9 GIs Die In Iraq [Archive] - Marine Corps

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:02 AM

9 GIs Die In Iraq
Associated Press
January 7, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A roadside bomb killed seven U.S. soldiers in northwest Baghdad and two Marines were killed in western Iraq on Thursday, the deadliest day for American forces since a suicide attack on a U.S. base last month.

The bombing came as Iraq extended a state of emergency by 30 days to battle militants whose attacks have surged ahead of this month's elections. The prime minister warned the number of assaults would only rise as voting day draws closer.

Just three weeks before the Jan. 30 elections, the commander of U.S. ground forces in Iraq acknowledged that security is poor in four of 18 Iraqi provinces. But Lt. Gen. Thomas Metz told a briefing in the capital that delaying the vote would only increase the danger.

"I can't guarantee that every person in Iraq that wants to vote, goes to a polling booth and can do that safely," Metz said. "We're going to do everything possible to create that condition for them, but we are fighting an enemy who cares less who he kills, when he kills and how he kills. A delay in the elections just gives the thugs and terrorists more time to continue their intimidation, their cruelty, their brutal murders of innocent people."

The soldiers with Task Force Baghdad were on patrol Thursday evening when their Bradley fighting vehicle hit the explosive, the military said in a statement. Everyone inside the Bradley was killed.

No other details were immediately available about the latest attack. But Iraq's insurgents have frequently targeted American troops with crude explosives planted in roads and detonated remotely as patrols pass.

The two other U.S. Marines killed in action Thursday were both members of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and lost their lives in Anbar province, which is home to the volatile city of Fallujah.

The previous four days had seen a string of assassinations, suicide car bombings and other assaults that killed 90 people.

On Tuesday, five American troops were killed, including three Task Force Baghdad soldiers who died in a roadside bombing, one who was slain in Anbar, and another who died in Balad, north of Baghdad.

But Thursday's toll was the highest for the U.S. military in Iraq since a suicide bombing at a mess tent in Mosul on Dec. 21 killed 22 people, including 14 U.S. soldiers and three American contractors.

The latest deaths brought the number of U.S. troops killed since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003 to 1,350, according to an Associated Press count. At least 1,063 died as a result of hostile action.

The military said the names of the troops who died Thursday were being withheld until their families are notified.

As militants continued with the attacks, Iraqi authorities made some grisly discoveries. Police in the southern city of Basra found two charred and beheaded bodies in a house used by election officials. Police also announced they found the bodies of 18 young Shiites killed last month while seeking work at a U.S. base.

The state of emergency, originally announced two months ago, was extended for 30 days throughout the country except for the northern Kurdish-run areas, a government statement said. The decree includes a nighttime curfew and gives the government additional power to make arrests and launch military or police operations.

Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said he expected the number of attacks would rise before the Jan. 30 vote and called the decision on prolonging the state of emergency a precaution. He blamed former members of Saddam Hussein's regime for the continuing violence.

"Saddam's followers, who have intensely shed the blood of our people and army, are still in action clandestinely, allying with a bunch of criminals, murderers and terrorists who are the enemies of our people and our progress," Allawi said during a ceremony to mark the national Army Day holiday.

"Our army and police have become targets of these hateful forces that fear the formation of the people's army and police."

Allawi, a secular Shiite, is insisting the elections go forward, despite calls from some Sunni religious leaders for a boycott. Sunni Arab political parties have largely withdrawn from the race because of security fears, particularly in western Iraq. Some have sought a delay of the vote.

The United States strongly opposes a postponement. Metz acknowledged U.S. forces "continue to deal with violence and lawlessness in some areas," specifically citing Nineveh, Anbar, Salahadin and Baghdad provinces. But he said other areas were secure enough to allow the elections to go ahead.

Foreign ministers of neighboring countries issued a statement Thursday saying they "stood strongly behind the interim government of Iraq" and "urged all segments" of society to participate in the elections.

The election is expected to shift power to the Shiite Muslim community, an estimated 60 percent of the population that had been dominated by the Sunni Arab minority since modern Iraq was created after World War I.

The call was backed by Jordan, a Sunni-dominated neighbor that had previously supported postponing the election. King Abdullah II had also suggested the elections would produce an Iraq controlled by Shiites who would quickly align themselves with Iran, ruled by a Shiite theocracy.

But Jordanian Foreign Minister Hani al-Mulqi insisted the elections be held as scheduled.

"From this podium, I call on all factions of the Iraqi people, young and old, men and women, to go to the polls to choose their representatives and draw their own future," al-Mulqi said. Failing to do that "will leave the door open for others to choose for them."

The charred bodies of the two beheaded Iraqi policemen were found in a house in Basra used by officials organizing the election, police said.

In the deaths of the 18 Iraqis seeking work with the Americans, police said the insurgents shot the young men - ranging in age from 14 to 20 - on Dec. 8 after stopping two minibuses about 30 miles west of the volatile city of Mosul, 225 miles north of Baghdad.

Their hands were tied behind their backs and each was shot in the head, police said. All were Shiites from Baghdad who had been hired by an Iraqi contractor to work at a U.S. base in Mosul.

The bodies were discovered Wednesday, the day a suicide attacker blew up an explosives-laden car outside a police academy south of Baghdad, killing 20 people. A second car bomber killed five Iraqi policemen in Baqouba. Both attacks were claimed by al-Qaida in Iraq, the group led by Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Iraqi forces announced the arrest of Abdul Aziz Sa-dun Ahmed Hamduni, a leader of al-Zarqawi's group in Mosul.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:03 AM

Diverted Marines Happy To Help
Associated Press
January 7, 2005

ABOARD THE USS BONHOMME RICHARD - When Lance Cpl. Keith Delatorre boarded this warship in San Diego a month ago, he thought he was on his way to Iraq. Now, he's loading up his gear for a very different mission, bringing badly needed aid to Indonesians left isolated by the tsunami that battered coastlines along the Indian Ocean.

Delatorre, who celebrated his 22nd birthday Wednesday, said he was happy for the new orders, which came down two days after the disaster struck as the USS Bonhomme Richard was making a port call at the Pacific island of Guam.

"We just need to get the mission done," he said, sweating in the heat of the ship's hull. "A lot of guys would say they want to go right to Iraq. But I'm kind of glad. There's not much chance of dying here."

The Bonhomme Richard and another warship brimming with Marines, helicopters and heavy equipment arrived off the shores of northwest Sumatra on Thursday to begin its part of what is possibly the largest U.S. military humanitarian aid operation ever.

