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| Iraq |
| SpecOps unit nearly nabs Zarqawi |
| 2006-04-29 |
| Via The StrataSphere Blog Just nine days before al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi released his latest video, a special operations raid killed five of his men, captured five others and apparently came within a couple of city blocks of nabbing Zarqawi himself. Then, the day Zarqawi’s video debuted, special ops forces killed 12 more of his troops in a second raid in the same town. The raids in Yusufiyah, 20 miles southwest of Baghdad in the heart of the Sunni Triangle, were the latest battles in a small, vicious war being waged largely in the shadows of the wider counterinsurgency effort. It is a war fought by a secretive organization called Task Force 145, made up of some of the most elite U.S. troops, including Delta Force and SEAL Team 6. They have one goal: hunting down Zarqawi, Iraq’s most wanted man, and destroying his al-Qaida in Iraq organization. Zarqawi’s escape in Yusufiyah was not the first time special ops troops have nearly had him. In early 2005, they came so close they could see the Jordanian’s panicked face as he fled. The first of the two Yusufiyah raids began at 2:15 a.m. April 16 when SEAL Team 6 operators and Army Rangers approached a terrorist safe house, a U.S. special operations source said. A U.S. Central Command news release said “coalition forces” — the usual shorthand for Task Force 145 elements — were “searching for a wanted al-Qaida associate.” When the U.S. troops arrived, the enemy opened fire with small arms. In the fight that followed, the special ops troops killed five terrorists, three of whom wore suicide belts, according to Central Command. “Two of the suicide bombers were killed before either could detonate his vest, and the third detonated his body bomb, killing only himself and injuring no one else,” the news release said. A woman in the house also was killed. Three other women and a child were wounded and were medically evacuated to the 10th Combat Support Hospital in Baghdad. U.S. forces detained five other occupants, one of whom was wounded. One of the five was later confirmed as “the wanted al-Qaida terrorist for whom the troops were searching,” according to Central Command. “The terrorist, whose name is currently being withheld, was involved in the planning and execution of improvised explosive device attacks and allegedly was associated with al-Qaida foreign fighter operations,” the command said. The other four suspects are being “assessed for knowledge of and involvement in terrorist activity,” the news release said. Yusufiyah is Zarqawi country. Indeed, intelligence later suggested the terrorist kingpin “was probably 1,000 meters away” at the time of the raid, a special operations source said. Rest at link. |
| Posted by:ed |
| #17 Army?? Wow. Are y'all really that good? I knew y'all were good, but truly that big a differential? |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-04-29 22:52 |
| #16 A US Army or Marine division at normal or wartime strength, before during and after the Cold War, was always ascribed by analysts as the approxi equivalent of a NATO/Euro-CORPS or Soviet Ground Army(s). |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2006-04-29 22:18 |
| #15 The U.S. knows of “high-tier” al-Qaida personnel in multiple European countries, he said. “They’re around the world ... The point is, does the U.S. have the resolve … to go conduct a unilateral operation to get these folks?” Asked if anyone in JSOC was doing this now, he said, “Not really.” Part of the reason: Special mission units are already stretched by the mission in Iraq. “There’s no one left,” he said. really? |
| Posted by: Hupavitle Elmeretch1915 2006-04-29 19:40 |
| #14 Once again, victomized by our own Rules of Engagement (ROE) and legal timidity. I wonder how many JAG officers Zarqawi has on his staff? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2006-04-29 17:11 |
| #13 Top narrowly escapes, Zaqawai narrowly escapes, everyone narrowly escapes, including Saddam a few times. There are major holes in our intelligence community. Time to figure where the holes are. How hard is that given this much time? We know many self-righteous, self-important people in the CIA would be willing do do this. Give different information to different people and see which info makes it to the enemy front lines. Then narrow it down to the specific individuals and then track how the information gets there. I'm sure they know how to do that and yet still the information gets out. Must be at a very, very high level which should narrow down the suspects a bit. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-04-29 16:22 |
| #12 '...did not give the OK because he did not have “positive ID”' Combined with another current article on BBC regarding the Diyala/Baqubah battle(s): "In one of Thursday's attacks, gunmen reportedly pulled up at a checkpoint posing as a wedding party in a convoy of vehicles, one of which was decorated with ribbons and flowers. They then sprayed the checkpoint with bullets" show how effective the propaganda war has been for the AIF. We and our Iraqi trainees are so spooked by the threat of more bad PR (whether incidents are real tragedies or theatre) that they are hesitant to pull the trigger, resulting in escaped AQ leaders and dead IA soldiers. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2006-04-29 13:43 |
| #11 "...special operations raid killed five of his men, captured five others ... the day ZarqawiÂ’s video debuted, special ops forces killed 12 more of his troops in a second raid in the same town." "Ah shucks, we missed Zarky Boy again" is offset by the good news that our boys at least bagged 17 of Zarky's boys. |
| Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden 2006-04-29 13:03 |
| #10 They want to turn the whole 82nd into spec ops support? A battalion task force is a small part of the 82nd Airborne Division. |
| Posted by: lotp 2006-04-29 12:55 |
| #9 Another close but no Cigar. |
| Posted by: FeralCat 2006-04-29 12:17 |
| #8 A couple of big thermobaric bombs on those training camps while they are training dropped without warning - say by steath, would leave little actionable evidence and could be denied or ignored. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2006-04-29 11:34 |
| #7 Meanwhile, Zarqawi also hungers for more personnel. “Al-Qaida is trying to get some other people to him through Iran — some planners, some trainers,” the special ops source said. The Iranian government knows about this, and despite Zarqawi’s violence against fellow Shiites in Iraq, the Iranians have decided to allow the transit of al-Qaida personnel, the source said, calling it “a marriage of convenience.” JSOC knew of insurgent training camps in both Syria and Iran that TF 145 could hit, the source said, but “politics” had kept the task force from launching cross-border missions. What's the "politics" bs? |
| Posted by: 3dc 2006-04-29 11:31 |
| #6 ave when his vehicle came into view. He and his driver blew through a Delta roadblock before nearing a Ranger checkpoint. The Ranger M240B machine-gunner had Zarqawi in his sights and requested permission to fire, but the lieutenant in charge of the checkpoint did not give the OK because he did not have “positive ID” of the vehicle’s occupants, a TF 145 source said. A JAG? |
| Posted by: 3dc 2006-04-29 11:27 |
| #5 But McChrystal wants more combat power, and has asked that a battalion task force of the 82nd Airborne Division be placed at TF 145’s disposal, two special operations sources said. Multi-National Forces-Iraq “does not comment on proposed force deployments,” Army Capt. Bill Roberts, an MNF-I spokesman, wrote in an e-mail response to questions from Military Times. However, an Army colonel confirmed that MNF-I placed a request in mid-April for a three-battalion light-infantry task force, with communications, transportation, military police, medical, human intelligence and psychological operations “enablers.” They want to turn the whole 82nd into spec ops support? |
| Posted by: 3dc 2006-04-29 11:25 |
| #4 ...The source said Pakistan plays the same role for al-Qaida’s leaders that Cambodia did for the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War: “safe haven.” ... |
| Posted by: 3dc 2006-04-29 11:21 |
| #3 There is way too much operational information in the Naylor piece. |
| Posted by: Classical_Liberal 2006-04-29 10:53 |
| #2 Wonder who gets dibs of placing Zarq's head on a mantle over the fireplace? |
| Posted by: Captain America 2006-04-29 10:28 |
| #1 At the rate that they kill these guys, how much longer can they hold out? |
| Posted by: Chutch Jomoque9164 2006-04-29 10:22 |