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Cost of the War in Iraq
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Saturday, April 05, 2003
'Rolling' Victory
Key to
U.S. Endgame
Controlling Territory, Halting Resistance Are Aims; Surrender Not Expected
by Peter Slevin and Bradley Graham
The Bush administration has devised a strategy to declare victory in Iraq even if Saddam Hussein or key lieutenants remain at large and fighting continues in parts of the country, officials said yesterday.
The concept of a "rolling" victory contemplates a time -- not yet determined -- when U.S. forces control significant territory and have eliminated a critical mass of Iraqi resistance. U.S. military commanders would establish a base of operations, perhaps outside Baghdad, and assert that a new era has begun. Even then, tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers would remain to help maintain order and provide humanitarian assistance.
Although President Bush spoke yesterday of accepting "nothing less than complete and final victory," administration officials do not envision a formal Iraqi capitulation in a scene akin to the German surrender to the Allies at Reims that ended World War II in Europe. Rather, they hope to recognize a moment when the military and political balance tilts decisively away from Hussein's Baath Party government.
"The objective is not necessarily to take buildings or occupy areas," said a senior military officer involved in endgame planning. "It's the people. It's getting them to accept the fact that the regime is gone. That's the essence of the thing. It's not going to be a geographic piece."
The timing of declaring victory is important in military and psychological terms, and would be up to the president after a recommendation from military advisers. The administration is set on intimidating Iraqi leaders and seizing power, yet it would risk its credibility by declaring itself in charge while significant resistance remains.
Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said yesterday that Baghdad, the Iraqi capital, would not need to be under U.S. control for the administration to establish an interim Iraqi administration. When Baghdad is isolated from the rest of the country, he said, the city is "almost irrelevant."
more @ Washington Post.
post by vasco on 6:06 PM
The States Are
Preparing Bills
to Extend DMCA
Use a Firewall, Go to Jail
by Edward Felten
The states of Massachusetts and Texas are preparing to consider bills that apparently are intended to extend the national Digital Millennium Copyright Act. (TX bill; MA bill) The bills are obviously related to each other somehow, since they are textually similar.
Here is one example of the far-reaching harmful effects of these bills. Both bills would flatly ban the possession, sale, or use of technologies that "conceal from a communication service provider ... the existence or place of origin or destination of any communication". Your ISP is a communication service provider, so anything that concealed the origin or destination of any communication from your ISP would be illegal -- with no exceptions.
If you send or receive your email via an encrypted connection, you're in violation, because the "To" and "From" lines of the emails are concealed from your ISP by encryption. (The encryption conceals the destinations of outgoing messages, and the sources of incoming messages.)
Worse yet, Network Address Translation (NAT), a technology widely used for enterprise security, operates by translating the "from" and "to" fields of Internet packets, thereby concealing the source or destination of each packet, and hence violating these bills. Most security "firewalls" use NAT, so if you use a firewall, you're in violation.
If you have a home DSL router, or if you use the "Internet Connection Sharing" feature of your favorite operating system product, you're in violation because these connection sharing technologies use NAT. Most operating system products (including every version of Windows introduced in the last five years, and virtually all versions of Linux) would also apparently be banned, because they support connection sharing via NAT.
And this is just one example of the problems with these bills. Yikes.
I now have a page with information about all of these bills, including the current status in each state.
more @ Freedom to Tinker the Felten's blog.
post by vasco on 5:21 PM
Four Students Are
Accused of Running
Napster-Like Networks
RIAA Sues Students for File-Swapping
by Joris Evers
The Recording Industry Association of America has sued four university students who allegedly ran file-sharing networks on their school's local networks.
The students, two at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and one each at Princeton University and Michigan Technological University, operated "local area Napster networks," the RIAA said in a statement Thursday. File-swapping pioneer Napster was shut down by the entertainment industry two years ago.
The RIAA had previously identified campuses as a hotbed of music piracy, but the lawsuits are the first the organization has filed against students. Before, the RIAA's legal fire was aimed mostly at companies offering file-swapping software such as Kazaa and Morpheus.
Sharing Songs
According to the RIAA, the students operated Napster-like networks "designed to enable widespread music thievery." The students allegedly used software called Flatlan, Phynd, and Direct Connect to index files on the campus network and process search requests, according to the RIAA.