"We were training for Iraq, so getting diverted to a humanitarian mission is like night and day," said Delatorre, of Pleasant Hill, Calif., as he made his final check of the equipment loaded onto three huge hovercrafts stuffed into the hull of this amphibious assault vessel.

The Bonhomme Richard, with 1,300 Marines aboard, and the smaller USS Duluth are joining the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier and its battle group in the relief effort for the northwestern Sumatra province of Aceh, where as many as 100,000 people are believed to have been killed by the Dec. 26 catastrophe. Another ship, the USS Rushmore, was also on its way.

The Marines are planning to set up farther south than the Lincoln to reach villages there that may not yet have made contact with the outside world.

Their arrival strongly boosts the relief efforts. Along with dozens of helicopters, the ships carry large landing craft that float on cushions of air and can come ashore on virtually any kind of beach. Once ashore, the Marines could offer the manpower and equipment needed to build shelters, clear roads and airstrips, and distribute clean drinking water.

Working out the details of the operation has been delicate, however.

Though originally assigned to spearhead relief efforts on Sri Lanka, the Bonhomme Richard was diverted to Sumatra after the government in Colombo scaled down its relief request. An intensive airlift by helicopters from this ship to bring supplies out of the overwhelmed airport in Medan on Wednesday raised concerns from local officials that the military was crowding out commercial flights. And details of how the Marines would go ashore, most likely in the flattened fishing village of Meulaboh, were still being worked out as the ship arrived off the regional capital of Banda Aceh.

Even so, the mission was taking shape.

"Right now it's just coming together," said Capt. Ray Delarosa, a spokesman for the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit.

Delarosa stressed that the Marines' training for combat and for humanitarian missions overlaps, and that although they were preparing to go to Iraq they are able to easily tailor their capabilities to the new demands. He said that sanitation and preventing the spread of disease will be the top concerns when the Marines go ashore.

"In some ways, you could consider this mission more challenging than combat," Delarosa said. "We give it the same amount of attention and the same level of urgency."

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:03 AM

Roots of insurgency traced to appeasement by Saddam 
 
By Scheherezade Faramarzi 
Associated Press 
 
LONDON — Internationally isolated and fearful of losing power, Saddam Hussein made an astonishing...

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:04 AM

General: Key Iraq areas unsafe for vote 
 
By Colin McMahon Tribune foreign correspondent 
 
The commander of U.S. ground forces in Iraq (news - web sites) acknowledged Thursday that four of the...

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:05 AM

For Marines, home at dam is like villain's lair ... or ship

By Joseph Giordono, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Friday, January 7, 2005

HADITHA, Iraq — The Marines say it’s like living in the secret lair of a James Bond villain — at least one of the villains from the slightly dated Sean Connery-Roger Moore era.

Perched at the southern end of Lake Qadisiyah in Iraq’s Al Anbar province, along the Euphrates River, the 1st Battalion, 23rd Marine Regiment occupies what has to be the most unique base camp in Iraq: a hydroelectric dam.

The base isn’t beside the dam, or near the dam. It’s inside the massive concrete structure. Office spaces and long concrete hallways have been converted to living areas, a chow hall and weight rooms.

Giant concrete rooms with transformers, high-voltage wires and indecipherable machines festooned with dials and knobs are used as phone centers, a makeshift gym and a chapel.

At the same time, the Marines say, the dam is fully operational and provides power to up to one-third of Iraq’s 25 million people.

“It’s almost exactly like being on a ship. You’ve got all the stairwells, there’s the constant humming from the turbines, the water all around,” said Staff Sgt. Thomas Watson, 38, from Warner Robins, Ga.

The stairwell, or “ladderwell” in Marine-speak, is the most noted feature of the Marines’ temporary home. The dam has 11 levels above ground and none of the elevators works. Each level has ceilings of different heights, so sometimes going from one floor to another involves three to four flights of stairs.

For exercise, the Marines run the stairwells and jog along the top of the dam.

“It’s definitely a workout,” said 1st Lt. James Crabtree. “The spaces get wider as you get toward the base of the dam. There are three levels below ground, but they’re off-limits to us."

Deep in the bowels of the structure, the tops of the power turbines are visible in a cavernous space bounded on one side by a wall of pointed metal panels. At the far end of the room, a series of metal symbols, reminiscent of Soviet worker propaganda, extol the virtues of labor and the power provided by the dam.

“I had some friends in the unit that occupied the dam before we did,” Crabtree said, walking past the turbines. “They described it to me, but until I got here, I couldn’t really picture it.”

Small signs in the stairwell landings list the actions Marines should take at several levels of alert, from a possible failure of the dam to a terrorist attack.

According to the Iraqi power plant workers still on duty, the facilities at the dam used to be a resort hotel for honeymooners under the Saddam Hussein regime. A quick look at the rooms used as living quarters for the Marines backs that up — many have large balconies overlooking the spillways and the Euphrates, which leads downstream a few miles to the city of Haditha.

The balconies are separated from the rooms by large windows and double doors made of glass. The windows and doors have now been reinforced and taped over so they don’t shatter in case of a rocket or mortar attack.

Marines say the area around the dam gets hit a few times a week by incoming rounds. At around 6 p.m. Tuesday, a pair of mortar rounds slammed into the ground near the dam. The explosions rattled fixtures and echoed through the cement halls. Marines in the chow hall barely paused, looking up from their T-rations to see if any more rounds were on their way.

“This is pretty much the safest place in Iraq if you’re going to get mortared,” Watson said.

The Marines also share the facility with a company-size contingent of Azerbaijani soldiers, who provide perimeter security for the base. The Marines admit the Azerbaijanis have it pretty rough. They’re on 18-month tours in Iraq and have no mail or telephone links to home.

Of course, the dam has its drawbacks for the Marines as well. Even though it was built just 20 years ago, much of the facility is crumbling. The plumbing doesn’t work, so Marines have to use portable toilets and showers on either the first or seventh levels.

Mice are also a problem. In offices and living quarters throughout the dam, Marines have set up mousetraps and have made a sport of figuring out the best bait to lure the rodents. Peanut butter just gets licked off without triggering the trap. The old standby — cheese — works best, if you can get your hands on it.

Paradoxically, the dam experiences occasional power outages. The turbines shut down, the lights flicker and everything goes black. It’s the only time the constant hum stops.

And there’s the odor. Particularly on the lower levels of the dam, a distinct, pungent sulphur smell permeates the air. At times, it creeps up the stairwells all the way to the top levels.

