our troops.
That's a big lie.
We can get up and leave at any time. But the corporations want that sweet crude.
How long will it take before people realize the truth?

[Barrett808]

17. It's exactly the same line we were fed about Saddam

The Good People of Iraq were intimidated by bad old Saddam, and they were begging for us to liberate them. I remember one Telegraph story which had a terrified Iraqi taxi driver pleading with his eyes to the reporter, too afraid of "government minders" to beg for the invasion aloud.

[Erika]

19. And as Rummy said "We'd be welcomed with flowers"

See the facts at www.icasualties.org. Read the actual stories.

[0007]

22. Rummy also said he knew where the Iraqis were hiding the WMD

Rummy got a paper asshole.