Homecoming

Homecoming
Redeployment Ceremony; April 22nd, 2008

In The News

Articles, pictures, and other news about the 2-32 Field Artillery, and the area (Yarmouk and Hateen neighborhoods) where they've been working. For posts older than 30 days, check the archive links on the left, or use the searchbox at the top of the page.

[last update: April 22, 2008]

Saturday, September 22, 2007

Mansour District Patrol, Factory and Vehicle Search

Mansour District Patrol, Factory and Vehicle Search
DVIDS

September 20, 2007

Mansour District Patrol, Factory and Vehicle Search

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Soldiers Provide Security for Business Seminar

Soldiers Provide Security for Business Seminar
DVIDS
Sept 17, 2007

Soldiers Provide Security for Business Seminar

Assessing the ‘Surge’: A Survey of Baghdad Neighborhoods

Assessing the ‘Surge’: A Survey of Baghdad Neighborhoods
New York Times
September 7, 2007

Interactive map of Baghdad neighborhoods, with links to video-reports.

To study the ground-level effects of the American troop buildup, reporters and video journalists for The New York Times visited Baghdad's neighborhoods, interviewing residents, Americans on patrol and Iraqi officials.

Yarmouk: Under Control of the Iraqi Army, Though Insurgents Remain
Stephen Farrell

An upmarket Sunni district of west Baghdad half way between the airport and the Green Zone. Regarded as one of the last real Sunni bastions in Baghdad. Until early 2007 under the sway of vicious Sunni insurgent groups like Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and their former allies, the 1920s Revolution Brigades, insurgents bombed and ambushed Iraqi government security forces, killed Shiites and set up sniper positions on the central Yarmouk area of 'Arbaa Shawaria' (Four Streets), firing on cars at random. Yarmouk is a mirror image of east Baghdad's Shiite- dominated Sadr City; Shiites could not go to Yarmouk hospital, fearing Sunni death squads. After the beginning of the surge, residents say, Yarmouk has improved considerably and is now under the control of the Iraqi Army, although the insurgents are still lurking, and many Shiites are too fearful to go back. Arbaa Shawaria, although better because of numerous checkpoints, is still dangerous. Residents close side streets with roadblocks.


Electricity Variable. Some residents say they depend on generators, others say that service has increased from nearly zero to seven hours on, two hours off.

Garbage Until the surge, garbage collectors refused to come because insurgents planted so many bombs in the trash. Bodies used to be left for days because insurgents booby-trapped them to kill police officers. Reassured by the Iraqi Army presence, the collectors have begun to come, though only rarely, leaving piles of rubbish in yards.

Displacement Many wealthy Sunnis fled, fearing the extremists. Shiites left the area, avoided the area completely or carried fake Sunni identity cards to pass through checkpoints.

Freedoms "The army raided my house, and they saw posters of Imam Abbas in the living room. They told me, 'You are Shia, what are you doing here?' They beat me up, burned my house and forced me out of the area."—Khatan Kareem, a Shiite displaced from Yarmouk.

Outlook Earlier this year, Yarmouk Hospital, the most important in west Baghdad, took delivery of three large imported refrigerators, to cope with increased demand. They were for the morgue.

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Battery B Platoon featured on MultiNational Force Website

Multi-National Force Website
Sept 17, 2007



U.S. Army soldiers with Bravo Battery, 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, receive a mission brief (from SGT Brown) at Joint Security Station Torch in Baghdad. During his weekly radio address, President Bush said “The more successful we are, the more troops can return home. And in all we do, I will ensure that our commanders on the ground have the troops and flexibility they need to defeat the enemy”. Photo by U.S. Air Force Tech. Sgt. Andrew M. Rodier.
[picture was used in an unrelated article: Bush supports Petraeus’ recommendations on troop levels]

Blackwater Incident in Yarmouk

Iraq battle was self-defense, security firm says
CNN
Sept 18, 2007

[This is the only article I've found so far that places the incident in Yarmouk.]

Iraqi officials Monday condemned the weekend killings of eight civilians during a Baghdad street battle involving American security contractors and said they would shut down Blackwater, the company involved.

Blackwater said its employees acted in self-defense. The U.S. State Department said it plans to investigate what it calls a "terrible incident."

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to express regret for the weekend killings, both governments said.

In addition to the fatalities, 14 people were wounded, most of them civilians, an Iraqi official said.

Sunday's firefight took place near Nusoor Square, an area that straddles the predominantly Sunni Arab neighborhoods of Mansour and Yarmouk.

The ministry said the incident began around midday, when a convoy of sport utility vehicles came under fire from unidentified gunmen in the square. The men in the SUVs, described by witnesses as Westerners, returned fire, the ministry said.

Blackwater's employees were protecting a U.S. official when they were hit by "a large explosive device, then repeated small-arms fire -- and to the point where it disabled one of the vehicles, and the vehicle had to be towed out of the firefight," said Marty Strong, vice president of Blackwater USA.

A senior industry source said Blackwater guards had escorted a State Department group to a meeting with U.S. Agency for International Development officials in Mansour before the shootings.

A car bomb went off about 80 feet (25 meters) from the meeting site and the contractors started evacuating the State Department officials, he said. A State Department report on the attack said the convoy came under fire from an estimated eight to 10 people, some in Iraqi police uniforms.

