Unfortunately they took some fairly serious losses themselves. MANILA, Philippines -- Philippine troops overran two jungle camps of al-Qaida-linked militants in their deadliest clash in years, with 23 soldiers and 31 guerrillas killed in what a top commander described Thursday as a "slugfest." More than 400 marines, army and police commandos stormed the hilltop camps on southern Basilan Island on Wednesday in raids targeting about 150 Abu Sayyaf militants led by two terror suspects wanted for a series of bomb attacks and kidnappings, said navy chief Vice Adm. Ferdinand Golez. Heavy fighting ensued when a unit of marine reinforcements met up with a large group of fleeing militants, leaving them outnumbered with 18 marines killed, Golez said. Abu Sayaf have been the perpetrators of some pretty ugly violence over the years and this type of an action, striking them where they were strongest, can help stop that. Terrorists need safe havens to plot and plan and pushing them out of an area they have controlled forces them to split into smaller groups and work to simply survive. Not to mention that the 31 dead will not be bothering anyone. A Philippine Army spokesperson said: The Marines were completing their training on close-quarter combat and were sent to the Abu Sayyaf lair in the town on a test mission when they go in contact with the bandits. Training the Army, Marines and the Police Constabulary was an ongoing mission for 1st Special Forces Group when I was there. This sounds like they sent them on a confidence target that may have been a bit more than they expected. Generally when you have units that just finished their training in advanced skills you want to give them one or two operations with a high likelihood of success, so they can get their feet wet. They mention that this was a mix of units, so I assume some of them were experienced. It's tough that they caught so many casualties, but they did prevail and the spirit of the Filipino forces is strong and determined. They will continue to drive on.
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Posted
Aug 13 2009, 12:43 AM
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