MOSUL, Iraq — In a city once safe for American troops, assailants killed two U.S. soldiers riding in a civilian car Sunday in the northern city of Mosul and, in a bloody scene, Iraqi teenagers then reportedly pummeled their bodies with concrete blocks. Residents trashed the vehicles and made off with the soldiers’ belongings.
Military officials would only confirm Sunday that two soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division were shot at as they drove between U.S. garrisons.
Witnesses to the Mosul attack said gunmen shot two soldiers driving through the city center, sending their vehicle crashing into a wall.
About a dozen swarming teenagers dragged the soldiers out of the wreckage and beat them with concrete blocks, the witnesses said.
"They lifted a block and hit them with it on the face," said Younis Mahmoud, 19.
It was unknown whether the soldiers were alive or dead when pulled from the wreckage.
Initial reports said the soldiers’ throats were cut. But another witness, teenager Bahaa Jassim, said the wounds appeared to have come from bullets.
"One of the soldiers was shot under the chin and the bullet came out of his head. I saw the hole in his helmet. The other was shot in the throat," Jassim said.
Some people looted the vehicle of weapons, CDs and a backpack, Jassim said.
"They remained there for over an hour without the Americans knowing anything about it," he said. "I … went and told other troops."
Television footage showed the soldiers’ bodies splayed on the ground as U.S. troops secured the area. One victim’s foot appeared to have been severed.
The frenzy recalled the October 1993 scene in Somalia, when locals dragged the bodies of Marines killed in fighting with warlords through the streets.
Asked at a Baghdad news briefing about reports that the soldiers’ throats had been slit, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the U.S. military deputy director for operations, replied only, "We’re not going to get ghoulish about this."
The soldiers’ deaths came shortly after another U.S. soldier was killed and two were wounded by a roadside bomb in Baqubah, 30 miles northeast of Baghdad.
The bloody tableau in Mosul clashes with the image of progress and cooperation that had previously characterized postwar Mosul, a place with a functioning government, an efficient police force and a vigorous economy.
While Mosul had been a notorious stronghold of the former Baath regime, the Army pumped more than $30 million in seized ex-regime funds into hundreds of redevelopment projects. U.S. troops stationed here were able to spend much of their time refurbishing schools and factories, jump-starting civic life and handing out Beanie Babies and soccer balls.
U.S. forces also helped set up a new police force, fire department and city council.
"They (Iraqis) don’t understand being nice," said Col. Joe Anderson, who oversees the military zone that includes Mosul and environs and doesn’t hide his irritation after months dedicated to restoring the city. "We spent so long here working with kid gloves, but the average Iraqi guy will tell you, ‘The only thing people respect here is violence. … They only understand being shot at, being killed. That’s the culture.’ … Nice guys do finish last here."
The surge in violence in Mosul — along with recent bombings in Nasiriyah and Basra in southern Iraq, also areas that have been relatively calm — indicate to some that the armed opposition wants to send out a message that no place is safe.
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