The Marines aren’t sure what causes the smell. But some have a sardonic guess: “We’re living right on top of the gates of hell,” they say.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:05 AM

Marines diverted from Iraq for effort
By Eric Talmadge, Associated Press | January 7, 2005

ABOARD THE USS BONHOMME RICHARD -- When Lance Corporal Keith Delatorre boarded this warship in San Diego a month ago, he thought he was on his way to Iraq. Now, he's loading up his gear for a very different mission, bringing badly needed aid to Indonesians left isolated by the tsunami that battered coastlines along the Indian Ocean.

ADVERTISEMENT
Delatorre, who celebrated his 22d birthday Wednesday, said he was happy for the new orders, which came down two days after the disaster struck as the USS Bonhomme Richard was making a port call at the Pacific island of Guam. "We just need to get the mission done," he said, sweating in the heat of the ship's hull. "A lot of guys would say they want to go right to Iraq. But I'm kind of glad. There's not much chance of dying here."

The Bonhomme Richard and another warship brimming with Marines, helicopters, and heavy equipment arrived off the shores of northwest Sumatra yesterday to begin its part of what is possibly the largest US military humanitarian aid operation.

"We were training for Iraq, so getting diverted to a humanitarian mission is like night and day," said Delatorre, of Pleasant Hill, Calif., as he made his final check of the equipment loaded onto three huge hovercrafts stuffed into the hull of this amphibious assault vessel.

The Bonhomme Richard, with 1,300 Marines aboard, and the smaller USS Duluth are joining the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier and its battle group in the relief effort for Aceh Province, in northwestern Sumatra, where as many as 100,000 people are believed to have been killed by the Dec. 26 catastrophe. Another ship, the USS Rushmore, was also on its way.

The Marines are planning to set up farther south than the Lincoln to reach villages there that may not yet have made contact with the outside world.

Their arrival strongly boosts the relief efforts. Along with dozens of helicopters, the ships carry large landing craft that float on cushions of air and can come ashore on virtually any kind of beach. Once ashore, the Marines could offer the manpower and equipment needed to build shelters, clear roads and airstrips, and distribute clean drinking water.

Working out the details of the operation has been delicate.

First assigned to spearhead relief efforts on Sri Lanka, the Bonhomme Richard was diverted to Sumatra after the government in Colombo scaled down its relief request. An intensive airlift by helicopters from this ship to bring supplies out of the overwhelmed airport in Medan on Wednesday raised concerns from local officials that the military was crowding out commercial flights. Details about how the Marines would go ashore, probably in the flattened fishing village of Meulaboh, were still being worked out as the ship arrived off the regional capital of Banda Aceh.

Even so, the mission was taking shape.

"Right now it's just coming together," said Captain Ray Delarosa, a spokesman for the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit.

Delarosa said that the Marines' training for combat and for humanitarian missions overlaps, and that although they were preparing to go to Iraq, they are able to easily tailor their capabilities to the new demands. He said that sanitation and preventing the spread of disease will be the top concerns when the Marines go ashore.

"In some ways, you could consider this mission more challenging than combat," Delarosa said. "We give it the same amount of attention and the same level of urgency."

© Copyright 2005 Globe Newspaper Company.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:06 AM

01-04-2005

Does This Sound Familiar?

By Philip A. Quigley

After more than 18 months of “post-combat” occupation in Iraq, the United States may yet lose the war because of poor planning in the top ranks of the Bush administration before and after the March 2003 invasion. Egotism and arrogance may have cost the lives of a still-growing number of American troops serving in that unfinished conflict.

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki wanted to “transform” the military when he came aboard back in 1999. Shinseki wanted to intensify the training of troops and create a new design of a highly-mobile medium-light brigade of mechanized infantry that could be used for various purposes from reconnaissance, to speedy troop transport, to quick, cavalry-like attacks. Shinseki also wanted to key on the soldier in the field by giving him a sleek, mobile, equipped vehicle that was capable of performing many duties and was armored and armed enough to handle the environments of modern warfare – the Stryker.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld disagreed. He also wanted to “transform” the military, but he wanted to key on our technological superiority with aerial firepower. Does this sound familiar?

Rumsfeld believed that with our superiority with aerial firepower, fewer, more heavily armed, technologically-equipped soldiers – in conjunction with tactical target air strikes using cruise missiles and “smart bombs” – could do the job of many lighter-armed but more mobile troops.

Prior to the invasion of Iraq, when asked by the Senate Armed Services Committee how many troops he felt would be needed to invade and secure the country, Shinseki replied, “something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers.” Rumsfeld’s aides, preferring their lower estimate over the general’s, quickly shot down the estimate and publicly rebuked the Army Chief.

Think about that for a moment.

A long time ago, there was a secretary of defense who had a tremendous impact on the Pentagon and how it worked. He also had a large impact on a war. This secretary was an ex-CEO who was known as brilliant and tough, but also known for being impatient and often called arrogant. He came into office believing the Pentagon was hopelessly “behind the times” and needed to be “transformed.” The new SecDef believed DoD needed a more “business like and efficient” way of doing things and he held the Joint Chiefs in contempt. He cancelled major weapons programs and pushed others. He generated a lot of controversy but was strongly backed by his commander-in-chief.

That SecDef’s downfall came from a war, one that he micromanaged and directed from the Pentagon – a war in which he and the president never told the truth to the American people about the cost both in dollars and lives, and a war where on many critical occasions he overruled the Joint Chiefs and instead relied on his group of senior civilian advisors who used statistics, charts and computer programs to analyze and decide.

This Defense Secretary, of course, was Robert McNamara, and his President was Lyndon B. Johnson. Both were regarded as brilliant in their fields prior to becoming the National Command Authority (Johnson as a legislative leader and McNamara at the Ford Motor Co). And today, both McNamara and Johnson are known to history as abject failures who pushed the nation into a costly, divisive war that took the U.S. military 20 years from which to recover.

The question now, is simple: Is Donald Rumsfeld our new McNamara for the Iraq war?

Look at some interesting facts:

Rumsfeld and his advisors have never leveled with the American people about the cost and difficulty of the war. Remember what happened with Shinseki when he told the Congress his opinion on the manpower requirements? He was cut off at the knees. It is interesting that Rumsfeld and his supporters today insist that the SecDef didn’t fire Shinseki. Strictly speaking, Rumsfeld didn’t – but he did play an age-old Washington game. He and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz publicly castrated Shinseki, and then Rumsfeld publicly announced Shinseki’s replacement a year before his term was to expire, effectively making the Army Chief a lame duck service leader. Then Rumsfield purged the Army of most of its the three- and four-star generals, and brought retired Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker back on active duty to be his personal candidate as Army Chief of Staff.

