Car Bomb Kills 9 U.S. Soldiers in Iraq
Pastor Dale Morgan
Car Bomb Kills 9 U.S. Soldiers in Iraq
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Tuesday April 24, 2007 2:16 AM
BAGHDAD (AP) - Nine U.S. soldiers were killed and 20 were wounded Monday
in a suicide car bombing against a patrol base northeast of Baghdad, the
military said.
The attack occurred in Diyala province, a volatile area that has been
the site of fierce fighting between U.S. and Iraqi troops, Sunni
insurgents and Shiite militias, according to a statement.
The nine Task Force Lightning soldiers died of injuries sustained in the
blast, which also left 20 soldiers and an Iraqi civilian wounded, the
military said.
Of those wounded, 15 soldiers were treated and returned to duty while
five others and the Iraqi civilian were evacuated to a medical facility
for further care, it added.
Identities were not released pending notification of relatives.
It was the second bold attack against a U.S. base north of Baghdad in
just over two months and was notable for its use of a suicide car bomber.
On Feb. 19, insurgents struck a U.S. combat post in Tarmiyah, about 30
miles north of Baghdad, killing two soldiers and wounding 17 in what the
military called a ``coordinated attack.''
It began with a suicide car bombing, then gunfire on soldiers pinned
down in a former Iraqi police station, where fuel storage tanks were set
ablaze by the blast.
Militants have mostly used hit-and-run ambushes, roadside bombs or
mortars on U.S. troops and stayed away from direct assaults on fortified
military compounds to avoid U.S. firepower.
Meanwhile, U.S. officials signaled that they might reconsider putting a
three-mile concrete barrier around a Sunni Arab neighborhood in Baghdad
after Iraq's struggling prime minister came under pressure from Sunnis
and ordered the project halted. With the latest snag in U.S.-Iraqi
security cooperation, insurgents delivered a fresh example of the style
of attacks that the military said the wall was designed to deter - seven
bombings that killed at least 48 people across Iraq.
Plans for the separation barrier to protect the Azamiyah neighborhood
were in doubt after Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki criticized the idea
of creating ``gated communities'' to separate Baghdad's sectarian
neighborhoods.
Speaking during a tour of Sunni-led Arab countries, the Shiite Muslim
prime minister said he did not want the 12-foot-high wall planned for
Azamiyah to be seen as dividing the capital's sects.
Iraq's Sunni Arab minority dominated during Saddam Hussein's reign, and
its members remain deeply distrustful of Shiite intentions and provide
the backbone of the Iraqi insurgency.
Shiite militias, in turn, have been attacking Sunni neighborhoods in
retaliation for insurgent attacks on their own communities.
Azamiyah's Sunni residents have been the target of frequent mortar
attacks by Shiite militants, but hundreds of people in the district took
to the streets to protest against the wall that they said would make
their neighborhood ``a big prison.''
The new American ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, defended the barrier
plan Monday, saying it was an effort to protect the Sunni community from
surrounding Shiite areas, not to segregate it.