The guards called for backup, at one point finding their escape route blocked by an Iraqi quick-reaction force that pointed heavy machine guns at one vehicle in the convoy. A U.S. Army force, backed by air cover, arrived about half an hour later to escort the convoy back to the Green Zone, the report states.

A team from another security company passed through the area shortly after the street battle.

"Our people saw a couple of cars destroyed," Carter Andress, CEO of American-Iraqi Solutions Groups, told CNN on Monday. "Dead bodies, wounded people being evacuated. The U.S. military had moved in and secured the area. It was not a good scene."

An Interior Ministry spokesman, Brig. Gen. Abdul Kareem Khalaf, said, "We have revoked Blackwater's license to operate in Iraq. As of now they are not allowed to operate anywhere in the Republic of Iraq. The investigation is ongoing, and all those responsible for Sunday's killing will be referred to Iraqi justice."

Company and State Department officials said they had not been notified of any order to that effect.

Rice and al-Maliki agreed to conduct "a fair and transparent investigation into this incident" and punish those responsible, the prime minister's office said.

The Diplomatic Security Service has launched an official investigation, a review that will be supported by the Multi-National Forces-Iraq, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

"The secretary wants to make sure we do everything we possibly can to avoid innocent loss of life," he said.

McCormack said that while the United States tries to avoid innocent casualties, "we are fighting people who don't play by any rules" and have no problem killing innocent civilians.

The weekend's incident raised concerns in the U.S. Congress about the use of private security guards. Rep. Henry Waxman, whose House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held hearings on contractor operations in February, said he will hold new hearings into the issue in light of Sunday's shootings.

"The controversy over Blackwater is an unfortunate demonstration of the perils of excessive reliance on private security contractors," said Waxman, D-California.

Blackwater, founded in 1997 and based in Moyock, North Carolina, is one of many security firms contracted by the U.S. government during the Iraq war. An estimated 25,000 employees of private security firms are working in Iraq, guarding diplomats, reconstruction workers and government officials. As many as 200 are believed to have been killed on the job, according to U.S. congressional reports.

Some Blackwater personnel died in a grisly attack in Iraq more than three years ago that sparked shock and outrage in the United States.

Four Americans working as private security personnel for Blackwater, all of whom were military veterans, were ambushed, killed and mutilated in March 2004 in Falluja, west of Baghdad.

People close to the company estimate it has lost about 30 employees during the war.

Iraqi authorities have issued previous complaints about shootings by private military contractors, the Congressional Research Service reported in July.

"Most recently, a news article discussing an incident in which a Blackwater guard shot dead an Iraqi driver in May 2007 quoted an Iraqi official's statement that the Iraqi Interior Ministry had received four previous complaints of shootings involving Blackwater employees," the congressional service report said.

The Congressional Research Service report cited other concerns, such as "the apparent lack of a practical means to hold contractors accountable under U.S. law for abuses and other transgressions and the possibility that they could be prosecuted by foreign courts."

The reported added, "Iraqi courts do not have jurisdiction to prosecute contractors without the permission of the relevant member country of the Multi-National Forces in Iraq."

Contractors fall under Justice Department and FBI jurisdiction for alleged crimes, said a Pentagon official, who confirmed the accuracy of the congressional report.

Security Developments

Security Developments
McClatchy Newspapers
Laith Hammoudi
Sept 17, 2007

5 people (3 civilians and 2 policemen) were wounded in an IED explosion that targeted a police patrol in Yarmouk neighborhood west Baghdad around 8,00 pm.

Monday, September 17, 2007

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides
Dagger Brigade Combat Team Official Site
Week: Sept 10 - Sept 16
Slides: 33, 34

Golf Company Medic Treats Children Following Mortar Strike
  • SPC Brandon Villavisencio, medic for 1st Platoon, Golf Company, treats local children in Hateen after a mortar round impacted near their house. The children sufered minor shrapnel wounds, but will not have to worry about infection or scarring because of SPC Villavisencio's timely medical care.
Bravo Battery Medic Treats Yarmouk Children
  • SPC John Hutson, medic for 3rd Platoon, Bravo Battery, treats local children in Yarmouk for assorted bumps and bruises.

Iraqi boy leads troops to weapons cache

Iraqi boy leads troops to weapons cache
Multi-National Division – Baghdad PAO
Monday, 17 September 2007

A Multi-National Division-Baghdad unit discovered a cache of explosives and improvised explosive device-making materials in a western neighborhood of the Iraqi capital following a tip from a local boy Sept. 15.

A platoon from Battery B, 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment (Task Force Patriot), was conducting a census operation in the western Baghdad neighborhood of Yarmouk when an 11-year-old Iraqi boy pointed out an abandoned house and suggested that insurgents had used it as a base of operations in previous months.

The Soldiers discovered two cache sites within the house after a detailed search. The contents of the two caches included four RPG-7 rockets, nine 57mm rockets, two 82mm mortars, one 130mm artillery round, one 122mm artillery round, one block of TNT, a foot of detonation cord, 52 AK-47 magazines and an assortment of IED-detonating devices.

An explosive ordnance disposal team responded to the scene and removed the explosives for detonation later in a controlled environment.

“We’re encouraged by the fact that a tip from an Iraqi child led us to this cache,” said Capt. Jayson Morgan, commander of Battery B and a Munday, Texas native. “It’s just another sign that our efforts in this community are paying dividends.”

Morgan said he will return to the neighborhood later this week to pay the family of the young boy a reward for providing such valuable information.