Aleppo
'Main battle' about to begin in Aleppo, UN peacekeeping chief says
(CNN) -- Officials believe the "main battle" is
about to begin in the Syrian city of Aleppo, the U.N. peacekeeping chief
said Thursday.
"The focus is now on
Aleppo, where there has been a considerable buildup of military means,
and where we have reason to believe that the main battle is about to
start," said Herve Ladsous, the United Nations under-secretary-general
for peacekeeping operations.
Ladsous spoke to
reporters and briefed the U.N. Security Council Thursday, hours after
Syrian rebels battered a military base near Aleppo as the battle for the
nation's most populous city raged.
Rebels used tanks seized
in previous clashes with government troops to pound the Menagh military
airport, the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The base is north of Aleppo, Syria's commercial capital. The main military airfield in the region is southeast of the city.
The government-run Syrian
Arab News Agency said authorities were "killing or wounding dozens of
terrorists" in the countryside outside Aleppo.
Regime warplanes shelled the western and northern parts of the city, the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria said.
Communication was spotty
inside the besieged city. Cellular phone service was cut off, and power
outages were reported in neighborhoods where there was heavy shelling,
according to Deama, an activist there who asked that her full name not
be used for her protection.
Thursday's fighting comes
amid unsuccessful international diplomacy. Kofi Annan, who championed a
six-point peace plan this year, said he has resigned as the U.N. and
Arab League joint special envoy to Syria.
While diplomats debate
how to handle the situation, there has been stepped-up help for the
emboldened rebel forces, dominated by military defectors who have
streamed into the opposition's arms for months.
Rebels are now equipped
with heavy weaponry, including tanks, the United Nations said, a sign
that the armed resistance to President Bashar al-Assad's regime is
gaining military potency.
Government forces also used heavy weapons in the clashes.
MiG-23 fighter jets struck rebels in an Aleppo village, said Capt. Ammar Al-Wawi of the Free Syrian Army.
Syrian state TV said
soldiers "have been able to eliminate scores of terrorists and
mercenaries" in Aleppo and claim to be sweeping through the city's
Salaheddine neighborhood and towns west of Aleppo.
Shelling and clashes
have raged across the city for days, prompting thousands to flee their
homes. Both rebels and government forces are placing great importance on
gaining control of the metropolis.
But Aleppo was not the
only hot spot in Thursday's fighting. Anti-al-Assad fighters and
government forces continued clashing across Syria. At least 130 people
were killed throughout the country Thursday, including 50 in Damascus
and its suburbs and seven in Aleppo province, the LCC said.
The opposition activist
network blamed government troops for an attack on a Palestinian refugee
camp in southern Damascus that killed 15 people. More than 50 others
were wounded due to heavy shelling in the area, the LCC said.
Syrian state television said terrorists were behind the attack, adding that authorities were searching for those responsible.
In an online video
purporting to show the camp after the shelling, men ran past charred,
bloodied bodies on the street. In the background, a woman screamed.
Another video purportedly showing the camp later Thursday night showed
protesters chanting "the people want to bring down the regime."
CNN cannot independently
confirm reports of violence in Syria because the government has limited
access by international journalists.
The fighting has
devastated the Syrian economy and left many people in dire straits. As
many as 3 million Syrians will need food in the next 12 months as
farmers in the conflict-ravaged nation lose assets and livestock, the
United Nations said in a report Thursday.
The Syrian agricultural
sector has suffered $1.8 billion in losses this year, including crops,
livestock and irrigation systems, according to the report.
"While the economic
implications of these losses are quite grave, the humanitarian
implications are far more pressing," said Muhannad Hadi, the World Food
Programme representative in Syria.
The Syrian crisis
started when al-Assad's security forces launched a violent crackdown on
peaceful protests in March 2011. That clampdown spurred a nationwide
uprising as armed rebels, including military defectors and other
fighters, battled under the Free Syrian Army.
The conflict has claimed
roughly 17,000 lives, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said last
week. Opposition activists put the toll at more than 20,000.
A key question remains:
whether United Nations observers will remain in Syria. The group's
mandate is set to expire on August 19.
The 150 military
observers and 80 civilians remaining in Syria conducted more than 50
patrols over the past few weeks, according to Ladsous, the United
Nations' peacekeeping chief.
"They report, they
inform us. And they try -- wherever it's possible -- to mediate, to
arrange local ceasefires, humanitarian pauses to allow civilian
populations to withdraw from shelling areas," he said.
Meanwhile, U.N. Security
Council President Gerard Araud suggested that the council should
consider shifting its attentions toward humanitarian problems in Syria.
