Marines Find Huge Weapons Cache in Falluja

[Nickdfresh]

CNN is also reporting that a lab for making chemical weapons was also found. Story to follow when available:


U.S., Iraqi forces find Falluja's 'largest weapons cache'
Thursday, November 25, 2004 Posted: 9:00 AM EST (1400 GMT)


BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraqi insurgents in Falluja were storing a huge amount of weapons and explosives in a mosque, U.S. Marines said Thursday.

A statement from the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force called the find the city's "largest weapons cache to date."

The Marines said the Saad Abi Bin Waqas Mosque compound was also being used as a suspected safe house and planning site for insurgents in Falluja, according to the statement.

The statement didn't provide specific numbers of the weapons -- which were discovered by U.S. and Iraqi forces on Wednesday.

The statement did say that the mosque compound was "heavily laden with small arms, artillery shells, heavy machine guns, and anti-tank mines."

"Other buildings within the compound had mortar systems, rocket-propelled grenades, launchers, recoilless rifles and parts of surface-to-air weapons systems. Marines also found the barrel of an anti-aircraft gun outside one of the buildings."

Weapons and explosives also filled the mosque's main prayer building, the mullah's residence and, adjacent to the residence, a small shed that had been "rigged to explode," the statement said.

In addition, Iraqi forces and Marines found a vendor's truck full of explosives, grenades and bomb-making materials. The truck may have been used as a mobile bomb-making factory, the Marines' statement said.

Also, the mosque's rectory contained documents detailing "insurgent interrogations of recent kidnap victims," according to the statement.

Alleged Sunni Muslim rebel supporter Sheik Abdulla al-Janabi also had been using the mosque to preach anti-coalition rhetoric, the statement said.

U.S. and Iraqi forces have been mopping up remaining insurgents in the stronghold city after a two-week offensive. U.S. forces said the assault destroyed resistance command operations there.

Insurgents have used mosques as safe havens across Iraq and have launched attacks from the holy sites, taking "advantage of Multi-National Force-Iraq's respect for these sites," the Marines said.

Throughout the Iraq war, the U.S. military has said mosques are considered holy sites and are not targeted unless they are used in the insurgency.

Many mosques in Falluja lost their protective status after insurgents fired at U.S. and Iraqi forces from the mosque towers -- called minarets.

Elsewhere in Iraq, more than 5,000 troops, including Iraqi SWAT forces, the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit and British military are conducting anti-insurgent operations in Iraq's Babil province, south of Baghdad. (Full story)

The operations in Babil, Falluja and elsewhere are aimed at putting down anti-American fighters and rebels against Iraq's interim government in advance of the nation's first, free Democratic elections since the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime. Iraqi elections are scheduled for January 30.

Iraqi and U.S. forces found explosives and ammunition in a Falluja mosque compound Wednesday.
Image:

[Nickdfresh]

Iraqi forces find chemical materials in lab
Official: Top al-Zarqawi aide arrested
Thursday, November 25, 2004 Posted: 11:40 AM EST (1640 GMT)


BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraqi soldiers have discovered chemical materials in a Falluja lab, while a top aide of wanted terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been arrested in Mosul, Iraq's interim national security adviser said Thursday.

The reports came as U.S. and Iraqi forces conducted anti-insurgency operations in Falluja, Mosul and south of Baghdad in the province of Babil.

Iraq's interim National Security Adviser Kasim Dawood announced discovery of the lab with chemical materials which he said was "manufacturing death, intoxication and assassination."

"We have also discovered in this laboratory a pamphlet and instructions showing how to manufacture explosives and toxins," Dawood said. "And they also talk about the production of anthrax."

Dawood said alleged al-Zarqawi aide Abu Said was arrested on Tuesday in the northern city of Mosul. An audio message purported to be by the Jordanian-born al Qaeda associate was discovered on the Internet on Wednesday. (Full story)

On Thursday, forces in Mosul detained three suspected insurgents, the U.S. military said. Two of the detainees were arrested in a cordon-and-search operation in the west-central sector of the city. One detainee was identified as a member of a terrorist cell. A detainee who was arrested in eastern Mosul was wanted for "anti-Iraqi activities," the U.S. military said.

South of Baghdad, Iraqi, U.S. and British forces Thursday arrested 81 suspected insurgents during a third day of their anti-rebel offensive in Babil province, the U.S. military said.

The arrests were made in the early morning near Yousefiya by Iraqi SWAT personnel, elements of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit and the 1st Battalion of Britain's Black Watch Regiment, according to a military statement.

Black Watch rounded up 26 people. Iraqi forces and Marines detained 43. Elsewhere in the area, Marines arrested 12 others, the statement said, raising the total arrests of suspected insurgents since Tuesday to 116.

The Babil operation, the U.S. military has said, differs from the recent mass assault in Falluja. It is surgical rather than sweeping -- more of a focused hit-and-run operation.

In Falluja, the former rebel stronghold west of Baghdad, U.S. Marines said Thursday that U.S. and Iraqi forces had discovered a huge weapons cache inside a mosque compound.

A statement from the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force called the find the city's "largest weapons cache to date."

The Marines said the compound -- the Saad Abi Bin Waqas Mosque -- was also being used as a suspected safe house and planning site for insurgents in Falluja.

The statement didn't provide specific numbers of the weapons -- which were discovered by U.S. and Iraqi forces on Wednesday.