In addition to setting up the networks, the RIAA accuses the students of making available hundreds, in some cases thousands, of copyright protected works on the networks.
The answer to file sharing is not lawsuits, but making file sharing legal while artists get paid, Fred von Lohmann, senior staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation said in a comment posted on the civil liberty organization's Web site. The lawsuits are an example of how the music industry is treating music fans like criminals, Lohmann said in the statement.
more @ PC World.
post by vasco on 4:53 PM
A High-Tech Pilot
Who Keeps His Feet
on the Ground
In the Field: With the Dragon Eye
by Jonathan Finer
Michael Deguzman is not a pilot, but he will have a bird's-eye view of the battlefield if U.S. forces are ordered to invade Iraq. That's because the 21-year-old lance corporal is the only Marine in his battalion with an airplane in his backpack.
Deguzman, an intelligence analyst from Glendale, Calif., operates the military's newest, and smallest, unmanned aerial vehicle, a battery-powered drone called the Dragon Eye. With a four-foot wingspan, it soars hundreds of feet in the air, recording images shot by a camera mounted on its nose. Wearing goggles linked electronically to the drone camera, Deguzman can see what the plane sees, and he directs its flight by typing grid coordinates into a laptop computer.
"It's a great challenge using such high-tech gear," Deguzman said as he unpacked pieces of the white fiberglass plane from a black carrying case. He said what he likes best about the Dragon Eye is that it could save the lives of some of his fellow Marines.
"We'd normally have to send scouts into harm's way to find the enemy," he said. "The plane can move more quickly and cover more ground, without putting people at risk. It'll also help prevent friendly fire when units are working real close together."
The Pentagon is increasingly relying on drones for missions that once required men to be put in the line of fire. The Air Force's Predator was used heavily in Afghanistan, where it became the first U.S. drone aircraft to be armed. Outfitted with potent Hellfire antitank missiles, it was used to conduct several airstrikes in the Afghan war during the fall of 2001. Last November, the lethal Predator was used by the CIA in Yemen to kill six alleged al Qaeda terrorists. The Air Force's big Global Hawk reconnaissance plane, which has a wingspan wider than a Boeing 737's, also had its first operational flight in Afghanistan and is expected to be used heavily in any war with Iraq to monitor suspected caches of chemical and biological weapons for hours at a time. The Navy and Marines have a medium-sized reconnaissance drone, the Pioneer, that is stationed with the Predator at a pair of air bases in Kuwait. The Army also uses drone aircraft.
The Dragon Eye, a fraction of the size of the Global Hawk, is one of the first in what military analysts say will be a new generation of drones to be deployed directly by commanders of small units in the middle of the fighting, rather than from far away, as was the Predator. Put into service a few months ago -- earlier than originally planned -- by the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab in Quantico, Va., the Dragon Eye can be carried, launched and operated by a single Marine. It has never been used in combat before but will likely make its debut if U.S. forces are sent into Iraq. Deguzman said each drone, manufactured by AeroVironment in Monrovia, Calif., costs between $40,000 and $60,000. Landing on uneven terrain can be rough on the planes. Deguzman said they are usually expected to hold up for about 40 flights before falling apart.
"It looks like something my kids would play with. I couldn't believe it actually works, but it does," said Lt. Col. Christopher Conlin, 44, of Falls Church, the commander of the 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, to which Deguzman is assigned. "I could have him pop it over a ridgeline to see what's on the other side. It goes where you don't want to send a pilot or a scout, so it's a big advantage. We've got plans for it, and [Deguzman] will be the one doing the flying."
< William Gibson comment > Dragon eye: Didn't you imagine having one of these when you were a kid, playing soldiers? Why does it take so long for some things to become reality? < /comment >
more @ Washington Post.
found @ Gibson's Blog.
post by vasco on 4:03 PM
Bush United
the Entire World
Against America
The Reason Why
by George McGovern
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die.--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
"The Charge of the Light Brigade"
(in the Crimean War)
Thanks to the most crudely partisan decision in the history of the Supreme Court, the nation has been given a President of painfully limited wisdom and compassion and lacking any sense of the nation's true greatness. Appearing to enjoy his role as Commander in Chief of the armed forces above all other functions of his office, and unchecked by a seemingly timid Congress, a compliant Supreme Court, a largely subservient press and a corrupt corporate plutocracy, George W. Bush has set the nation on a course for one-man rule.