The lesson was well learned by the people who are currently running the war.

Does anyone really believe that we have enough troops in Iraq? Does anyone really think that any general in the Army will tell Rumsfeld what he doesn’t want to hear on any important subject?

Is this fear of political revenge in part guiding us toward a major disaster in Iraq?

What’s going to happen is simple. There will be an election at the end of January (unless the Iraqi provisional government yields to the insurgent attacks and delays it). Whenever the vote does take place, it will go well in some areas of Iraq – notably the Kurdish north and the Sunni heartland – and in others, particularly the Sunni triangle, it won’t.

Nevertheless, a permanent Iraqi government will emerge. We will spend some more time and more money equipping Iraqi troops. Then sometime, as early as this summer or fall, we will declare victory and begin pulling out our troops. We will declare victory.

Rumsfeld & Co. will believe their own rhetoric, even if the rest of the world recognizes that under the fig leaf we have suffered a major loss of prestige, power and the near-destruction of the Army.

Does this sound familiar?

Contributing Editor Philip A. Quigley Jr. served as an enlisted Marine combat scout during Operation Iraqi Freedom, and is pursuing a post-military goal of writing about contemporary defense issues. He can be reached at HawkmanPQ@aol.com. *Send Feedback responses to dwfeedback@yahoo.com.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:06 AM

US marines net more suspects and weapons west of Baghdad
(AFP)

6 January 2005

BAGHDAD - US marines said they detained nine suspected insurgents and seized weapon caches in operations in the past 48 hours in Iraq’s restive Al-Anbar province, west of Baghdad.

Six people were arrested in a “cordon and knock” operation in the village of Sadah in the Qaim region, close to the Syrian border, said the marines in a statement Wednesday.

Three other suspects were detained elsewhere in Anbar, it added.

Marines also seized large quantities of weapons and ammunition in operations throughout Anbar.

Among the discoveries listed were 83 rocket-propelled grenades, more than a thousand rounds of ammunition and 360 pounds (163 kilograms) of TNT said the statement.

Marines continue to battle pockets of insurgents in Anbar weeks after the end of a major assault on the rebel stronghold of Fallujah in the province.

The attack on Fallujah left the city in ruins and abandoned by most of its estimated 300,000 inhabitants.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 09:44 AM

Riverine craft proves itself in Iraq
Submitted by: 2nd Marine Division
Story by Cpl. Shawn Rhodes

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. (Jan. 5, 2005) -- In April 2004, the assault on Fallujah raged inside the city. There were reports of insurgent movement to and from the city via the Euphrates River, creating a liquid highway for trafficking people and weapons. It was up to 2d Marine Division’s Small Craft Company to stop it.

To do so they relied on the latest fusion of speedboat and warfighting craft – the Small Unit Riverine Craft.

“The boat has proven itself to be perfectly suited for the environment in Iraq. It’s held up well right off the shelf,” said Color Sgt. Matthew R. Tomlinson, a landing craftsman first class with the British Royal Marines. The Somerset, England native has participated in landing operations from Northern Ireland to Sierra Leone and recently worked with the company and the SURC in Iraq.

“I look at it this way: Every country has rivers and waterways. A lot of countries have more waterways than roads so it is important we have a strong riverine force,” Tomlinson said.

The force Small Craft Company brought to Iraq included a few of the new 39-foot SURC capable of carrying three weapons systems per craft, making them the most dangerous thing in the water.

Not only do we have the most firepower on these boats compared with the Rigid Raider Craft, but the speed and maneuverability blows other tactical boats out of the water, according to Sgt. Aaron A. Smith, a platoon sergeant with the company who has been able to work with the SURC. Although the Riverine Assault Craft carried four weapons systems on board, the speed and maneuverability of the SURC makes it a better fighting platform. The Kerrville, Texas Marine explained how the new boat can out-perform any other craft on the water.

“This boat can go from zero to 25 knots in 15 seconds. A top speed of 40 knots means Marines can move in and out of kill-zones faster,” Smith said. He added, “Because of the twin 440 horsepower six-cylinder diesel engines it can move and turn faster than our other boats. Additionally, it is the only boat with ballistic protection even around the engine compartment.”

Smith said they would be field testing mini-guns and possibly missiles on the craft in the future.

Not only are the SURC crafts faster, they can travel farther than their predecessors as well.

“The old Raider craft could travel 75 nautical miles whereas the SURC can travel for 250 nautical miles,” said Staff Sgt James A. Cascio, a platoon sergeant with the company and native of Long Island, N.Y. He added, “This boat is great both on (seaside and riverine) operations. Because of the way it is designed it performs well both on the ocean and on rivers.”

“If we didn’t have this (riverine assault) asset on the water, the insurgents would be moving around in boats on the water,” Tomlinson said. He explained about one situation where the boats proved themselves in combat.

“It was the first day of our assault on Fallujah and we were ambushed,” Tomlinson recounted. “We went full speed to the shore and started laying down fire with our guns. The word got out not to mess with these boats and there weren’t any boats around us on the water after that.”

Tomlinson added the reason the company always beat the enemy was due not only to the boats but also the extreme professionalism of the crew and gunners on board.

The SURC boats proved themselves time and time again in the waterways of Iraq and despite being new, come with great reviews from the men who live on them.

“The boats are like homes for seven months. The Marines are so proud you feel you need to wipe your feet before stepping on board,” Tomlinson said. He added, “The boats have never failed a mission or task they’ve been put up to and we’ve never had to quit, saying ‘something happened to one of our boats’.”

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 10:15 AM

Reserve First Responders Form Rescue Team in Iraq
By Kathleen T. Rhem
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Jan. 6, 2005 -- When Army Sgt. Joseph Taylor arrived on the scene of the Dec. 29 explosion in Baghdad, Iraq, chaos was the order of the day.

Insurgents had lured several Iraqi police to a home, then detonated powerful explosives. The homes of at least three families were destroyed, leaving nothing but piles of rubble. One house had "pancaked," a first-responder term to explain that the building's walls had collapsed and one floor had fallen on top of another like a stack of pancakes.

Despite the devastation, those families were fortunate Taylor was among the first U.S. servicemen on the scene. And several people are alive today because he was.

Taylor is second-in-command of a unique team of Army Reserve soldiers with civilian experience in "heavy rescue" -- saving people trapped in collapsed structures.

While other members of 91st Engineer Battalion, to which Taylor is attached, began securing a perimeter around the incident site, Taylor began assessing the wreckage, keeping a particular eye out for potential "voids," small open places where someone might have survived the building's collapse.