"The divisions in the council are very deep. I think its irreconcilable in political terms," he said.
"Maybe we should work on
(the) humanitarian situation, which is becoming disastrous. At least
the Security Council would be useful," Araud added.
On Wednesday, U.S.
officials said President Barack Obama had signed a covert directive
authorizing U.S. support for Syrian rebels. The secret order, referred
to as an intelligence "finding," allows for clandestine support by the
CIA and other agencies.
Syrian state TV said Obama signed "secret documents" to "support terrorists."
The Obama administration
had said it would step up its assistance to the opposition after last
month's failure by the U.N. Security Council to agree on tougher
sanctions against the al-Assad regime, but exactly what type of support
the finding authorizes was unclear. The Obama administration has ruled
out arming the rebels for now, providing only nonlethal assistance, such
as communications equipment.
August 3, 2012 -- Updated 0006 GMT (0806 HKT)
One soldier returns to Iraq for his family - and a comrade who never made it home
Editor's note: This is the last of four stories profiling soldiers and their families whose lives were defined by the Iraq war. The first, second and third parts were published earlier this week.
Al Asad Air Base, Iraq (CNN) -- First Sgt. Marc
Campuzano braced against a cold November wind as he walked across a
parking lot at a U.S. airbase in Iraq's Anbar province.
There at the sprawling complex that once served as Saddam Hussein's
premiere airfield, Marc surveyed the few remaining armored vehicles that
would carry him and his company out of Iraq.
It would be an historic journey. They would be among the very last
U.S. soldiers to leave the country before the January 1, 2012, deadline
to withdraw.
Their exit from Iraq would take them along some of the same routes
the U.S. military used during the invasion more than eight years ago,
and it would take Marc near some of the very places where he nearly lost
his life -- and then, in a way, gained it back.
Seeing those places would be meaningful. But Marc carries reminders with him every day.
There's the black metal bracelet that bears the inscription of a
fallen comrade. There are the scars on his leg and shoulder from bullets
that nearly ended his life. There are the photos he carries of his
wife, son and daughter, the family for whom he has sacrificed so much.
Marc, 38, began wearing the bracelet during his second tour in Iraq.
Now, he was wearing it through his third -- and, possibly final --
deployment of his military career.
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| First Sgt. Marc Campuzano has served three tours in Iraq. The last time "was about coming back and facing fears," he says. |
"I've worn it every day I've been here," he said, running his fingers
across the bracelet. "I'm going to give it to the family. I want them
to know that he finished what he started."
And in a way, so had Marc.
Going back again, for family
The narrative of the Iraq war -- the invasion, the rise of the
insurgency, the surge of troops that helped quell the violence and now
the withdrawal -- is woven through the lives of thousands upon thousands
of soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines.
Repeated deployments have served as chapters in their lives -- each
marked by a moment that altered their personal journey. Moments that
changed the course of a life, the nature of relationships.
Such is the story of the Iraq war for Marc and his family.
The first time Marc deployed to Iraq, it was for his country. He was
part of then-President George W. Bush's troop surge aimed at breaking
the insurgency's stranglehold of violence.
His second tour in Iraq, he says, was about "getting his head right."
It also coincided with a shift in U.S. military policy in Iraq, with
American soldiers no longer patrolling the streets but rather advising
and assisting Iraqi security forces.
He didn't have to go a third time. His injuries could have been his
out. But he was offered the position of first sergeant of the 123rd
Support Battalion, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division, after
somebody else turned it down.
This third and final deployment to Iraq was about his job, his soldiers and, ultimately, his family.
"It's always been about them," he said. "No offense to the Army. But
do you think I'd be doing this if it wasn't for something more? It's
about my family."
'I don't remember hearing the shot'
The Iraq war has its roots for Marc and Lanita Campuzano -- as it
does for most military families -- with the September 11, 2001,
terrorist attacks.
But for them, there was a twist.
It was their wedding anniversary, and they were a young couple with
two small children. Marc was stationed at Fort Carson, Colorado, where
he was a mechanic "wrenching" on Bradley Fighting Vehicles.
 |
| Campuzano is on hand with his wife, Lanita, left, son Anthony and daughter Taylor at Anthony's high school graduation. |
The couple married after Marc graduated high school in Marysville,
California. The Army followed shortly after, offering a solution for the
young couple walking a financial tightrope that included work, college
and a new baby boy.
In those early years after the terrorist attacks, everything Marc did
-- first as a mechanic, then later as a drill instructor and then
finally working as part of a support unit that fixed and maintained
vehicles -- was in support of the U.S. military effort in Afghanistan
and Iraq.