He treads carelessly on the Bill of Rights, the United Nations and international law while creating a costly but largely useless new federal bureaucracy loosely called "Homeland Security." Meanwhile, such fundamental building blocks of national security as full employment and a strong labor movement are of no concern. The nearly $1.5 trillion tax giveaway, largely for the further enrichment of those already rich, will have to be made up by cutting government services and shifting a larger share of the tax burden to workers and the elderly. This President and his advisers know well how to get us involved in imperial crusades abroad while pillaging the ordinary American at home. The same families who are exploited by a rich man's government find their sons and daughters being called to war, as they were in Vietnam--but not the sons of the rich and well connected. (Let me note that the son of South Dakota Senator Tim Johnson is now on duty in the Persian Gulf. He did not use his obvious political connections to avoid military service, nor did his father seek exemptions for his son. That goes well with me, with my fellow South Dakotans and with every fair-minded American.)
The invasion of Iraq and other costly wars now being planned in secret are fattening the ever-growing military-industrial complex of which President Eisenhower warned in his great farewell address. War profits are booming, as is the case in all wars. While young Americans die, profits go up. But our economy is not booming, and our stock market is not booming. Our wages and incomes are not booming. While waging a war against Iraq, the Bush Administration is waging another war against the well-being of America.
Following the 9/11 tragedy at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the entire world was united in sympathy and support for America. But thanks to the arrogant unilateralism, the bullying and the clumsy, unimaginative diplomacy of Washington, Bush converted a world of support into a world united against us, with the exception of Tony Blair and one or two others. My fellow South Dakotan, Tom Daschle, the US Senate Democratic leader, has well described the collapse of American diplomacy during the Bush Administration. For this he has been savaged by the Bush propaganda machine. For their part, the House of Representatives has censured the French by changing the name of french fries on the house dining room menu to freedom fries. Does this mean our almost sacred Statue of Liberty--a gift from France--will now have to be demolished? And will we have to give up the French kiss? What a cruel blow to romance.
During his presidential campaign Bush cried, "I'm a uniter, not a divider." As one critic put it, "He's got that right. He's united the entire world against him." In his brusque, go-it-alone approach to Congress, the UN and countless nations big and small, Bush seemed to be saying, "Go with us if you will, but we're going to war with a small desert kingdom that has done us no harm, whether you like it or not." This is a good line for the macho business. But it flies in the face of Jefferson's phrase, "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind." As I have watched America's moral and political standing in the world fade as the globe's inhabitants view the senseless and immoral bombing of ancient, historic Baghdad, I think often of another Jefferson observation during an earlier bad time in the nation's history: "I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just."
The President frequently confides to individuals and friendly audiences that he is guided by God's hand. But if God guided him into an invasion of Iraq, He sent a different message to the Pope, the Conference of Catholic Bishops, the mainline Protestant National Council of Churches and many distinguished rabbis--all of whom believe the invasion and bombardment of Iraq is against God's will. In all due respect, I suspect that Karl Rove, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld and Condoleezza Rice--and other sideline warriors--are the gods (or goddesses) reaching the ear of our President.
more @ The Nation.
post by vasco on 1:43 PM
Thursday, April 03, 2003
Oregon Law
Would Jail War
Protesters as Terrorists
by Lee Douglas
An Oregon anti-terrorism bill would jail street-blocking protesters for at least 25 years in a thinly veiled effort to discourage anti-war demonstrations, critics say.
The bill has met strong opposition but lawmakers still expect a debate on the definition of terrorism and the value of free speech before a vote by the state senate judiciary committee, whose Chairman, Republican Senator John Minnis, wrote the proposed legislation.
Dubbed Senate Bill 742, it identifies a terrorist as a person who "plans or participates in an act that is intended, by at least one of its participants, to disrupt" business, transportation, schools, government, or free assembly.
The bill's few public supporters say police need stronger laws to break up protests that have created havoc in cities like Portland, where thousands of people have marched and demonstrated against war in Iraq since last fall.
"We need some additional tools to control protests that shut down the city," said Lars Larson, a conservative radio talk show host who has aggressively stumped for the bill.
