heres the article mang...sorry for the log-in shite
THE INSURGENCY
U.S. Military Kills Scores in Fighting Near Mosul
By ERIK ECKHOLM
Published: September 10, 2004
AGHDAD, Iraq, Sept. 9 - After a long morning of fierce but one-sided combat near the northern city of Mosul on Thursday, American forces said they had killed 57 enemy fighters with great precision, and without a single American casualty.
But a local hospital said it had received scores of civilian dead and wounded, including women and children, a reminder of the human and political costs of military victory in battlegrounds like this one, near the Syrian border and a hub of Sunni resistance.
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Several civilians were also killed Thursday in an American bombing raid on what was described as a terrorist location in the rebel stronghold of Falluja. An initial military report said no civilians had been at the site but that account was changed following later news reports and photographs. The battle near Mosul, along a highway leading to Syria, took place in the town of Tal Afar. It began at 2 a.m. and was one of the deadliest in Iraq since the siege of Najaf, far to the south, last month.
The fight was described by an American spokesman as a step "to restore control of Tal Afar to legitimate Iraqi government officials." The spokesman said it followed repeated attacks on American forces "by a large terrorist element that has displaced local Iraqi security forces throughout the recent weeks."
The offensive in Tal Afar followed a failed attempt by the Iraqi authorities to secure government control through talks with tribal and community leaders, American officials said.
Overwhelming firepower - pitting jets, helicopters and tanks against lightly armed militants - won the day, but the region is far from secure, officials said.
American and Iraqi government forces on the main highway around Tal Afar were "attacked by terrorists using the Al Huda Mosque and other buildings in town as cover," Lt. Col. Paul Hastings, an Army spokesman, wrote in an e-mail statement.
American forces "responded to this attack with precise and accurate fire," he said.
"Air power successfully attacked enemy strong points,'' he continued. "The latest casualty figures report 57 enemy killed today."
Local residents did not deny that the town had been infiltrated by militants, but they described a far less tidy battle. "There is bombing everywhere and my cousin was killed by a rocket when he was trying to get his family out of the city," said Bashir Abboosh, a 41-year-old sheep farmer, as he fled Tal Afar this afternoon.
"The city is weeping,'' he said. "It is empty of people."
For long periods, witnesses said, the fighting prevented ambulances from collecting the wounded and the dead.
The director of the Tal Afar hospital, Dr. Fawzi Ahmed, said Thursday that his hospital had seen 45 dead and more than 80 wounded, most of them civilians.
A third day of American air attacks on suspected militant bases in Falluja was also clouded by contrasting claims of damage and civilian deaths.
On Thursday, citing what it said was compelling evidence from multiple sources, the American military announced that at 2:21 a.m. it had conducted "a precision strike on a confirmed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi operating location in northern Falluja." Three associates of Mr. Zarqawi, a Jordanian Islamic militant with ties to Al Qaeda, "were reported to be in the area," the statement said, and "no other individuals were present at the time of the strike."
As the day progressed, news accounts and photographs of dead women and children along with credible witness reports, told a different story. At least eight people died, including four children and two women, a local doctor told The Associated Press, and another 16 people including 8 children were wounded. In the rubble of a demolished house, workers found only one survivor, a 10-month-old infant, said Ahmad Jabir, a member of the rescue team.
On Thursday evening, an American spokesman, Maj. Jay Antonelli, revised the earlier description of events in Falluja. "In spite of the great care taken to spare the lives of noncombatants, an unknown number of Iraqi civilians were unfortunately among those killed and wounded in the strike," Major Antonelli said in an e-mail statement.
"The foreign fighters who hide among the people of Falluja place them at significant risk,'' Major Antonelli said.
He added: "Foreign fighters will not enjoy safe haven anywhere in the city."
Iraqi employees of The Times whose names have been withheld for their safety contributed reporting for this article from Mosul and Falluja.
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