Battle of Karbala (2003)

Battle of Karbala
	Part of the invasion phase of the Iraq War
Date	23 March – 6 April 2003; (2 weeks)
Location	Karbala, Iraq
Result	U.S. victory
Belligerents
United States	Iraq
Commanders and leaders
David Petraeus	Ra'ad al-Hamdani; Riyadh Hussein Nayeri; Faiq Abdullah Mikbas; Colonel Hassani Khamis Sarhan
Units involved
3rd Infantry Division; 1st Armored Division; 101st Airborne Division; Charlie Company,1-41st Infantry Regiment; 70th Armor Regiment	Fedayeen Saddam;
Casualties and losses
13–21 killed; 1 M1 Abrams tank disabled; 1 M2A2 Bradley destroyed; 1 US Navy F/A-18 shot down by a friendly Patriot battery; 1 UH-60 Black Hawk crashed due to disoriention in the darkness	170–260 killed

The Battle of Karbala took place during the 2003 invasion of Iraq as U.S. troops fought to take control of the city from Iraqi forces. The city had been bypassed during the advance on Baghdad, leaving American units to clear it in two days of street fighting against Iraqi Saddam Fedayeen Irregular forces.^[7]

^ ^a ^b James Dietz. "Fedayeen Saddam". Strike on Karbala. Archived from the original on 19 January 2013. Retrieved 28 November 2012.
^ "On April 2 a navy F/A-18 was shot down west of Karbala, Iraq." Leave No Man Behind: The Saga of Combat Search and Rescue, George Galdorisi, Thomas Phillips, p. 519, Zenith Imprint, 2008
^ "The plane from the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk in the Persian Gulf went down just before midnight Wednesday while on a bombing mission near Karbala, a city 50 miles south of Baghdad where fighting raged between U.S. forces and the Republican Guard. A search team was immediately launched. Other aircraft reported seeing surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft fire in the area where the plane disappeared, said Lt. Brook DeWalt, a spokesman for the Kitty Hawk ... Iraqi television broadcast pictures Thursday of what it said was the wreckage and Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed Al-Sahaf claimed the aircraft was shot down by the Saddam Fedayeen, Iraq's paramilitary force." Two Aircraft Down Over Iraq Archived 24 January 2016 at the Wayback Machine/
^ "Blue-On-Blue! The story of the U.S. Navy F/A-18 that was shot down by a U.S. Army PAC-3 Patriot missile battery during OIF". 7 March 2018. Archived from the original on 31 January 2020. Retrieved 31 January 2020.
^ "ARMY AIR CREWS: UH-60 Black Hawk Crewmembers Line of Duty Deaths". Archived from the original on 25 October 2010. Retrieved 31 January 2020.
^ "Wages of War – Appendix 1. Survey of reported Iraqi combatant fatalities in the 2003 war | Commonwealth Institute of Cambridge". Archived from the original on 2 September 2009. Retrieved 5 August 2008.
^ Dwyer, Jim (6 April 2003). "A NATION AT WAR: In the Field | 101ST AIRBORNE DIVISION; In Karbala, G.I.'s Find Forsaken Iraqi Armor and Pockets of Resistance". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 26 February 2018. Retrieved 29 January 2018.

[valorstudios.com-1] James Dietz. "Fedayeen Saddam". Strike on Karbala. Archived from the original on 19 January 2013. Retrieved 28 November 2012.

[Karbala,_Iraq_p._519-2] "On April 2 a navy F/A-18 was shot down west of Karbala, Iraq." Leave No Man Behind: The Saga of Combat Search and Rescue, George Galdorisi, Thomas Phillips, p. 519, Zenith Imprint, 2008

[3] "The plane from the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk in the Persian Gulf went down just before midnight Wednesday while on a bombing mission near Karbala, a city 50 miles south of Baghdad where fighting raged between U.S. forces and the Republican Guard. A search team was immediately launched. Other aircraft reported seeing surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft fire in the area where the plane disappeared, said Lt. Brook DeWalt, a spokesman for the Kitty Hawk ... Iraqi television broadcast pictures Thursday of what it said was the wreckage and Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed Al-Sahaf claimed the aircraft was shot down by the Saddam Fedayeen, Iraq's paramilitary force." Two Aircraft Down Over Iraq Archived 24 January 2016 at the Wayback Machine/

[4] "Blue-On-Blue! The story of the U.S. Navy F/A-18 that was shot down by a U.S. Army PAC-3 Patriot missile battery during OIF". 7 March 2018. Archived from the original on 31 January 2020. Retrieved 31 January 2020.

[armyaircrews.com-5] "ARMY AIR CREWS: UH-60 Black Hawk Crewmembers Line of Duty Deaths". Archived from the original on 25 October 2010. Retrieved 31 January 2020.

[wagesofwar-6] "Wages of War – Appendix 1. Survey of reported Iraqi combatant fatalities in the 2003 war | Commonwealth Institute of Cambridge". Archived from the original on 2 September 2009. Retrieved 5 August 2008.

[NYTimes-7] Dwyer, Jim (6 April 2003). "A NATION AT WAR: In the Field | 101ST AIRBORNE DIVISION; In Karbala, G.I.'s Find Forsaken Iraqi Armor and Pockets of Resistance". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 26 February 2018. Retrieved 29 January 2018.

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