But it was always done at a distance. That changed in October 2006 when Marc first deployed to Iraq.
Marc, Lanita and the children had been through separations before.
But this was different. This was seeing Marc off to the war zone.
The headlines were terrifying, filled with reports of sectarian
fighting between Shiites and Sunnis and a rising American military body
count.
A few months into the deployment, he and thousands of other troops
learned their 12-month assignment was being extended by at least three
months as part of the surge of an additional 20,000 into Iraq.
In March 2007, Marc found himself at Joint Security Station Thrasher,
a small outpost named for a U.S. soldier killed in a sniper attack. He
and his soldiers were moving giant concrete blast walls along the outer
perimeter of the outpost in the heart of one of Baghdad's most violent
neighborhoods.
He was leaning against a wall for cover, knowing there were snipers
in the area, when he saw a soldier lying out in the open and bleeding
badly.
"I don't remember hearing the shot," Marc said later.
He grabbed his weapon, ran toward the soldier and began dragging him
toward safety. He heard the bullets as they passed him, striking
concrete and dirt. He heard his soldiers firing back.
Then Marc felt it: The painful, excruciating burn of a bullet ripping into his body.
Today, the events of March 17, 2007, play out for Marc as a series of interrupted images.
 |
| Campuzano, 38, has scars on his leg and shoulder from bullets that nearly ended his life in a 2007 firefight in Iraq. |
There's the soldier on the ground. There's the medic who grabbed Marc
and staunched the flow of blood from the gunshot wounds in his leg and
upper torso. There's the ride to a military hospital.
Gaps in the story have been filled in by those who witnessed the
attack and by those at home in El Paso, Texas, who heard the news of his
shooting -- and waited to learn his fate.
In those conversations Marc learned that four soldiers, among them a
good friend, were killed by a roadside bomb while coming to his aid.
That his son Anthony, then 14, after hearing the news that his father
had been badly wounded, punched the wall and walked out of the house.
And that his daughter Taylor, then 8, cried herself to sleep for nights.
"Don't worry, baby," he later whispered as he hugged her from a hospital bed. "They aren't going to make me go back."
'Please God, take care of my family'
The bullet had blown holes in his leg and shoulder. Another soldier
grabbed the fallen comrade, and dragged him the last few feet to safety.
He survived.
The firefight was in full swing as Marc pulled himself behind the
concrete wall and opened fire. He only stopped when he ran out of
ammunition.
"I remember grabbing for my leg. I was like 'Man, that hurts,'' he recalled.
He looked down at his pant leg, soaked through with blood that was now pooling around his foot.
Marc was going into shock.
 |
| Marc and Lanita Campuzano married after Marc graduated from high school. Their anniversary is September 11. |
"Please God, take care of my family," he prayed as medics worked on him.
He heard an explosion after he was loaded into the back of a Bradley for the 20-minute drive to the hospital at Camp Victory.
A few hours later, at the Baghdad hospital, he saw his fellow soldiers. "Why are you crying? I'm ok," he told them.
"You didn't hear? Doc Allen was killed."
The explosion Marc had heard in the Bradley was a massive roadside
bomb. It killed his good friend Doc Allen, as Sgt. John E. Allen of
Palmdale, California, was known, and three others: Sgt. Ed Santini of
Toa Baja, Puerto Rico; Pfc. William N. Davis of Adrian, Michigan; and
Pfc. John F. Landry of Lowell, Massachusetts.
"I can't forget that," Marc says now. "They were coming to get me."
'Why does dad hate me?'
While Marc's body healed, psychological wounds were slower to repair.
Sometimes he dreamed about Doc Allen. Sometimes he awoke angry about
being wounded, about being taken away from his soldiers who needed him.
He even attempted to get his doctor to release him back to duty months before he was ready.
"Every little thing seemed to make him mad," Taylor said, recalling
the early days after her father returned home from the hospital. "He
would just get angry really fast."
He was hardest on his son.
By any standard, Anthony was a parent's dream. He got good grades. He
did what his folks asked of him. He was the starting quarterback on his
high school team. There was talk he might get an offer to play ball for
a top university.
After Marc's return, he was harder on the teen. He demanded more of him. He was less tolerant of mistakes.
"Why does Dad hate me?" Anthony asked his mother.
 |
| Lanita has been awaiting her husband's return from Iraq. Marc must decide whether to stay in or get out of the military. |
Lanita never judged her husband, standing by him through the hardest phases in his recovery and rehabilitation.
