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BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 19, 2006 - The 506th Regimental Combat Team discovered a huge weapons cache May 10 in the New Baghdad neighborhood of eastern Baghdad. During Operation Roll Tide, a combined effort between elements from 6th Battalion, 2nd Brigade Iraqi National Police, and soldiers from Company D, 3rd Battalion, 67th Armored Regiment, 4th Infantry Division (attached to HHC, 506th RCT), uncovered a huge weapons cache of land mines, rockets, explosives, and documents in a house. In one home the unit found over 140 mines, 58 blocks of explosives, 18 rockets, and almost 40 mortars, as well as manuals and equipment to convert munitions into improvised explosive devices. Operation Roll Tide was partially in response to anti-Iraqi forces rocket attacks against Forward Operating Base Rustamiyah. An intelligence-based operation which stressed combined planning and execution with Iraqi security forces, Operation Roll Tide focused on countering anti-Iraqi force indirect fire capabilities. During the collection of intelligence, the armored regiment found information which led them to an area where the cache was found. "We took the information found at the site, and that was what led us to this house," said 1LT Edward Stoltenberg, executive officer, Company D. "We found a woman when we entered the building," said Stoltenberg, a native of Portsmouth, RI. "She immediately fled the house. Red platoon found her at one of her relative's houses nearby." The 4th Brigade Special Troops Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment and members of the 519th Military Police responded to the site as well. "What we do is sensitive site exploitation," said SPC Randi Lee May, a nuclear, biological and chemical specialist from Fishersville, VA. "We come out here to help pick up evidence. We're on what they call 'on-call' status. If they can't handle it on their own, then we come out," he said. Their team is a combination of identification of explosive weapons and NBC specialists. In this particular case, the cache was huge, but the explosive ordnance disposal team on the scene was able to handle it and destroy the weapons. The 4th Brigade Special Troops Battalion was not idle though. They, along with soldiers of the 519th and 6th Battalion, 2nd Brigade Iraqi national police were tasked with providing security at the end of the street, where an angry crowd of Iraqi citizens had begun to chant anti-American slogans due primarily to dissatisfaction with Coalition forces detaining a female. The crowd soon swelled into hundreds of increasingly aggressive locals, separated from the soldiers and the Iraqi police officers only by a single coil of concertina wire. The female detainee was handed over to the 6th Battalion, 2nd Brigade Iraqi national police after the Soldiers removed the munitions from the cache site. With the assistance of an imam and other civic leaders, the tense situation was diffused without violence. 
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