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Information is highly contradictable...
Remains of Iraqi troops continue resistance in Umm-Kasr...
Iraqi division has probably not surrendered but captured as a result of coalition Special Ops action...
Iraqi elite troopers are coming toward coalition troops. El-Nasiria is ready to fight...
Two UK search and rescue choppers were downed...
Iraqi command and communication system is still intact...
Iraqi losses are up to 250-300 killed and 500 wounded. Coalition suffers some casualties too...
Do not laugh! Coalition troops have captured Umm-Quasr for fifth time.
There is no Iraqi resistance in area. Just, the coalition likes the very process.
Russia has already started a humanitarian operation in order to help Iraqi civilians. First cargo plane landed in Kermanshah, Iran, with humanitarian aid for Iraqi refugees. The second one is going now. Two more planes will fly tomorrow.
Sources: numerous Russian TV channels and news agencies.
Do not laugh! Coalition troops have captured Umm-Quasr for fifth time.
There is no Iraqi resistance in area. Just, the coalition likes the very process.
Please remember that this thread is about the latest news... Please provide links or the story... This thread is not meant for rumors or commentary. And please check to see if your information has already been posted. Unless you have more to add...
A lot of people have been suspended for including their commentary or spam... don't join them
Keep on Civin'
RIP rah, Tony Bogey, Baron O and Slowwhand
CNN: Possible move by Iraqi military to surrender to the United States?
The timing of the bombing campaign was tied to the progress in the negotiations, a U.S. official told CNN
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Iraqi expatriates have been facilitating negotiations among CIA operatives, U.S. military officials and senior members of the Iraq Republican Guard inside Iraq aimed at achieving a peaceful surrender of Iraq, CNN has learned.
The expatriates, including Kurdish leaders and former military commanders who have "active contact with the Iraqi military," have been having "face-to-face discussions with senior members of the Iraqi Republican Guard in the last 24 to 36 hours," an administration official told CNN.
There "has been some receptivity to the idea, [but] it's not a done deal," the official said.
"They are negotiating a countrywide pacification that allows the U.S. to enter Iraq peacefully to achieve the purpose of disarmament," the official said.
He said the discussions were being "closely held and coordinated very closely" with CIA and U.S. military officials.
Timing of bombing campaign linked to talks
The official said the status of the negotiations was a factor in the timing of the start of the major U.S. bombing campaign Friday as officials assessed whether a deal could be struck.
But "because we weren't there yet, we decided to continue with the bad cop role," he said.
"The end result will be the same whether there is a peaceful agreement or not," the official said. "We are going to control every square inch of Iraq.
"We are going to remove the regime. The country will be disarmed."
He said the United States was going to begin "de-Baathification" and help Iraqis create a new government. The Baath Party controls Iraq.
'It's a simple choice.'
"The Iraqi [military] can die or live. It's a simple choice," the official said.
A CIA spokesman had no comment about the negotiations.
"There are a number of individuals in countries around the world who have been conveying the message to the Iraqi regime that it is now inevitable that there will be a change," Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday.
"In order to prevent any loss of life beyond that which may have occurred already, it would be wise for Iraqi leaders to recognize that their day is over and that this is going to happen."
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has been saying in recent days the United States was in touch with Iraq's military leadership at all levels, but he indicated Friday talks had not progressed as far as the United States felt they should have.
The administration official said one of the reasons a deal had not been reached was the United States was trying to ascertain the authority with which the Iraqi Republican Guard senior leaders were speaking.
"It is unclear whether these guys represent themselves or a coalition of military commanders who want a brighter future for Iraq," he said.
He said some senior members of the Iraqi leadership who stepped down peacefully could be offered some sort of asylum.
The official said the Iraqi expatriates driving the negotiations were "pre-positioned in northern Iraq, ready to move at a moment's notice when we see the pillars of Iraqi leadership beginning to fall."
Some have "been hanging out for months" and some were recently dispatched to the region before getting a green light from the United States to enter Iraq over the past day or so.
"These are people for whom lines of communication with the U.S. have been open previously," the official said.
He said the United States had heard about the expatriates and had sent them leaflets and spammed their e-mails in recent weeks "asking them to take positive action ... and telling them we would deeply appreciate it if they did."
