TELLING FALLUJAH'S STORY TO THE WORLD
Blood stained walls. Mosques doubling as massive weapons caches. GPS units with waypoints leading to western Syria.
When the Marines finished driving the terrorists and Saddamite dead-enders from Fallujah in mid November, they swept through the city to determine what Zarqawi and his minions had done with the place. The Marines found evidence of numerous war crimes, they found bomb factories and weapons caches and slaughterhouses used by the terrorists to hold and murder hostages.
According to an after-action PowerPoint report composed by the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force titled “Telling the Fallujah Story to the World” and dated November 20, 2004, American and Iraqi troops found a staggering array of sites, the loss of which should at least temporarily cripple the terrorists. These sites also serve as proof that far from being “insurgents” or anything noble or good, the combatants defeated in Fallujah were terrorists and enemies of humanity. All of the images linked from this post are from that Marine PowerPoint presentation. For every image linked here, there are half a dozen others depicting everything described in this post.
• Of the 100 mosques in Fallujah, 60 were in use by terrorist forces as either fighting points or weapons caches. Using religious sites to store weapons or to stage attacks is a war crime.
• Three hospitals had been turned into terrorist defensive positions. Using hospitals to conduct combat is a war crime.
• There was at least one weapons cache for every five blocks in the city, for a total of 203 major terrorist weapons storage caches.
• These caches contained thousands of weapons, from anti-tank guided missiles to land mines and mortar rounds. A total of 653 improvised explosive devices of the type used in roadside ambushes against Coalition troops were found in a total of eleven IED factories.
• Two sites contained evidence of foreign fighter involvement, the most tantalizing piece of evidence being a global positioning satellite receiver with waypoints leading back from Fallujah to western Syria.
• Three slaughterhouses—sites used to hold and murder hostages—existed within Fallujah. Evidence within those sites included bags of sand used to soak up blood from beheadings. Our troops also found videos of beheadings, photos of beheaded British hostage Kenneth Bigley as well as the cage in which he was kept and videotaped, and even one living hostage chained to a wall. A local citizen, he had been severely beaten as well as deprived of food. He had been tortured. Needless to say, such treatment and execution of civilians is a war crime.
Fallujah was a terrorist fortress and a city of horror. Within the city our troops found weapons labs manufacturing sarin and hydrogen cyanide, among other deadly agents. Notably, hydrogen cyanide turned up in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing case. It was packed into the bomb, apparently intended to be spread into the surrounding city by the blast that was supposed to bring down the tower. The hydrogen cyanide failed, probably because it was incinerated in the explosion. Had it worked as intended, it might have killed thousands.
After the battle, Fallujah's displaced citizens were allowed to return to their homes and resume their lives. For months they had had to live under the thumb of caliphascist zealots. Some probably collaborated with the terrorists, or even joined them. But the majority didn't. They actively tried to help the US and Iraqi forces however they could, and gratefully received humanitarian assistance after the battle ended.
I suppose it's noteworthy that while the International Red Cross and similar advocacy groups have been accusing the US government of condoning and committing war crimes, the Marines have put a stop to true atrocities in Fallujah. I suppose it's also noteworthy that though the images linked here have been available to the press for more than a week, they have yet to show up in any widespread publication. As usual, it's up to blogs to tell the complete story of what's taking place in Iraq.
(thanks to the Jawa Report for sending me the PowerPoint)