American Soldier

Coalition Troops Put Pressure on Insurgents During Operation Phantom Thunder
Photo by Spc. Olanrewaju Akinwunmi
June 28, 2007

Sgt. David Bauer attempts to breach a door during a house-to-house search for illegal weapons, explosives and high value targets in the Sadiyah section of Baghdad. Sgt. Bauer is from Company C, 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division.

Army News

WASHINGTON (American Forces Press Service, June 28, 2007) - The troop plus-up has become “a surge of operations,” and coalition forces are in the early stages of a difficult fight, a Multinational Force Iraq spokesman told reporters in Baghdad yesterday.

Coalition and Iraqi troops working together have led successful operations recently in Baqubah, Mosul, Anbar and Diyala provinces, and north of Baghdad, Army Brig. Gen. Kevin Bergner said.

“We are on Day 12 of Operation Phantom Thunder, the Multinational Corps’ offensive to simultaneously increase pressure in and around Baghdad. This has been, and will continue to be, a tough fight; we are in the early stages of that fight,” he said.

We sure aren’t hearing much about the troops surge and the victories our Soldiers are having in Iraq. Or is it just me?

Coalition (read: American) Troops have killed senior al_Qaeda leaders.

One of the leaders killed operated a cell that helped foreign fighters move into Iraq; he also fought against coalition forces in Afghanistan in 2001. The other slain insurgent, known as Khalil al-Turki, operated with the same cell and held close ties to other senior al Qaeda leaders, Brig. Gen. Bergner said.

Illegal prisons, torture chambers, execution chambers used by al-Qaeda have been uncovered. Weapons caches have been found and destroyed.

Local residents in Mosul this week led Iraqi and coalition forces to a weapons cache and a large bomb factory where troops found insurgents assembling four truck bombs and two car bombs “in an assembly-line manner,” Brig. Gen. Bergner said. In conjunction with this raid, combined forces nabbed 32 suspected terrorists.

This article gives credit to friendships forming between coalition troops and the Iraqis. I personally think they will cooperate with who they view as the stronger and more protective. As long as the Americans show strength and the Iraqis feel they will be protected from al-Qaeda retribution, the Iraqis will cooperate.

Read the story.

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