"I went directly over to the pile to try to figure out exactly what was going on, to try and figure out some numbers and get a good assessment of what was happening," Taylor said in a telephone interview with American Forces Press Service.

He alerted his battalion commander it would be best to call the as-yet-untested "Rescue 1" team, formed from members of the 458th Combat Engineer Battalion in the unit's predeployment phase at the behest of the 1st Cavalry Division, which is responsible for security operations in and around Baghdad.

Then Taylor got to work on the serious business of saving innocent lives. Over the next three hours -- while the rest of the team of part-time rescuers was notified, assembled and deployed -- Taylor pulled four people out of "the pile" alive.

When two of the team's three rescue companies arrived, they pulled out another -- a 22-year-old woman. Taylor and the rest of the team also recovered several bodies from the rubble. In all, 29 people, many of them Iraqi policemen, died in the attack.

The Rescue 1 team came about after many hours of planning meetings at Fort McCoy, Wis., as the 458th, an Army Reserve unit from Johnstown, Pa., was preparing for its yearlong deployment to Iraq. A group of six individuals with extensive civilian experience in firefighting, emergency medicine and hazardous-materials handling planned the 90-member team, set training tasks, cobbled together equipment from several different sources, and manned the new organization with volunteers.

Many team members had little or no rescue experience before this mission. They trained extensively at Fort McCoy, then some more as the unit was processing through Camp Victory South, in Kuwait. Since they arrived in Iraq in February 2003, the team members have trained together at least once a month, explained Army Sgt. Greg Renko, a medic with the 458th and one of the team's original six "officers."

The team uses "firematic" terms, and many of the so-called officers here are actually Army enlisted men. What's important in this context is not their military ranks, but their rescue expertise gained through civilian experience. The team's commander is Army Maj. Adam Roth, battalion executive officer of the 458th. Taylor, also a medic with his unit, is the team's deputy commander.

Taylor said seeing the team save lives is an amazing experience for the six original officers. "It's almost like it's your own child," he said. "It's something you've created, you've helped it grow. And it's now mature enough to go out there … and be able to do amazing things."

In Iraq, the team acts much like a volunteer fire department. Members each have their normal jobs, not necessarily together. Members' day-to-day duties include sweeping routes for roadside bombs, patrolling areas of Baghdad, and construction jobs. But when they're notified of an emergency, they meet up and head out as a team.

"At any point they can give us a call, and they bring us all back in, just like a civilian volunteer fire department," said Renko, who in his civilian life is a paramedic firefighter in Monroeville, Pa.

The explosion on the 29th was the first time they actually deployed to an incident, Renko said. But they'd had plenty of "false alarms" before then. "We've been called up numerous times where we'd have the vehicles ready to go," he said. "We'd be staged, and we'd get 'called down.' They didn't need us, or there'd be nobody entrapped."

Renko and Taylor said they received a grateful response from the Iraqi police, firefighters and civilians who were at the scene of the major explosion last month. "The civilians … were outstandingly happy we were there. They came up hugging us, shaking our hands," Renko said. "The interpreter they had there, he kept telling us they were saying how happy they were that we were showing up to help them."

He said the Iraqis knew there were no U.S. casualties at the scene and were touched that these soldiers were working so hard to save the lives of Iraqi civilians.

Being part of a rescue team in Iraq has unique challenges. Especially poignant is that the members are deployed far from their usual support networks and stress relievers. In the civilian world, veteran first responders devise ways to help them deal with the horror of seeing people injured and killed. In the aftermath of the recent explosion, the team pulled many bodies from the wrecked buildings, including several children.

Taylor explained that when he returns from an incident in his civilian job as a paramedic firefighter in Norfolk, Va., the first thing he does is to call his wife, Jennifer, and to talk to his young sons. Playing with "the boys" allows him to get past the strain of his job. In Iraq, that outlet is not available to him.

Added to the routine strain of a deployment and stressful missions, is that Jennifer has given birth to a third son since Taylor has been in Iraq. She is now caring for 9-month-old Noah, and Adam, 4, and Zachary, 3, at home by herself until Taylor's unit redeploys in the next month or so. And many other men in the unit are in similar situations.

"A lot of these rescuers, we've had children on this deployment. We weren't there for that. A lot of us don't know those children. I don't know my youngest," Taylor said. "It just makes it that much harder."

To help them cope, chaplains are available to the rescuers, and the more experienced members make themselves readily available to the others -- just to talk or to refer them to other help, if that's what's needed.

And the soldiers "do what soldiers do best -- you rely on each other," Taylor said.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 11:13 AM

Semper family: Meeting helps counsel relatives of Marines heading to Iraq 
By LORNA THACKERAY 
Of The Gazette Staff 
 
Al Bloem was surprised when son Nicholas joined the Marine Reserve two years...

thedrifter

01-07-05, 11:37 AM

January 06, 2005

Marines readily adapt to humanitarian mission

By Eric Talmadge
Associated Press

ABOARD THE USS BONHOMME RICHARD — When Lance Cpl. Keith Delatorre boarded this warship in San Diego a month ago, he thought he was on his way to Iraq. Now, he’s loading up his gear for a very different mission — bringing badly needed aid to Indonesians left isolated by the tsunami that battered coastlines along the Indian Ocean.
Delatorre, who celebrated his 22nd birthday Wednesday, said he was happy for the new orders, which came down two days after the disaster struck as the amphibious assault ship Bonhomme Richard was making a port call at the Pacific island of Guam.

“We just need to get the mission done,” he said, sweating in the heat of the ship’s hull. “A lot of guys would say they want to go right to Iraq. But I’m kind of glad. There’s not much chance of dying here.”

The Bonhomme Richard and another warship brimming with Marines, helicopters and heavy equipment arrived off the shores of northwest Sumatra on Thursday to begin its part of what is possibly the largest U.S. military humanitarian aid operation ever.

“We were training for Iraq, so getting diverted to a humanitarian mission is like night and day,” said Delatorre, of Pleasant Hill, Calif., as he made his final check of the equipment loaded onto three huge hovercrafts stuffed into the hull of this amphibious assault vessel.

The Bonhomme Richard, with 1,300 Marines aboard, and the smaller dock landing ship Duluth are joining the carrier Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier and its battle group in the relief effort for the northwestern Sumatra province of Aceh, where as many as 100,000 people are believed to have been killed by the Dec. 26 catastrophe. The dock landing ship Rushmore was also on its way.

The Marines are planning to set up farther south than the Lincoln to reach villages there that may not yet have made contact with the outside world.

