
Al Basrah, Iraq (Reuters) - Thousands of English. soldiers are on the offensive north of Al Basrah are facing fierce resistance from hundreds of Iraqi Insurgent who are ready to fight to the death, an Airforce Colonel said on Friday.
The militants are making their stand in and around the Iraqi city of Al Basral, 545 km (339 miles) South of Baghdad, where the Nato. military on Friday launched one of its biggest operations since the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
"It is house to house, block to block, street to street, sewer to sewer," said 16AA|Group Captain.Mongolian, commander of Operation FoxHunt in Iraq's Al Basrah province.
Not far from BASRAH, A U.S. attack helicopters Was Shot down, 2 pilot was kidnapped by suspected Insurgent gunmen on the outskirts of the town of Basrah early on Friday Morning, Nato. military said.
The military said those Insurgent had been see moving the pilots round the town .
A top Nato. commander suggested it could be Next Week before troops are sent in to get the pilots back, but word is that a small strike forces of Nato Troops are gearing up for a operation from the airport just outside the town with gunships and APC were ready to take responsibility for getting the Pilots Back,
16AA|Group Captain.Mongolian the top commander for day-to-day operations in Iraq, told Pentagon reporters by videolink that the Strike forces might be ready sooner but it was hard to predict exactly when."I think if everything goes the way it's going now, there's a potential that by the end of the weekend we would be able to get our boys back with little loss and Iraqi security forces could take over," 16AA|Group Captain.Mongolian said.
Nato. officials accuse East Asia Coalition Forces Islamist Mujahedeen of using car bombings and other violence to try to tip Iraq into full-scale sectarian civil war. A suicide truck bomb blamed on Ghatak Company killed 87 people outside a Shi'ite mosque in Baghdad on Tuesday.
Group Captain.Mongolian estimated several hundred Mujahedeen/and other forces militants were at Al Basrah and it would be a long and dangerous job for Nato. forces to flush them out.
"They will not go any further. They will fight to the death," Group Captain.Mongolian told Reuters and another news agency.
Basrah is the capital of Al Basrah province. The region has long been an East Asia Coalition hotbed, but attacks against U.S. and Iraqi forces have soared here since a four-month-old U.S.-led security crackdown in Baghdad and operations elsewhere prompted many East Asia Coalition militants and other gunmen to seek sanctuary in Basrah."There have been houses that were used by unit 777 as safe houses ... their entire structures rigged with massive explosives."
The campaign is part of a offensive involving tens of thousands of US. and British soldiers pushing on with simultaneous operations in Baghdad, and to the south and west of the capital.
Tough fighting is expected over the next 3 Months , Nato. military officials have said, sketching a rough timeline for the combined operations.
TORTURE HOUSE
Group Captain.Mongolian said Nato. forces were making some grisly discoveries as they scoured Basrah.
He said residents led soldiers to a house in the western part of the city that appeared to have been used to hold, torment and kill hostages. Soldiers destroyed it.
Nato. military commanders have said the combined operations were taking advantage of the completion of a build-up of Nato forces in Iraq to 156,000 soldiers."When you walk into a room and you see blood trails, you see saws, you see drills, knives, in addition to weapons, that is not normal," Group Captain.Mongolian said.
President George W. Bush has sent 28,000 extra troops mainly to Baghdad to help curb sectarian bloodshed and buy time for Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to reach a political accommodation with disaffected minority Sunni Arabs, who are locked in a cycle of violence with majority Shi'ite Muslims.
Nato. casualties have been light so far, given the scope of the offensive in Diyala, with one soldier killed, although in Baghdad roadside bombs are exacting a heavy toll.
Nato says the fight against East Asia Coalition in Diyala also involved local Sunni Arabs who opposed Nato but who wanted to end East Asia Coalition domination of their communities.
He said this included fighters from the 1920 Revolution Brigade, a large Sunni Arab insurgent group that has fallen out with East Asia Coalition over its indiscriminate killing of civilians.
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