U.S. Troops Build Wall of Sand in Iraq (Operation Verdun)

[cal04]

Villagers watched from rooftops as U.S. military bulldozers heaved a wall of sand into snaking lines around their homes Saturday in an attempt to trap insurgents believed to be hiding among them.
The drastic tactic in Siniyah came after weeks of increasingly bold insurgent attacks, including almost daily roadside bombs targeting 101st Airborne Division soldiers patrolling the village, 155 miles north of Baghdad.

``This is not in any of the courses they teach in the Army,'' said Maj. Shawn Daniel, who oversees operations for the 3rd Brigade's 33rd Cavalry Regiment. ``But if bad people are coming to Siniyah to attack coalition forces, let's catch them at the gate.'' Spanning six miles and broken by watchtowers to be manned by Iraqi security forces, the 10-foot tall crude barrier is the Army's latest tool to rout out insurgents.

Construction was expected to last several days. Once complete, all vehicles leaving or entering the village will be stopped as soldiers look for known insurgents, bomb-making materials and illegal weapons. Dubbed ``Operation Verdun,'' after a famous World War I battle, the 3rd Brigade decided to blockade the village after determining it had become a staging point for insurgents to plan and execute their attacks.

The village of a few thousand people in the volatile so-called Sunni triangle is less than a mile from a former Iraqi airfield that coalition forces named Forward Operating Base Summerall - now home to units from the 3rd Brigade. Roadside bombs have hit convoys and patrols around Siniyah at a rate of about one every two days since early December, officials said. Two soldiers from the 3rd Brigade, also known as the ``Rakkasans,'' died last Sunday in roadside explosions outside Siniyah. Mortar attacks also have become increasingly familiar inside the Summerall base, often falling just after sunset or before sunrise when locals know soldiers congregate in large numbers to eat.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5530334,00.html

[Terran1212]

1. How long until they get a Berlin Wall?

[saigon68]

16. Winning "Hearts and Minds" one corpse at a time

Ass-Clowns

[tocqueville]

2. nothing new since "strategic hamlets" ....

didn't work there either

[bobthedrummer]

10. Also Operation PHOENIX

Phoenix Rising
http://www.prospect.org/print/V15/1/dreyfuss-r.html

[DoYouEverWonder]

3. When do they install the gas chambers?

Are we there yet?

[HysteryDiagnosis]

4. And all of this because of a lie in the sand. nt.

[leftchick]

5. this is also known as Operation Whack a Mole...

:eyes:

[Journeyman]

6. Check this link. . .

this is going to work well. . . work well if we're willing to accept Pyrrhic Victory as decisive. . .


http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWverdun.htm

[Voltaire99]

8. Over the top, lads!

Nice job, Journeyman. This short summary of Verdun will also be of help to people:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/special_report/1998/10/98/world_war_i/203224.stm

But if someone really wishes to understand the vicious idiocy of naming an Iraq mission after a WWI disaster, there is no more vivid record of that suffering than the poetry of WWI:

http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/chapters/ch4_voices2.html

[Voltaire99]

7. Leave it to the Pentagon...

...to resurrect the corpse-filled abyss of Verdun for an exercise in brand-naming!

To sane people with any historical memory, Verdun is a symbol of human tragedy on an epic scale: over 500,000 deaths from one battle alone...

But we are not talking here about the sane, or the decent, or the good; these motherfuckers treat history no better than they treat the living.

[leftchick]

9. I can't help but notice these mega bulldozers...

A bulldozer pushes sand to form a wall surrounding the city of Siniyah, Saturday, Jan. 7, 2006, 250 kilometers (155 miles) north of Baghdad, Iraq. Army units operating in the area believe the village had become a staging point for insurgents to attack coalition forces. (AP Photo/Ryan Lenz)


Are they from Israel?

[Zodiak]

11. No

The ones in Israel are ours, I believe.

They are also the same type of bulldozer that ran over Rachael Corrie a few years ago, from the picture.

[gkhouston]

12. Christ on a crutch, why would you name ANY military operation

after Verdun? Are they THAT fucking stupid? :banghead:

[mike_c]

13. so much like the Warsaw ghetto....

Trap the residents inside a wall, control their crossings, makes it easy to arrest them at the gate and to round them up inside.

[hobbit709]

14. Until the ghetto had had enough

When you've got nothing left to lose, go for it.

[HuffleClaw]

15. walling up their cities?

what the hell kind of tactic is that? i seem to remember a certain occupying force doing something similar in a city called warsaw some years back.

[Auntie Bush]

17. Is someone going to be on top of the wall with pots of boiling oil?

As long as we are going back to old fashioned methods of fighting...we
might as well go all the way and pour boiling oil on them there insurgents. A few feathers might help too.

[bemildred]

18. "US Troops pound sand in Iraq."

You want to be safe, come home, we will welcome you back.

[daleo]

19. Sounds like the British concentration camps of the Boer war.

"The wall's purpose in Siniyah ``is to separate insurgents from the population,'' said Capt. Christopher Judge, of Milford, N.H., as he oversaw construction on Friday. ``We're trying to make it very difficult for them to enter and leave.''"

That was the idea then too. The secure hamlets of Viet Nam come to mind as well.