Their arrival strongly boosts the relief efforts. Along with dozens of helicopters, the ships carry large landing craft that float on cushions of air and can come ashore on virtually any kind of beach. Once ashore, the Marines could offer the manpower and equipment needed to build shelters, clear roads and airstrips, and distribute clean drinking water.

Working out the details of the operation has been delicate, however.

Though originally assigned to spearhead relief efforts on Sri Lanka, the Bonhomme Richard was diverted to Sumatra after the government in Colombo scaled down its relief request. An intensive airlift by helicopters from this ship to bring supplies out of the overwhelmed airport in Medan on Wednesday raised concerns from local officials that the military was crowding out commercial flights. And details of how the Marines would go ashore, most likely in the flattened fishing village of Meulaboh, were still being worked out as the ship arrived off the regional capital of Banda Aceh.

Even so, the mission was taking shape.

“Right now it’s just coming together,” said Capt. Ray Delarosa, a spokesman for the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit.

Delarosa stressed that the Marines’ training for combat and for humanitarian missions overlaps, and that although they were preparing to go to Iraq they are able to easily tailor their capabilities to the new demands. He said that sanitation and preventing the spread of disease will be the top concerns when the Marines go ashore.

“In some ways, you could consider this mission more challenging than combat,” Delarosa said. “We give it the same amount of attention and the same level of urgency.”

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 12:00 PM

Punishment for Marine bears idiocy 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
January 7, 2005 
BY BRIAN DICKERSON 
DETROIT FREE PRESS COLUMNIST 
 
In today's...

thedrifter

01-07-05, 12:32 PM

Officer: Army May Change Reserves Policy

By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON - Stretched thin by the wars in Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites), the Army is considering a National Guard and Reserve policy shift that could result in part-timers being called to active duty multiple times for up to two years each time, a senior Army official said Thursday.

The official, who discussed the matter with a small group of reporters on condition of anonymity because the matter has not been fully settled inside the Pentagon (news - web sites), said the Army probably will ask Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in the next several months to change the policy.

The official also said it appeared likely that the Army will ask Congress to permanently increase the statutory size of the Army by 30,000 soldiers, to 512,000. He said that decision would be made next year.

The Army has the authority to add 30,000 soldiers, but arranged for it to be only a temporary boost because it did not want a long-term commitment to the cost of a larger force. But now it appears that the Army has no choice but to accept a permanent increase, the official said.

The Army estimates that a permanent increase of 30,000 soldiers will cost it about $3 billion a year.

The Pentagon is sending retired Army Gen. Gary E. Luck to Iraq next week to conduct an "open-ended review" of the military operations there, including troop levels, The New York Times reported on its Web site Thursday night.

One reason that the National Guard and Reserve have been used so heavily over the past three years is that the active-duty Army is too small to meet the demands of war — particularly in Iraq, where troop levels have far exceeded original predictions — while also maintaining a presence in traditional areas of influence such as Europe and the Korean peninsula.

The Army now has about 660,000 troops on active duty, of which about 160,000 are members of the Guard and Reserve.

The Army wants them to be eligible for an unlimited number of call-ups, so long as no single mobilization lasts more than 24 months, the official said.

Under current policy set by Rumsfeld, a Guard or Reserve member is not to serve on active duty for more than 24 total months. Thus, for example, if a Guard or Reserve member was mobilized for six months after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and later for nine months in Afghanistan, then that person is off limits for duty in Iraq because a yearlong tour there would exceed the 24-month limit. A standard tour in Iraq, for both active-duty and reserves, is 12 months.

If the limit were set at 24 consecutive months, with some break between tours, then in theory a Guard or Reserve member could be mobilized for multiple 12- or 24-month tours in Iraq or elsewhere.

That is the kind of flexibility the Army has decided it needs in order to sustain the forces needed in Iraq and Afghanistan, the official said. He stressed that the Army would make only sparing use of the authority to call up soldiers for longer tours because it would not want to alienate soldiers.

The National Guard, with about 350,000 members, and the 200,000-strong Reserve already are seeing signs of a slide in recruiting and retaining soldiers. Some may question whether a policy change that results in longer mobilizations could further erode the Guard and Reserve's ability to attract new soldiers and keep the ones it has.

The Guard in particular has been used so much in Iraq and Afghanistan that the Army now has deployed — or put on notice of plans to mobilize in 2005 — all 15 of its main combat brigades.

___

On the Net:

Army Reserve at http://www4.army.mil/usar

Army National Guard at http://www.arng.army.mil

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 12:39 PM

Marines revoke Marine's Purple Heart By Deborah Sederberg
The Michigan City News-Dispatch
Jan. 7, 2005

Editor's note: Reporter Deborah Sederberg is the mother-in-law of 1st Lt. Dustin P. Ferrell.

Twice 1st Lt. Dustin P. Ferrell wore his Purple Heart to the Marine Corps Birthday Ball.

No more.

Ferrell, a Marine who was nearly killed in Iraq in the early days of the war, has received notice: His Purple Heart has been revoked.

"I was stunned," Ferrell said. "I didn't know what to think."

Nothing else has changed. Ferrell still suffers a 40 percent vision loss in his right eye. He still carries a face and jaw full of metal and plastic.

A graduate of the University of Notre Dame with a degree in business and a concentration in accounting, Ferrell now is assigned to Camp LeJeune, North Carolina, where doctors continue to work on his injuries. He expects to be released on a medical retirement in the spring.

In December, Ferrell received a letter on Department of the Navy stationery stating, "The purpose of this letter is to inform you that an administrative error was made when you were awarded the Purple Heart Medal." The letter thanked him for his service.

Ferrell's wounds were the result of an accident. No one disputes that matter. Ferrell and two lance corporals were riding in a Humvee driven by 22-year-old Sgt. Nicholas Hodson. They were speeding across the Iraqi desert in the black of night with no headlights when they struck something - hard.

Sgt. Hodson died instantly.

Ferrell and the corporals were seriously wounded. Only a tracheotomy kept Ferrell alive long enough to be treated at a hospital in Kuwait. From there, he was flown to Germany, where doctors put his face back together and looked after his injured lung and hip.

When he was strong enough, he was returned to the U.S., to Bethesda Naval Hospital, just outside Washington, D.C.

Breathing with the aid of a ventilator, his jaw wired together and his facial skeleton laced with metal and plastic, Ferrell received his Purple Heart from Gen. William Nyland, assistant commandant of the whole Marine Corps.

A nurse took pictures. Ferrell felt honored.