Larson said protesters should be protected by free speech laws, but not given free reign to hold up ambulances or frighten people out of their daily routines, adding that police and the court system could be trusted to see the difference.
more @ Washington Post.
post by vasco on 4:40 PM
Marine Soldiers
Thinks Iraq's Soldier Are
Bad Traineds and Cowards
Either Take a Shot or Take a Chance
by Dexter Filkins
At the base camp of the Fifth Marine Regiment here, two sharpshooters, Sgt. Eric Schrumpf, 28, and Cpl. Mikael McIntosh, 20, sat on a sand berm and swapped combat tales while their column stood at a halt on the road toward Baghdad. For five days this week, the two men rode atop armored personnel carriers, barreling up Highway 1.
They said Iraqi fighters had often mixed in with civilians from nearby villages, jumping out of houses and cars to shoot at them, and then often running away. The marines said they had little trouble dispatching their foes, most of whom they characterized as ill trained and cowardly.
"We had a great day," Sergeant Schrumpf said. "We killed a lot of people."
Sergeant Schrumpf said that while most Iraqi soldiers had posed little danger, a small number appeared to be well trained and calm under fire. Some, the sergeant added, wore black suits, described by some Iraqis as the uniform of the Saddam Feydayeen, a militia of die-hard loyalists of Saddam Hussein.
Both marines said they were most frustrated by the practice of some Iraqi soldiers to use unarmed women and children as shields against American bullets. They called the tactic cowardly but agreed that it had been effective. Both Sergeant Schrumpf and Corporal McIntosh said they had declined several times to shoot at Iraqi soldiers out of fear they might hit civilians.
"It's a judgment call," Corporal McIntosh said. "If the risks outweigh the losses, then you don't take the shot."
But in the heat of a firefight, both men conceded, when the calculus often warps, a shot not taken in one set of circumstances may suddenly present itself as a life-or-death necessity.
"We dropped a few civilians," Sergeant Schrumpf said, "but what do you do?"
To illustrate, the sergeant offered a pair of examples from earlier in the week.
"There was one Iraqi soldier, and 25 women and children," he said, "I didn't take the shot."
But more than once, Sergeant Schrumpf said, he faced a different choice: one Iraqi soldier standing among two or three civilians. He recalled one such incident, in which he and other men in his unit opened fire. He recalled watching one of the women standing near the Iraqi soldier go down.
"I'm sorry," the sergeant said. "But the chick was in the way."
The two marines recalled their battlefield experiences as American commanders halted one of the three main columns advancing toward Baghdad today. The commanders said a combination of tenacious Iraqi resistance and overexposed supply lines had prompted them to catch their breath.
Officers with the First Marine Division, whose troops have driven 200 miles into Iraqi over the past week, ordered their troops to stop their northward push up Highway 1. The column, comprising about 14,000 marines, is the middle of a three-pronged effort to attack Baghdad.
The Marine force, strung out along the highway in the Iraqi desert about 100 miles south of Baghdad, has met steadily fiercer Iraqi resistance since it crossed the Euphrates River earlier this week. Soldiers fighting on the front lines near here said they had killed hundreds of Iraqi soldiers and irregulars this week.
more @ New York Times.
post by vasco on 4:33 PM
Japanese Public
Opinion in Opposition
to the U.S.-led War
65% say they do not support the U.S.-led war against Iraq.
Japanese public opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq has grown, according to the latest telephone survey conducted by The Asahi Shimbun.
Sixty-five percent of the respondents to the weekend survey did not support the U.S.-led war. In a survey conducted March 20-21, immediately after fighting began, 59 percent of the respondents said they opposed the war.
The percentage of respondents who said they supported the war fell from 31 percent to 27 percent.
There was also pessimism that the war would not be a short one, with only 20 percent saying the war would be finished within a month, while 70 percent said the fighting would last for longer than a month.
Increases in percentages of those opposed to the war were noticeable among women as well as respondents over the age of 50.
Anti-war sentiment was also reflected in the public's perception of Japanese politicians' actions. Fifty-three percent of respondents said they opposed Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's announcement in support of the United States. Only 36 percent said they sided with Koizumi. The figures were generally unchanged from the previous survey.
When asked their reasons for opposing or supporting the war, 70 percent of those who opposed the war said ``opposition to war in general'' while 20 percent said ``the unconvincing U.S. argument for war.''
Of those who supported the war, 60 percent said ``there was a need for U.S. cooperation to deal with the North Korean issue,'' while 30 percent said ``because the United States was an ally.''