"The first six months were probably the worst," she said later. "Certain things would set him off."
But she believed her husband needed to know what his behavior was doing to their son.
That news was like a punch in the gut.
"I didn't know I was having a problem until my wife told me what my son said. I love my son. And here he thinks I hate him."
Going back
The road back for Marc was slow. Each day was better than the last,
and by the time his soldiers returned to Fort Bliss he was walking and
on hand to meet them.
His company lost seven soldiers, and the division lost dozens more.
While he was home, Marc got word that Pfc. Raymond N. Spencer Jr., a
23-year-old from Carmichael, California, had been killed in Baghdad when
insurgents targeted his convoy with an EFP, a type of explosive that
melts through armor.
Marc had an easy relationship with the soldier. They shared the same
sense of humor, and they hailed from the same part of the country. Both
had lived in Northern California.
Marc volunteered to act as a military liaison to Spencer's family,
providing whatever aid and comfort the family needed as they grieved and
made preparations to bury their son.
After Spencer's mother told Marc that it was hard knowing her son
hadn't finished what he started, Marc got the memorial bracelet. He
didn't put it on until he returned to Iraq in 2009.
"I knew he would go," said Lanita, now 36. "It's his job. It's his duty. What am I going to do?"
Anthony, like his mother, accepted the news with stoicism. Taylor, though, took the deployment hard.
She told her father she hated the military. She hated it for making him go back.
Before her dad was wounded, Taylor had taken comfort in knowing he worked at "the motor pool."
Now she understood what that meant. Her father worked for a brigade
support battalion whose mission was to go "outside the wire" to fix and
maintain vehicles and reinforce outposts. His job was dangerous.
Again? A daughter struggles
 |
| Taylor, 14, and her brother, Anthony, 18, both have been affected by their father's frequent deployments. |
Marc arrived in Iraq's Maysan province, an area in the southern
Shiite heartland that sits near the Iranian border, in the summer of
2009 with a bit of apprehension.
He knew he was returning to a different Iraq, one where violence had
fallen off dramatically thanks in large part to the surging of troops a
few years earlier.
Still, the threat remained.
He was initially assigned to Contingency Operating Base Adder, then
transferred to a much smaller base known as Garry Owen. It was a
favorite target of Iranian-backed Shiite militias, the U.S. military has
said. It was routinely hit with mortar and rocket attacks.
Marc's job was different this time. He wouldn't have to go "outside the wire" as much.
His first trip came within a month after his arrival when an armored
vehicle broke down while on patrol, and he and his soldiers had to go
get it.
"I was a little concerned about it," he said. "The last time I went outside the wire I didn't come back. "
This time he made it back to the base. And he would finish the
deployment with his soldiers, walking -- off the plane at Fort Bliss.
Marc was home less than 30 days when he learned the 4th Brigade
Combat Team, 1st Armored Division, at Fort Bliss was scheduled to return
to Iraq the summer of 2011.
Their assignment: Help close down U.S. military operations ahead of an end of the year deadline to withdraw from Iraq.
Initially, Marc was told he was not being sent with the brigade. Then
he was named the company's first sergeant. Not only was he going -- he
was in charge of overseeing the company.
In mid-September, with her father already gone, Taylor struggled to
explain her feelings. She was upset. She wanted her dad to see her
successes and coach her through her struggles.
Now 14, Taylor has followed in her brother's footsteps. She's on the
high school honor roll and has become a star volleyball and softball
player. Her parents wonder if she, too, will earn an athletic
scholarship.
Before this Iraq deployment, Marc and Lanita coached her teams. Before this tour, he cheered her on at games.
"I want to do better when he's there. He makes me want to try
harder," she said recently, wiping away tears as she struggled to find
the right words to describe what can only be called "a hole" in her
heart.
"I just want him here."
Life after the war
 |
| Lanita puts the finishing touches on homecoming mums in the Campuzano home in El Paso, Texas. |
At the motor pool at Al Asad Air Base, Marc joined his soldiers
stacking boxes of prepackaged meals, known as MREs, and cases of snacks
and beverages into storage units.
"See all of this?" he said, pointing the boxed food and beverages. "That's to feed everybody during the road march" out of Iraq.
Sitting in a plywood-lined makeshift office at the motor pool, Marc
reflected on his sacrifices -- and those of his family during more than
eight years of war.
"The last deployment was because I had to get my head right. It was about coming back and facing fears," he said.
This time, it was about the job, his soldiers. He wanted to keep everyone safe.
But Iraq has been more difficult this time. Not because of the job, but because of the time away from family.
