Al-Qaqaa, located 30 miles south of Baghdad, is home of the infamous facility in Iraq where nearly 400 tons of explosives went missing. On October 25, 2004, a U.N. nuclear agency warned that insurgents in Iraq may have obtained 380 tons worth of explosives that could be used in the kind of car bomb attacks that have targeted U.S.-led coalition forces for months. The disappearance raised questions about why the United States didn't do more to secure the Al-Qaqaa facility.
Baghdad
Baghdad is the capital of Iraq. The city extends along both banks of the Tigris. The east-bank settlement is known as Rusafah, the west-bank as al-Karkh. To the north, urban expansion has absorbed the medieval townships of al-A'zamiyah on the east bank and al-Kazimiyah on the west bank. Baghdad suffered damage from allied bombing during the Persian Gulf War in 1991 and the recent Iraq War this past year. The city continues to be a place of unrest.
Fallujah
Fallujah is a large town forty miles west of Baghdad. Currently considered the most violence-prone city in Iraq, Fallujah has experienced crowd-control incidents, murders and bombings. U.S. Army and Marine units have thrust into the insurgent stronghold recently, fighting fierce street battles and conducting house-to-house searches on the second of a major assault to retake the city from Islamic militants.
Mosul
Mosul is Iraq's third largest city, with approximately 665,000 inhabitants as of 1987. It is situated some 400km north of Baghdad situated on the west bank of the Tigris River, close to the ruined Assyrian city of Nineveh. Mosul was the headquarters of the Iraqi Army 5th Corps and the 16th Infantry Division of the Iraqi Army 5th Corps. As fighting continues in Iraq, the will of the city will strongly dictate the future of Iraq.