In relation to the role the United Nations can play in bringing about a quick end to the fighting, 60 percent of the respondents said they held ``great'' or ``some'' expectations for the United Nations, while 40 percent said they did not expect the United Nations to play a role.
The U.S. government gave as one reason for attacking Iraq the need to protect the world from danger. When asked if the United States was playing a central role in maintaining global security, a majority of the respondents said ``no.''
more @ The Asahi Shimbun.
post by vasco on 4:12 PM
Tuesday, April 01, 2003
Arnett Fired From MSNBC
and Hired by Daily Mirror
After Iraq's TV Interview
A British tabloid said Tuesday it has hired reporter Peter Arnett shortly after he was fired by NBC-TV for saying on Iraqi television that the U.S.-led war effort had failed.
"Fired by America for telling the truth," the Daily Mirror said in a Page 1 headline.
"I am still in shock and awe at being fired," Arnett wrote for the newspaper, which is vehemently opposed to the war. "I report the truth of what is happening here in Baghdad and will not apologize for it."
NBC fired journalist Peter Arnett on Monday, angered that he had given an unauthorized interview with state-run Iraqi TV saying the American-led war effort initially failed because of Iraq's resistance.
Arnett apologized for his "misjudgment," but added: "I said over the weekend what we all know about this war."
Meanwhile, the Pentagon was investigating whether Fox News Channel reporter Geraldo Rivera endangered troops by revealing the plans of a military unit in Iraq in advance. Rivera denied reports that he had been expelled from the country.
Arnett, who won a Pulitzer Prize reporting in Vietnam for The Associated Press, gained much of his prominence from covering the 1991 Gulf War for CNN. One of the few American television reporters left in Baghdad, his reports were frequently aired on NBC and its cable sisters, MSNBC and CNBC.
NBC was angered because Arnett gave the interview Sunday without permission and presented opinion as fact. The network initially backed him, but reversed field after watching a tape of his remarks.
The network said it got "thousands" of e-mails and phone calls protesting Arnett's remarks - a thousand e-mails to MSNBC President Erik Sorenson alone.
"When I heard he had given an interview to Iraqi TV, I immediately thought it was about as bad a judgment that a reporter in the field could make," Sorenson said. "I held out hope initially that maybe he had given the interview at gunpoint or there was some extenuating circumstance."
more @ hired and fired Associated Press news.
post by vasco on 4:05 AM
Monday, March 31, 2003
Advices of Cheney's
Gang Are Wrong and
Dangerous to U.S. Interests
Advisers Split as War Unfolds
by Glenn Kessler and Walter Pincus
The first 11 days of the war have brought back with a vengeance the deep splits that have long existed within the Bush administration and the Republican Party over policy toward Iraq.
Already there is a behind-the-scenes effort by former senior Republican government officials and party leaders to convince President Bush that the advice he has received from Vice President Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz -- a powerful triumvirate frequently at odds with Secretary of State Colin L. Powell -- has been wrong and even dangerous to long-term U.S. national interests.
Citing past public statements by Cheney and others about the prospective ease with which the Iraq war could be won and the warm welcome U.S. forces would receive from the Iraqi people, one former GOP appointee said he and his allies were looking at "whether this president has learned something from this bum advice he has been getting."
Other Republicans and Bush administration officials, some close to Powell, also expressed concern that the Iraq war plan, with its "rolling start" using a relatively small force, was based on faulty assumptions that the Iraqi government would quickly collapse. Moreover, there is fear among some officials, especially in the State Department, that postwar diplomacy, if handled poorly, could result in further U.S. estrangement from allies and international institutions.
Bush, who appears to value tension among his top advisers, "has been very Delphic on this and hard to read" on the emerging internal debate, a Bush adviser said.
more @ Washington Post.
post by vasco on 6:39 PM
U.S. Soldiers Killing
Civilians and Allies Defeat
"Liberators" View Efforts
One of Saddam's strategies is to harrass US troops to the point that they will turn on the population and be less hesitant to kill civilians.
Once US soldiers start indescriminantly killing civilians, it is less likely they will be greeted as liberators.
The strategy appears to be working. A London Times reporter, with US Marines near Nasiriyah, brought us this harrowing account from the frontlines:
Amid the wreckage I counted 12 dead civilians, lying in the road or in nearby ditches. All had been trying to leave this southern town overnight, probably for fear of being killed by US helicopter attacks and heavy artillery.