The official said that "if these guys play a positive role and help to facilitate this, they could certainly play a role" in a post-Saddam Iraq.
"I'm moving to the Left" - Lancer
"I imagine the neighbors on your right are estatic." - Slowwhand
Conscripts shoot their own officers rather than fight
From Tom Newton Dunn with 40 Commando near al-Faw, southern Iraq
IRAQI conscripts shot their own officers in the chest yesterday to avoid a fruitless fight over the oil terminals at al-Faw. British soldiers from 40 Commando’s Charlie Company found a bunker full of the dead officers, with spent shells from an AK47 rifle around them.
Stuck between the US Seals and the Royal Marines, whom they did not want to fight, and a regime that would kill them if they refused, it was the conscripts’ only way out.
In total, 40 Commando had collected more than 100 prisoners of war yesterday from the few square miles of the al-Faw peninsula that they controlled. Two of them were a general in the regular Iraqi Army and a brigadier. They came out from the command bunker where they had been hiding after 40 Commando’s Bravo Company fired two anti-tank missiles into it. With them was a large sports holdall stuffed with money. They insisted that they had been about to pay their troops, to the disbelief of their captors.
These were the men who had left their soldiers hungry, poorly armed and almost destitute for weeks, judging by the state we had seen them in, while appearing to keep the money for themselves.
It was only as dawn broke that the 900 Royal Marine commandos, who had moved forward during the night, realised the pitiful shape of the enemy. The first white flag was hoisted by three soldiers in a trench just outside the complex’s north gate, which had been surrounded by heavy machinegunners from Command Company.
They were taken prisoner by Corporal Fergus Gask, 26, who may have accepted the first surrender of the war. “We started engaging their positions with GPMGs (general purpose machineguns) when I noticed this white flag go up,” he said. “I didn’t know whether it was a trick or not, but I approached the trench anyway, probably a pretty silly thing to do if I think about it.
“But as soon as I saw their faces I knew they were genuine. They actually looked very relieved they didn’t have to fight any more. And they became very pleased to see us when they realised we weren’t going to do them any harm.”
The dawn light appeared to have provoked an exodus.
Small groups of dishevelled Iraqis were standing up all around us with their hands in the air, or with a dirty white T-shirt tied to a stick waving above them. Every time you turned around, a new trickle of silhouettes emerged from the horizon walking slowly towards us. One Marine joked: “Oh no. They’re surrendering at us from all sides.”
Each prisoner was thoroughly searched before he was accepted into captivity in a procedure that the commandos had clearly practised many times. The injured were quickly treated and a handful received almost immediate helicopter evacuation from the oil terminal to HMS Ocean, where a temporary hospital for PoWs has been set up.
As a new day began, so did the Marines’ gradual expansion outwards into the large expanse of waste ground that is still pockmarked with shell craters from the Iran-Iraq War.To save them having to translate from Arabic maps, 40 Commando named the clear paths they had established or wanted to seize with London street names: Downing Street, Abbey Road or Fulham Road.
Engineers, meanwhile, began the work of shutting down the many oil pipeline valves.
(Link in Russian, referring to Al-Alam TV channel who has live cameras at Iranian side of Shatt-Al-Arab river).
Iraqi troops have left Faw city, however, the coalition troops are still hesitating and do not enter it. The choppers are flying above Faw. The civilians are escaping being afraid of possible coalition air strike.
Umm-Quasr is still resisting to coalition. One may hear sound of rockets and small arm firing.
Saturday morning, two British Royal Navy helicopters collided over international waters in the Persian Gulf, killing all seven on board, a U.S. Navy officer and six British crew members, U.S. defense officials told MSNBC TV.
P.S. So far, the official death toll of coalition is equal to 7 US and 14 UK servicemen. Besides, 3 US and 2 UK helicopters have been lost.
Do not laugh! Coalition troops have captured Umm-Quasr for fifth time.
There is no Iraqi resistance in area. Just, the coalition likes the very process.
Right now, a Russian federal TV channel REN-TV claims the heaviest US Marine casualties near Basra. I omit the number till any independent confirmation will come.
Do not laugh! Coalition troops have captured Umm-Quasr for fifth time.
There is no Iraqi resistance in area. Just, the coalition likes the very process.
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