Partridge
11-05-2005, 11:23 AM
(Partridge: I have no doubt that this is the big one, the one that will once and for all 'break the back of the insurgency'. Oh yes.)
Several thousand US and Iraqi troops have begun a new operation on Iraq's Syrian border against militants from the al-Qaeda in Iraq group.
BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4409332.stm)
Some 2,500 American marines and other troops, as well as about 1,000 Iraqi government soldiers, are deployed around Husayba, the US military said.
It is the first time Iraqi troops have been used on a major scale, it added.
Operation Steel Curtain comes after two offensives against militants last month in the same province, Anbar.
Its aim is to "restore security along the Iraqi-Syrian border and destroy the al-Qaeda in Iraq terrorist network operating throughout Husayba", the US military said in its statement.
Troops, it added, are tasked with both finding insurgents and locating their "safe houses" ahead of the Iraqi parliamentary election on 15 December.
Steel Curtain also "marks the first large-scale employment of multiple battalion-sized units of Iraqi Army forces in combined operations" with US-led forces and the Iraqi forces include locally recruited desert scout platoons.
It is one of the biggest single campaigns so far in Iraq's remote wild west border area which has proven extremely difficult to control, the BBC's Jim Muir reports from Baghdad.
'Al-Qaeda route'
The area around Husaybah, located near the border town of Qaim and is about 320km (200 miles) west of Baghdad, is used by al-Qaeda in Iraq to smuggle in foreign fighters, money and equipment, the US military believes.
"They do not bring battalions - they bring the leadership, the financial man, the demolition expert," Marine Col Stephen Davis told AFP news agency.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq is among Iraq's most feared, having claimed responsibility for many of the country's bloodiest bombings and beheadings.
Its commander is said to be Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
October's two big operations, Iron Fist and River Gate, were aimed at ending al-Qaeda militants' "campaign of murder and intimidation" in the province.
Last week, US warplanes destroyed a building in Husayba, killing five leaders of the militant al-Qaeda group, according to military statements.
In August, the US reported that an air strike on the town had killed a senior al-Qaeda figure, Abu Islam.
Several thousand US and Iraqi troops have begun a new operation on Iraq's Syrian border against militants from the al-Qaeda in Iraq group.
BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4409332.stm)
Some 2,500 American marines and other troops, as well as about 1,000 Iraqi government soldiers, are deployed around Husayba, the US military said.
It is the first time Iraqi troops have been used on a major scale, it added.
Operation Steel Curtain comes after two offensives against militants last month in the same province, Anbar.
Its aim is to "restore security along the Iraqi-Syrian border and destroy the al-Qaeda in Iraq terrorist network operating throughout Husayba", the US military said in its statement.
Troops, it added, are tasked with both finding insurgents and locating their "safe houses" ahead of the Iraqi parliamentary election on 15 December.
Steel Curtain also "marks the first large-scale employment of multiple battalion-sized units of Iraqi Army forces in combined operations" with US-led forces and the Iraqi forces include locally recruited desert scout platoons.
It is one of the biggest single campaigns so far in Iraq's remote wild west border area which has proven extremely difficult to control, the BBC's Jim Muir reports from Baghdad.
'Al-Qaeda route'
The area around Husaybah, located near the border town of Qaim and is about 320km (200 miles) west of Baghdad, is used by al-Qaeda in Iraq to smuggle in foreign fighters, money and equipment, the US military believes.
"They do not bring battalions - they bring the leadership, the financial man, the demolition expert," Marine Col Stephen Davis told AFP news agency.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq is among Iraq's most feared, having claimed responsibility for many of the country's bloodiest bombings and beheadings.
Its commander is said to be Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
October's two big operations, Iron Fist and River Gate, were aimed at ending al-Qaeda militants' "campaign of murder and intimidation" in the province.
Last week, US warplanes destroyed a building in Husayba, killing five leaders of the militant al-Qaeda group, according to military statements.
In August, the US reported that an air strike on the town had killed a senior al-Qaeda figure, Abu Islam.