Their mistake had been to flee over a bridge that is crucial to the coalition's supply lines and to run into a group of shell-shocked young American marines with orders to shoot anything that moved.
One man's body was still in flames. It gave out a hissing sound. Tucked away in his breast pocket, thick wads of banknotes were turning to ashes. His savings, perhaps.
Down the road, a little girl, no older than five and dressed in a pretty orange and gold dress, lay dead in a ditch next to the body of a man who may have been her father. Half his head was missing.
But Iraqis are not the only ones suffering from trigger-happy Americans. The Brits are, as well:
Three wounded British soldiers described yesterday how they survived a terrifying attack by an American anti-tank aircraft that killed one of their troop and destroyed two armoured vehicles.
[...]
The blunder, 35 miles north of Basra, left one soldier missing, presumed dead, and another in intensive care on the hospital ship RFA Argus. A sixth Household Cavalry soldier escaped without injury when the two Scimitar light tanks were destroyed.
[...]
LCoH Gerrard criticised the A10 for shooting when there were civilians so close to the tanks. He said: “There was a boy of about 12 years old. He was no more than 20 metres away when the Yank opened up. There were all these civilians around. He had absolutely no regard for human life. I believe he was a cowboy.
Once US forces start blurring the lines between the rules of engagement and deadly retribution, it signals the defeat of US efforts to win "hearts and minds".
I don't think there's any easy solution to this problem. But one thing is clear, American forces are being unwittingly drawn into the trap laid by Iraqi forces, into a battle they cannot win.
more @ Daily Kos.
post by vasco on 6:28 PM
UK troops find
Jordanian munitions
cache in Iraq
British troops have discovered a huge cache of munitions in cases marked "Jordan Armed Forces" just outside Basra.
A Reuters team filmed and photographed the cache, around 5 kilometres east of Iraq's second biggest city, and on Monday local time British bomb disposal experts prepared to blow it up.
"I don't know exactly how much there is - we aren't exactly going to hang around and count it," one British officer said, guarding the cache.
"It's a bloody lot though - obviously for a forward position."
However, Jordanian Information Minister and government spokesman Mohammad al-Adwan, said "if anything is found it has to be old stocks from the previous pre-embargo period prior to 1991 Gulf War".
"It was no secret that Jordan along with other Western countries were then sending military equipment to Iraq," he said.
The cache was found near a series of locks controlling the flow of the Euphrates river through the marshes that lead into the Arabian Gulf.
more @ ABC News.
founded @ The Agonist.
post by vasco on 6:04 PM
Iraq Government
Presents at Baghdad
Official View of War
by Daniel Kimmage and Kathleen Ridolfo
Iraqi Information Minister Muhammad Sa'id al-Sahhaf vehemently disputed both the assertions and actions of coalition forces at a 26 March news conference in Baghdad carried by Abu Dhabi Television. Alternating comments on the military situation with scorn for coalition leaders, al-Sahhaf denied coalition control of the port city of Umm Qasr, Al-Nasiriyah, or the Al-Faw peninsula. Al-Sahhaf told journalists that Iraq faces aggression from the "donkeys of colonialism" and "colonialist louts." He estimated the number of civilian Iraqis wounded in Al-Nasiriyah at 500, with another nine killed by bombs at a village called Bani Sa'd. In response to a question about the deaths in Baghdad the same day, al-Sahhaf accused U.S.-led forces of "attacking civilian areas" and assured reporters that "they will lose without a doubt."
Iraqi military spokesman Major General Hazim al-Rawi told a 27 March press conference in Baghdad that Iraqi forces continue to inflict severe losses on coalition forces, giving a sector-by-sector summary of how Iraqi forces are "fiercely confronting the invaders." Al-Rawi said that naval forces destroyed a British helicopter on the ground as well as a tank and Land Rover in Al-Basrah. He added that Saddam Fedayeen destroyed one tank and two personnel carriers in the southern Iraqi city.
In Al-Nasiriyah, he claimed that a commando force from the 11th Division (Al-Miqdad forces) destroyed four armored personnel carriers (APCs) and killed the soldiers inside, while another force raided a coalition convoy on the outskirts of the city, "killing and wounding a large number of enemy troops." Al-Rawi insinuated that reports of "friendly fire" incidents in Al-Nasiriyah by coalition forces were untrue, claiming that Iraqi forces were responsible for coalition losses in that city.
