Iraqi Army Push Into Sadr City & Find Lots Of Goodies

Spread the love

Loading

The Iraqi army has been pushing into the northern areas of Sadr city after completing the wall that sectioned off the southern portion. As they have pushed in they have found cache after cache of weapons including Iranian built IED’s and chlorine gas bombs: (via The Long War Journal)

The Mahdi Army has stockpiled weapons throughout the district. Eight of the armor piercing, Iranian-made explosively formed projectiles have been found along with chlorine poison, eight roadside bombs, and large quantities of explosives, weapons, ammunition, and materials used to make bombs.

Iraqi troops raided a school in Sadr City on May 23 and uncovered a substantial weapons cache. “Two bottles of chlorine poison” were found amongst a remote-controlled improvised explosive device, six 155 mm artillery rounds, an artillery warhead, five grenades, two PKC light machine guns and 450 rounds of PKC ammunition, a Katusha rocket launcher, and radios used to remotely detonate roadside bombs.

The largest cache was found by Iraqi soldierson May 22. The cache consisted of “one explosively formed projectile; one homemade mine; more than 2000 7.62 mm rounds; 393 5.56 mm rounds; one 80 mm rocket-propelled grenade; RPG launchers, warheads and tails; one cannon ball; grenades; spools of wire; blasting caps; AK- 47 rifles; AK-47 and M-16 magazines; two body armor vests; a Kevlar helmet; two radios; and other assorted military equipment.”

Another significant cache seized by Iraqi troopson May 22 contained “seven explosively formed projectiles, five 60 mm mortar rounds, more than a dozen RPGs, hand grenades, a mortar sight, a BKC machine gun and 1,200 BKC rounds, a Kalashnikov rifle and five Kalashnikov magazines, igniters, indicators, command wire, charges, detonators, eight radios and four battery chargers.” A host of smaller caches were found and destroyed.

In addition to the weapons they have captured insurgents, one with a Iranian passport:

Iraqi National Police detained four Mahdi Army fighters in New Baghdad on May 22 and uncovered a weapons cache. A brother of one of the detainees possessed an Iranian passport. On May 23, US troops killed five Mahdi Army fighters in the Shawra area of New Baghdad.

~~~

Outside of Baghdad, US and Iraqi troops captured five Mahdi Army operatives. Iraqi Special Operations Forces captured a Special Groups financier and weapons smuggler in Az Zubayr, just north of Basrah on May 21. The operative smuggled weapons from Iran into Iraq.

Coalition Special Operations Forces captured four Special Groups operatives in Rashadiyah on May 23. The target was a “Special Groups weapons smuggler accused of bringing explosively-formed penetrators, rockets and other weapons into Diyala Province from Iran” who was also “responsible for multiple attacks on Iraqi Security and Coalition forces using EFPs, rocket-propelled grenades and sniper fire in the Husayniyah area.”

Obama still want to sit down with the Iranians? Yes he does.

0 0 votes
Article Rating
4 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

It’s undeniable that Iran has been training, supplying and funding Shia extremists to kill Americans and undermine Iraqi sovereignty.

Hundreds of Americans have died because of Iran’s use of proxy forces in Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere.

How much longer are we to just look the other way?

How many more idiots like Obama will come along and decide suddenly THEY know the way to deal with the Iranians when American Administrations of both political parties over decades have not succeeded?

The only think the Iranians respect is force and the knowledge that we will use it if they don’t stop committing acts of war against us and our allies.

That large weapon cache wasn’t so large. It sure wouldn’t have lasted long in a fire fight (maybe a hour or less). It sure make’s Sadr’s 60,000 man army look like a defensive army rather than an offensive one. It also looks like they were already low on ammo and now they have even less.

Greg,

You may not consider it large. I consider it a bunch of fellow Soldiers and hundreds of Iraqi civilians I do not have to worry about getting killed or injured by these barbarians.

On the flip side, Sadr’s army might hold 2,000 explosive devices (including grenades, rpg rounds, mortar rounds and artillery shells) or less and maybe a couple hundred thousand rounds of firearm ammo and maybe enough rifles for everybody. Spread that among 60,000 guys and that stuff would go pretty quickly if used. This is my guess with that cache considered to be big for his group). Then of course Sadr needs a real time communication network which he probably doesn’t have. Sadr can do some damage but when pushed, he will be forced to back down. Not only is he outmanned, he is outgunned by the Iraqi government alone. Iraq is running out of internal enemies that could put up a fight, which is one of the conditions for the U.S. to leave. I predict General Petraeus will lay out some major withdrawl numbers in the fall. Originally the news predicted that 100,000 troops may stay when Bush leaves, but that number could be even less now. Those troops would probably be replaced by some military aid.