The statement did say that the mosque compound was "heavily laden with small arms, artillery shells, heavy machine guns, and anti-tank mines."

"Other buildings within the compound had mortar systems, rocket-propelled grenades, launchers, recoilless rifles and parts of surface-to-air weapons systems. Marines also found the barrel of an anti-aircraft gun outside one of the buildings." (Full story)

The operations in Babil, Falluja and elsewhere are aimed at putting down anti-American fighters and rebels against Iraq's interim government in advance of the nation's first, free Democratic elections since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime. The elections are scheduled for January 30.

Other developments

This month's U.S.-Iraqi assault on insurgents in Falluja has resulted in the deaths of 2,085 "fighters" and more than 1,600 detainees, Iraqi interim National Security Adviser Dawood said.


An Iraqi Red Crescent humanitarian aid team of 56 staff members arrived in Falluja Wednesday with seven ambulances and three trucks loaded with food, water, and medical aid, the group's chairman, Said Ismail Hakki, said Thursday. Two Falluja aid centers have been set up in the city, Hakki said.


Iraq's interim foreign minister said Thursday his government will meet with tribal leaders and Iraqi opposition groups in an attempt to help broaden Iraq's political base for the upcoming elections. Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said the meeting will take place in Jordan sometime before the election. Zebari also said interior ministers from neighboring countries will meet Tuesday in Tehran, Iran, to discuss security matters.

CNN's Ayman Mohyeldin, Kianne Sadeq, Cal Perry and Kevin Flower contributed to this report.

Iraqi and U.S. forces found explosives and ammunition in a Falluja mosque compound Wednesday.
Image:

[Big Train]

Are we still so willing now to say it is an IMPOSSIBILITY of finding WMD'S?

[DEMON CUNT]

If these weapon cashes were as prevelant as Dumsfeld and Colin claimed, they would have found them a long long time ago.

Pop Quiz Twat-Shot:

If your home town was invaded, what sorts of things would you hide?

A. Flowers to throw at the invaders.
B. "Twix" brand candy bars and some weed.
C. Weapons to defend your home town, family, county.

[Big Train]

Not excluding that they could be mobile, destroyed or moved easily? C,mon now..

[LoungeMachine]

All that comes to mind is.................


" Mission Accomplished"


I guess it was all worth the 200 billion, 1,100 USM dead, 10K wounde, and tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians dead.

I feel better. And safer.


Where's the "grave danger" and "mushroom cloud" Condi/Shrub warned us of?

Were the tubes used as bongs after all?

[Nickdfresh]

Originally posted by Big Train
Are we still so willing now to say it is an IMPOSSIBILITY of finding WMD'S?

Yes! At least of any on the kind of scale that the Administration said existed on the eve of war.

This was a terrorist lab designed to experiment with and create toxic chemicals, hell you could make some pretty toxic stuff by using stuff you'd find in an everyday garage and under the kitchen sink.

This has nothing to do with WMD's.

[Big Train]

What I'm asking is, given the hundreds of miles of deserts and miles and miles of underground caves (foundr recently in Fallujah for example) that it is COMPLETELY beyond the realm of possibility that either the agents or the components are not there or buried in the sand? Obviously we gave them enough time...I'm just saying, there is NO possibility in your mind?

[Nickdfresh]

No, at least nothing of anything significance. I think somebody would have talked by now. According to Time Magazine, the investigators sent into Iraq have come up with a theory as to why there may have been some indications given by the Saddam regime.

The short answer was that he was playing a game with the U.S. and Iran. He was telling the West that Iraq no longer possessed chemical weapons (true) in order to get sanctions lifted.

But he was giving indications to the Iranians that he still had WMD's because he regarded a second war with Iran to be far more likely and wanted to deter them.

If Iraq had chems. I think they would have used them on the U.S. troops advancing into Iraq. And somebody would have talked by now as to where they were hidden.

[BigBadBrian]

Various organizations are still "tripping" over discarded chemical weapons from GWI from 1991. Were saying Chem Weaps from the Saddam era still can't have existed?

[John Ashcroft]

All of which leads me to wonder why the "international community" is so concerned with us blowing up mosques...

Could anyone seriously consider such a place a mosque anymore? It became a military compound, by the terrorist's own choice. And I say level the fucker (and any other like it).

[ELVIS]

Mosque Shmosque...

It's beyond time to remove every last one of them !!

[Mezro]

Re: Marines Find Huge Weapons Cache in Falluja

Originally posted by Nickdfresh
U.S., Iraqi forces find Falluja's 'largest weapons cache'

Read that the wrong way...thought it said: U.S., Iraqi forces find Falluja's largest gash

Mezro...I was wondering if they all fit inside...

[Wayne L.]

All of those far left liberal losers in the Democratic Party who were against the war in Iraq in the first place & complaining about President Bush lying about WMD's need to apologize to our soldiers & the president for making complete ASSES of themselves.

[Nickdfresh]

Originally posted by Wayne L.
All of those far left liberal losers in the Democratic Party who were against the war in Iraq in the first place & complaining about President Bush lying about WMD's need to apologize to our soldiers & the president for making complete ASSES of themselves.

Why would that be? He did at least fuck up when it came to WMD's. The chemical lab had nothing to do with Saddam. Try using your budding reading comprehension skills next time.