War News for Saturday, October 30, 2010

Sorry I left for the week but I haven't had a vacation in nearly two years now. I would have caught up on what I missed last night but the flight back was of stuff stories are made of which even my vivid imagination couldn't make up so I'll have to post short for today, thanks to the Cervantes something got posted for the week which I haven't even looked at yet. I'll be back up and running by Monday. -- whisker


Reported security incidents

Baghdad:
#1: An Iraqi civilian has been killed when an explosive charge stuck to his car blew off in Baghdad early on Saturday, killing him on the spot, a security source said. He said the explosive charge went off when he passed close to central Baghdad’s Jadiriya bridge, killing him and causing severe material losses to his car.


Diyala Prv:
#1: An Iraqi health official says the death toll from a suicide bombing north of Baghdad has risen to 26. Hussein Jaafar, the director of the hospital in Balad Ruz, said Saturday that five more people have died from injuries sustained in the blast. The suicide bomber blew himself up inside a popular cafe Friday night, breaking what has been a period of relative calm in Iraq. The neighborhood where the explosion occurred is home to many Shiites of Kurdish ethnicity.


Rashad:
#1: An eight-year-old boy was killed and two of his family members wounded when a grenade he had found in a field and was playing with exploded in the town of Rashad, southwest of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.


Mosul:
#1: A roadside bomb targeting an Iraqi army patrol wounded three civilians, including one woman, when it went off in eastern Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.



Afghanistan: "The Forgotten War"
#1: Insurgents armed with rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars tried to storm a combat outpost in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday, setting off a battle that killed 30 attackers and wounded five coalition soldiers, NATO said. Assailants struck from all sides in the nighttime attack on the outpost in Paktika province's Bermal district, where nearly all NATO forces are from the U.S. military. The military called in close air-support and aircraft dropped three bombs to help repel the insurgents. According to NATO, the five coalition service members who were wounded in the attack continued fighting. "Insurgents attacked from all directions," NATO said in a statement. It provided no further details. The attack took place in an area about 200 kilometres south of Kabul that borders the Pakistani region of North Waziristan. The area is controlled largely by the Haqqani network, a Pakistan-based Taliban faction closely tied to al-Qaida.

#2: Militants attacked a Pakistani military checkpost on Saturday, killing two soldiers in a restive tribal district on the Afghan border, a security official said. The attack took place in the Badar area, 30 kilometres north of Wana, the main town in South Waziristan district. "Militants attacked a military checkpost today in South Waziristan and killed two soldiers," a senior security official in the area told AFP on condition of anonymity.

#3: The noose has been tightened around one of the lingering insurgent strongholds where Canadian soldiers operate in Kandahar's Panjwaii district. But a two-day operation aimed at cutting insurgent supply lines into the volatile town of Nakhonay also angered locals and prompted a retaliatory attack by the Taliban. Teams of Canadian engineers and infantry troops were dropped by helicopter earlier this week on the southern edge of Khenjakak, a small village southwest of Kandahar City. They charged out of Chinook helicopters as daylight broke Wednesday morning, prepared for contact. As they moved north through the town, however, they only found traces of the shadow-like insurgency. In a grape hut, a patrol came across an extensive cache of medical supplies. "It's probably a stop-over for injured insurgents," said Warrant Officer Todd Weber, a member of Bravo Company's 4 Platoon. NATO has had little presence in this area until now, allowing the insurgents to use it as a staging area for attacks further north.

#4: A suicide car bomb apparently targeted security forces in Tanai district of eastern Khost province Saturday, casualties feared, district governor Daulat Khan Qayumi said.


DoD: Spc. Ronnie J. Pallares

DoD: Staff Sgt. Aracely Gonzalez O’Malley

DoD: Spc. Thomas A. Moffitt

DoD: Pfc. David R. Jones Jr.

DoD: Sgt. 1st Class Phillip C. Tanner

DoD: Sgt. Michael D. Kirspel Jr.