Several visiting generals assured him he indeed deserved the honor. He and his buddies were heading into battle, heading to a bridge then occupied by enemy forces, heading to free that bridge for troops to use as they headed toward Baghdad. One general told him the Humvee in which he was a passenger had been struck by a rocket-propelled grenade.

Ten other Marines had their Purple Hearts revoked in December. All the others are enlisted men. Some are barely 20 years old.

After inquiring, Ferrell was thankful to learn Purple Hearts are not being revoked from dead Marines. Sgt. Hodson's widow and children then will keep his Purple Heart.

Ferrel has turned for help to U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, the Democratic congressman representing the first district of Indiana.

"This is not about my Purple Heart," Ferrell said. "This is about looking for some answers and this is about those other 10 Marines. These guys have been through so much and this just strikes at their pride and dignity."

Ferrell asked the former commanding officer of his battalion why his Purple Heart had been revoked. The commanding officer, Lt. Col. Paul Dunahoe, who was in Iraq with his battalion, made some inquiries. "I do not concur with the outcome or the manner in which this situation was handled relative to the revocation of the awards," Dunahoe wrote to Ferrell in an e-mail.

A Marine Corps captain blames General Nyland. "Many people were not pleased that the Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps handed out Purple Hearts rather hastily in quite a few instances without thorough knowledge of background information," the captain wrote to Ferrell.

Now, Ferrell says he feels ashamed about having worn that Purple Heart "that I possibly didn't deserve."

Ferrell's wife, the former Rachael Sederberg, who has worked as a victim's advocate for the LaPorte County Prosecuting Attorney, is disturbed by her husband's self-doubts.

"Honor and duty are important to Dustin," she said. "That's why he was attracted to Notre Dame and that's why he was attracted to the Marines."

Major Larry Naifeh, a 23-year veteran of the Marines and director of the Junior ROTC program at Michigan City High School, was shocked to hear Ferrell's story.

Like other Marines who have talked with Ferrell, Naifeh said, "Except for a couple of cases of out-and-out fraud (and there's no question of fraud here), I have never in my life heard of revoking a Purple Heart."

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 01:01 PM

Lawmaker: Call it Department of the Navy and Marine Corps

Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. — The Republican congressman whose district includes Camp Lejeune and a Marine aviation hub at Cherry Point wants the Marine Corps included in the name of the governing military bureaucracy.
Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., on Tuesday introduced legislation that would rename the Department of the Navy as the Department of the Navy and Marine Corps. He said it would give the Marine Corps the representation it deserves as one of the four branches of the U.S. military.

The command of the Marine Corps is already distinct despite being a part of the Navy Department. Each service’s commanding officer serves equally as a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

“There isn’t a subordinate relationship between the Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandant of the Marines Corps,” Jones said. “They are equivalent parts of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and it is time that the Department of the Navy recognizes their equal status.”

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 01:30 PM

Leathernecks promote 'Wear Something Red' 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
By Gregory A. Summers 
The Lancaster News 
Jan. 7, 2005 
 
Clay Watson is...

thedrifter

01-07-05, 02:02 PM

Michigan governor orders flags lowered in honor of fallen Marine
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Associated Press
Jan. 7, 2005

LANSING - Gov. Jennifer Granholm has ordered that U.S. flags across the state be lowered to half-staff on Monday in honor of a Marine from Macomb County who died in Iraq.

Staff Sgt. Jason A. Lehto, 31, died Dec. 28 in what the Defense Department described as a non-hostile incident. He had been assigned to the Marine Forces Reserve's Marine Wing Support Group 47, 4th Marine Aircraft Wing, based in Macomb County's Harrison Township.

Granholm said it's important to recognize and honor those who give their lives to protect and defend the United States.

Lehto enlisted in the Marines after graduating from Clintondale High School in Clinton Township in 1992. He served in active duty until 1996, then joined the reserves.

Lehto's family said he worked as a service technician for SBC Communications in Trenton before leaving for Iraq in August.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 02:18 PM

America Supports You: Program Uses New Care Package Concept
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Jan. 5, 2005 — The Internet is chock-full of Web sites for groups that send care packages to deployed troops. But one organization, Operation Interdependence, has a unique twist: Its focus is on getting care packages to troops on the front lines without burdening the military logistics system.

Retired Marine Corps Chief Warrant Officer Albert Renteria founded Operation Interdependence to rally community support for the military and to express that support in way that didn't bog down the military supply train.

He'd seen that happen firsthand during the Gulf War, and remembers the difficulty of getting mountains of packages to the front lines, and the danger of doing so put on the troops involved. He said he was certain the American public had no idea that they had inadvertently hampered the very effort they had hoped to support through their outpouring of generosity.

As a result, Renteria came up with a concept called civilian rations, or "c- rats," that he said "maximize our military's efforts by minimizing their delivery and handling tasks."

Each 30-pound box sent by Operation Interdependence includes c-rats for 50 troops. Renteria said that means each 100 boxes sent and delivered through the program reach 5,000 rather than just 100 troops. During 2004 alone, Operation Interdependence delivered 500,000 care packages.

Packets contain a variety of treats: hygiene items, packaged snacks and most importantly, a personal letter expressing appreciation and support, he said.

Renteria said Operation Interdependence's goal is not to compete with "mom" or the military exchange system in getting items to the troops. It's to get Americans involved in showing support in whatever way they can, including volunteering their time to collect, pack and ship the boxes. He said it's also to get young people involved in civic service.

Later this month, the Blackwell International Academy of Performing Arts will honor Operation Interdependence at its third annual Omni Youth Music Awards in Sherman Oaks, Calif. Five students involved in the program, each escorted by a member of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard, will represent the organization as they accept the Dianne Wall-Wilson Troop Service Award at the Jan. 16 ceremony.

Also in the works for Operation Interdependence is a "15 Minutes of Giving" campaign, to be conducted in partnership with the Academy of Country Music. Renteria said the campaign will encourage every American to donate just 15 minutes to write a letter, collect items to pack or make a donation possible for troops deployed all over the world.

A "15 Minutes of Giving" tour will follow the National Hot Rod Association drag racing schedule, and will host events in each city to promote participation in Operation Interdependence, he said.

"The goal is to reach every American," Renteria said. "All we ask of people is 15 minutes. But once they do that and see how good it feels, they always want to give more."

