Reports are just coming through on the BBC World Service Radio of a large blast and "multiple casaulties"
Anyone know anything about this?
Anyone know anything about this?
US base blown up in Mosul
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22 killed in Mosul attack
Agencies
Tuesday December 21, 2004
An apparent attack on a dining hall at a US military base in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul today killed 22 people and injured another 51, Pentagon officials said.
Pentagon officials told CNN that multiple rounds hit the dining hall at midday local time, possibly timed to coincide with soldiers sitting down to a meal. US bases in the area generally have tented mess halls that seat hundreds of people.
Initial reports suggested that US troops, members of the Iraqi national guard and Iraqi civilians were all among the dead. A defence department official told the Associated Press on condition of anonymity that unknown assailants had used rockets and mortars in the attack.
In a statement on a website, an Iraqi militant group known as the Army of Ansar al-Sunna said it carried out the attack, Reuters reported. The group has claimed responsibility for a number of attacks on US troops, Iraqi security forces and foreign contractors in the past, including an ambush near Tikrit earlier this month that killed 17 Iraqis working for the US army.
The US army's 10,000-strong Task Force Olympia is based in Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, and home to a predominantly Sunni Muslim population. Sgt Joseph Sanchez, a spokesman for the force, said in a statement: "Details are still coming in and at this time we don't have a final casualty count or confirmed cause of the explosion."
Reuters reported that witnesses heard two or three explosions and saw smoke rising from the biggest US base in the region, around an airfield in the south-west of the city known as Camp Merez.
A defence official at the Pentagon told Reuters said the casualties were not caused by a single large explosion.
"There were an unknown number of rounds in a rocket and mortar attack. It wasn't a car bombing," the official said.
US bases across Iraq are hit daily by mortars and rockets. Poor accuracy means most land harmlessly but they can cause heavy casualties if they strike tents or groups of soldiers.
The attack came as the British prime minister, Tony Blair, made a surprise trip to Baghdad, 240 miles south of Mosul, to meet his Iraqi counterpart Ayad Allawi. He also visited British troops in Basra, in the south of the country.
Agencies
Tuesday December 21, 2004
An apparent attack on a dining hall at a US military base in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul today killed 22 people and injured another 51, Pentagon officials said.
Pentagon officials told CNN that multiple rounds hit the dining hall at midday local time, possibly timed to coincide with soldiers sitting down to a meal. US bases in the area generally have tented mess halls that seat hundreds of people.
Initial reports suggested that US troops, members of the Iraqi national guard and Iraqi civilians were all among the dead. A defence department official told the Associated Press on condition of anonymity that unknown assailants had used rockets and mortars in the attack.
In a statement on a website, an Iraqi militant group known as the Army of Ansar al-Sunna said it carried out the attack, Reuters reported. The group has claimed responsibility for a number of attacks on US troops, Iraqi security forces and foreign contractors in the past, including an ambush near Tikrit earlier this month that killed 17 Iraqis working for the US army.
The US army's 10,000-strong Task Force Olympia is based in Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, and home to a predominantly Sunni Muslim population. Sgt Joseph Sanchez, a spokesman for the force, said in a statement: "Details are still coming in and at this time we don't have a final casualty count or confirmed cause of the explosion."
Reuters reported that witnesses heard two or three explosions and saw smoke rising from the biggest US base in the region, around an airfield in the south-west of the city known as Camp Merez.
A defence official at the Pentagon told Reuters said the casualties were not caused by a single large explosion.
"There were an unknown number of rounds in a rocket and mortar attack. It wasn't a car bombing," the official said.
US bases across Iraq are hit daily by mortars and rockets. Poor accuracy means most land harmlessly but they can cause heavy casualties if they strike tents or groups of soldiers.
The attack came as the British prime minister, Tony Blair, made a surprise trip to Baghdad, 240 miles south of Mosul, to meet his Iraqi counterpart Ayad Allawi. He also visited British troops in Basra, in the south of the country.
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remember its "good vs evil", just can't work out which is whichfinders said:Isnt it terrible that the oppressed are fighting back against the aggressors? They "just dont play by the rules"
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finders said:Isnt it terrible that the oppressed are fighting back against the aggressors? They "just dont play by the rules"
Isnt it terrible that the "oppressed" are killing as many Iraqi civilians as the US ever did....
<sigh>
otaku said:
go look what the french did to collaborators after ww2.
BTW if the elections are free and open I hope the new iraq takes back what is theres and boots out scum like haliburton and the Blackwater mercenary deathsquads, but I doubt they'll have that kind of power with the US overlords there to control the oil.
finders
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otaku said:
They are a long way short of the estimated 100,000 innocent civilians the Yanks have murdered.
Having lived throught the Vietnam War its strange to see how stupid the US is they just keep on making the same mistakes in the name of "Freedom" all the time.
Then again being led by a former alcho, failed busisnessman. coward and now "born again" god botherer what would you expect?