His son, who is 18 now, began his freshmen year on a football
scholarship at Wayland Baptist University in Plainview, Texas. His
daughter had a date to homecoming, and has been learning to drive.
This time, there was no "what if" conversation between Marc and his
wife. This time, the conversation has been "what about after?"
With 18 years of military service under his belt, Marc is facing a
tough decision -- whether to stay in or get out at the 20-year mark.
Even with the specter of a deployment to Afghanistan on the horizon,
he is considering staying in. Much of it will depend on whether Marc
accepts a promotion (He learned he made the list on the road out of
Iraq, Lanita said.)
It would mean three more years of duty. But the military has been a good provider for his family -- and that's his focus.
There's plenty of time to weigh the options, he said. To talk it through with Lanita, Anthony and Taylor.
There will be time for lots of conversations when he is home and the war is over.
P.s.
Marc returned on Tuesday, earlier than Lanita anticipated. Now they can decorate for the holidays as a family -- and celebrate.
December 14, 2011 -- Updated 1841 GMT (0241 HKT)
Jon Leyne says protesters are determined to stay in the square as violence erupts nearby
UN human rights chief
Navi Pillay has condemned the "clearly excessive use of force" by
Egypt's security forces during clashes with protesters.
Ms Pillay called for an independent inquiry into the deaths of at least 30 people since the weekend.
Protesters are still occupying Cairo's Tahrir Square despite the pledge of a speedier handover to civilian rule.
However, a truce has been declared near the interior ministry where the worst of the clashes has taken place.
"I urge the Egyptian authorities to end the clearly excessive
use of force against protesters in Tahrir Square and elsewhere in the
country, including the apparent improper use of tear gas, rubber bullets
and live ammunition," Ms Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human
Rights, said in a statement.
"Some of the images coming out of Tahrir, including the
brutal beating of already subdued protesters, are deeply shocking," she
added.
"There should be a prompt, impartial and
independent investigation, and accountability for those found
responsible for the abuses that have taken place should be ensured," Ms
Pillay said.
Wednesday's street battles in Cairo again focused on the interior ministry building, near Tahrir Square.
However, correspondents said that by the afternoon a truce
had been declared. Soldiers are reported to have replaced the riot
police who were previously guarding the building.
Protesters had said they did not intend to storm the ministry but were pinning police down to stop them clearing Tahrir Square.
Security forces have been using tear gas and rubber bullets against demonstrators.
There have also been clashes in other Egyptian cities including Alexandria, Suez, Port Said and Aswan.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague urged the Egyptian
authorities "to respect the right of peaceful protest and immediately to
cease the use of violence against protesters, including live fire and
the use of gas".
Also on Wednesday, the Organisation of Islamic Co-operation (OIC) expressed "profound concern" at the situation in Egypt and urged "the various parties in Egypt to exercise maximum restraint".
Presidential hopeful Amr Moussa met political activists on Wednesday to discuss the unrest.
"Our young people in Tahrir Square have the right to express
their views freely and to protest and to sit-in provided that there will
be no attack on public buildings or public properties," said Mr Moussa,
former secretary general of the Arab League.
"There is a democratic path and it will not be beneficial for this path to be delayed. The elections must occur."
'Mubarak copy pasted'
Officials say more than 30 people have been killed and hundreds wounded
in the latest unrest. Many protesters camping on Tahrir Square are
wearing safety masks and goggles to protect themselves against the
effect of tear gas.
The demonstrators are continuing to demand
that the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (Scaf) hand over
power immediately to an interim civilian council.
On Tuesday the head of Scaf, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein
Tantawi, said parliamentary polls scheduled to begin on 28 November
would be held as planned, and added that presidential elections would be
held by July 2012.
The council had previously said they might not happen until late 2012 or 2013.
Anger at the delayed presidential elections, coupled with a
draft constitution produced earlier in the month that would exempt the
military and its budget from civilian oversight, prompted the mass
demonstrations in Tahrir Square that began on Friday.
The violence is the worst since a wave of street protests
toppled President Hosni Mubarak in February, after three decades in
power.
After Field Marshal Tantawi spoke, protesters in Tahrir Square chanted: "We are not leaving, he (Tantawi) leaves."
One protester told AFP news agency: "Tantawi is Mubarak, copy pasted. He's Mubarak in a military uniform."
However the BBC's Yolande Knell in Cairo says the main
opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood, as well as many Egyptians who
are not taking part in protests, seem satisfied with the concessions
announced by Field Marshal Tantawi.
Are you in Egypt? Have you witnessed the violence? Send us your comments and experiences using the form below.
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