In the Central Euphrates sector, al-Rawi claimed that Republican Guard forces blocked coalition forces and "managed to kill large numbers of the enemy personnel and destroy" six tanks, while Saddam's Fedayeen destroyed "through night infiltration operations" four tanks and two APCs "with their crews." Similar claims were made for Iraqi "successes" in Al-Najaf. In the North, al-Rawi said that Iraqi forces fired 44 Al-Tariq missiles at coalition forces who parachuted into Al-Sulaymaniyah overnight, as well as seven Al-Ra'd missiles, which were fired during the landing operation.
Al-Rawi denied reports that coalition forces had killed 1,000 fighters in Al-Najaf, saying, "Their mass media are excellent...they can show on satellite stations that number of martyrs, if we have so many martyrs." "At any rate," he added, "this would be a source of honor for us." He also reiterated the regime's desire to fight coalition forces "in the cities."
more @ Radio Free Europe.
post by vasco on 5:59 PM
Rumsfeld Denies War
Delays, Says He Didn't
Overrule War Planners
by Jeffrey Donovan
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld found himself on the defensive yesterday, denying two separate media reports that cast his decision making on Iraq in a critical light.
News agencies quote some U.S. officers and troops in central Iraq as saying that ground advances toward the capital could be delayed for several weeks while they await the arrival of reinforcements to protect overstretched supply lines from the south and for air attacks to soften stiff Iraqi resistance.
At the same time, reports in "The New Yorker" magazine and other U.S. media are largely blaming Rumsfeld for those problems, saying he rejected advice from top Pentagon planners that many more ground troops and armor would be needed to fight the war in Iraq.
Rumsfeld, appearing on American television yesterday, rejected both reports. He told ABC that the U.S. has no "plans for pauses or cease-fires or anything." And as for the charges that he disregarded advice from war planners about needing a larger number of land forces, Rumsfeld told Fox News: "The plan is a good one, and I would be happy to take credit for it, because it's an outstanding plan and it's going to work and we're going to win. But the reality is that it's a plan that was developed by General [Tommy] Franks and was worked through the [Joint] Chiefs of Staff in Washington. It was looked at carefully by the combatant commanders around the world, it's been through the National Security Council and it is our country's plan. And it's a good one and it's working."
Rumsfeld added that he did not know how long the war would take -- weeks or months -- and that the toughest fighting is still to come.
more @ Radio Free Europe.
post by vasco on 4:43 PM
Israel News Agency
Report Syrian Troops
to Join the Fight on Iraq
The leader of the Islamic Jihad in the PA - the group that claimed responsibility for yesterday's suicide attack in Netanya, calling it a "present to the Iraqi people" - has called on his fellow terrorists elsewhere in the PA to join the battle against the U.S. in Iraq by volunteering to commit suicide attacks. Arab sources in the PA and Iraq said that some 4,000 "martyrdom seekers" have already arrived in Baghdad. "Whoever is able to march and reach Iraq and blow himself up in this American invasion... this is the climax of Jihad and climax of martyrdom," said Abdullah Shallah, leader of Islamic Jihad. Abdul Baki Saadoun, a Baath Party official in southern Iraq, said fighters were competing to die in suicide attacks. "We all wish to blow ourselves up by explosive belts or assaults on the Americans, Zionists and the English," he told Arab satellite television channel al-Jazeera in an interview broadcast Sunday.
Al-Jazeera reported last night that an unknown number of Syrian troops had arrived in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, brandishing weapons and portraits of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. "Come to the land of the Arabs in Iraq and fight for Islam with your souls," they shouted.
The leading Syrian Moslem authority, Sheikh Ahmad Kaftaro, faxed a statement to the French News Agency calling on "Moslems everywhere to use all means possible to thwart the aggression, including martyr operations against the belligerent American, British and Zionist invaders... Resistance to the belligerent invaders is an obligation for all Muslims." The Syrian religious leader also called on Moslems everywhere to boycott the products of the US, Britain, and their supporters, and to disrupt airports, seaports and other facilities used in support of the allied war effort in Iraq.
Iraq's Vice-President Taha Yassin Ramadan went even further, warning that suicide attacks would become "routine military policy" also against targets in the United States and in Britain.
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post by vasco on 4:04 PM