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 03:32 PM

Marines trusted Hassoun on leave 
 
By Dave Moniz, USA TODAY 
 
Marine Corps officials defended their decision to allow a corporal facing desertion charges to take holiday leave before he turned up...

thedrifter

01-07-05, 05:36 PM

Suicide bombers kill 25

By Dusan Stojanovic
Associated Press

BAGHDAD, Iraq — A suicide attacker blew up an explosives-laden car outside a police academy south of Baghdad on Wednesday, killing 20 people, and another car bomb left five Iraqi policemen dead. Despite the surge of violence aimed at derailing this month’s elections, Iraq’s interim leader again insisted the ballot would go ahead as planned.
“We will not allow the terrorists to stop the political process in Iraq,” Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said as the death toll from insurgent attacks topped 90 over four days this week. “The elections process is the basis for the deepening of the national unity in Iraq.”

While Allawi and U.S. military commanders insisted parliamentary elections must be held as scheduled on Jan. 30, interim President Ghazi al-Yawer, who holds only ceremonial powers, left open the possibility that the vote could be postponed.

“I think that we should continue working on how to hold the elections on schedule, but we should not lack the courage if we see that this is impossible,” said al-Yawer, a Sunni Muslim tribal leader.

If the election takes place, it is expected to shift power to the Shiite Muslim community, an estimated 60 percent of the population that has been dominated by the Sunni Arab minority since modern Iraq was created after World War I.

The insurgency is believed to be led by Sunnis and Saddam Hussein’s supporters. U.S. officials believe the violence is aimed at blocking the elections and causing worse chaos in hopes of driving out the U.S.-led military coalition. They say postponing the vote would be tantamount to conceding victory to the militants.

The car bomb outside a gate of the police academy in Hillah, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, was the latest in a series of attacks on Iraqi security forces. More than 1,300 policemen were killed in the final four months of 2004, the Interior Ministry said Wednesday.

Police Capt. Hady Hatef in Hillah said the blast occurred during a graduation ceremony at the academy and killed at least 20 people, including civilians. Polish Lt. Col. Artur Domanski, a spokesman for the multinational force in Hillah, said at least 10 policemen were among the dead and 41 people were wounded.

In the restive city of Baqouba, 30 miles northeast of Baghdad, a suicide attacker rammed his car into a joint police and Iraqi National Guard checkpoint, killing five policemen and wounding eight other Iraqis, a U.S. spokesman, Maj. Neal O’Brien, said. The driver was also killed.

In a separate attack, gunmen killed police Col. Khalifa Hassan and his driver as they headed to work in Baqouba, said Dr. Ahmed Fouad at Baqouba General Hospital.

Between 20,000 and 30,000 insurgents are operating throughout Iraq and are directed by former officials of Saddam’s regime based in Syria, Iraq’s intelligence chief said in an interview published Wednesday by a London-based Arab newspaper.

“We officially call them terrorists,” Maj. Gen. Mohammed Abdullah al-Shahwani told Asharq Al-Awsat. “They are between 20,000 and 30,000 armed men operating all over Iraq, mainly in the Sunni areas where they receive moral support from about 200,000 people.”

Al-Shahwani predicted attacks would fade out within a year.

Allawi said Wednesday that “there is no doubt we will crush these terrorists and we will guarantee security and stability for our people in the near future.”

He said Iraqi security forces are being equipped with new weapons and armored vehicles.

“Hostile force are still trying to cause harm and damage, but the Iraqi forces are becoming better, and they have captured and killed some terrorists,” Allawi told reporters.

He said security forces recently arrested two aides of Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who is believed to be one of the insurgency’s leaders.

“They were detained in Mosul along with three or four others and they have started confessing now to Iraqi security about the networks they run in order to harm our people,” Allawi said.

In other violence, an explosives-filled car following a convoy of U.S. and Iraqi troops detonated in western Baghdad on Wednesday, killing two Iraqi civilians and wounding 10, police said. No troops were hurt.

The attack came as a funeral procession was held nearby for the governor of Baghdad, Ali al-Haidari, who was assassinated Tuesday. It was not clear if the bomb targeted the mourners, which included Iraqi officials, or the troop convoy. The Ansar al-Sunnah Army, a radical Islamic group, claimed responsibility.

Dr. Riyad al-Hiti at the hospital in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad, said four Iraqi civilians were killed and two injured when U.S. soldiers opened fire after their convoy was attacked by rocket-propelled grenades in Ramadi. The U.S. military had no information about the incident.

The U.S. military reported an American soldier with Task Force Olympia was killed and two were wounded Tuesday when a patrol was attacked by small arms and rocket-propelled grenades in Tal Afar in northern Iraq.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 05:41 PM

January 10, 2005 
 
Television 
War in Iraq relived on new TV channel 
 
By Phillip Thompson 
Times staff writer 
 
 
The Discovery Network unveils its “Military Channel” on Jan. 10, and three of its...

thedrifter

01-07-05, 06:59 PM

Working with U.S. combat troops in Iraq
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CHANAN TIGAY
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Jan. 7, 2005

Military men typically take the measure of a battle in stark tallies of dead and injured men, miles between enemy positions, numbers of insurgent hold-outs and the like.

But Cmdr. Irving Elson - a Conservative rabbi who for the first eight months of Operation Iraqi Freedom, and again for the High Holidays this fall, was the only Jewish chaplain serving with Marines in Iraq - uses a different battle calculus.

For Elson, 44, an affable man who keeps his graying hair neatly buzzed to about the same length as his mustache, the battle count looks something like this: Five days of Rosh Hashanah. Six Passover seders in Baghdad. Seven Shabbat services in one night. Seventeen High Holiday services.

"In the military, especially in times of combat, you can't say, 'Well, Rosh Hashanah's today, so today we're going to do Rosh Hashanah services,'" Elson told JTA earlier this month, just before addressing a group at Manhattan's Jewish Theological Seminary, where he was ordained in 1987.

"I did like five days of Rosh Hashanah. You're in one place for ma'ariv and shacharit," he said, using the Hebrew terms for the evening and morning prayer services, "and then you go to the next place, and then you go to the next place, and then you go to the next place, and Rosh Hashanah's over, but, hey, you still have another eight or nine places to go to."

And that's not eight or nine safe, comfortable synagogues. Elson led Yom Kippur services in Iraq under mortar fire; tripped over an M-50 machine gun while carrying a small Torah scroll at the Al Asad air base; and was forced to bury 100 copies of the Scroll of Esther in the Kuwaiti desert when the books wouldn't fit into his equipment-stuffed Humvee.

Still, he said, "These services were some of the most meaningful times in my life."

Of 40,000 troops with the Marine Expeditionary Force in Iraq, Elson said, about 400 are Jews, spanning the spectrum of religious engagement from secular to Orthodox.

Many of the Jews he guided in Iraq were combat soldiers coming to grips with their own mortality, said Elson, a Navy chaplain who served in Iraq with the 1st Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment.

"You're dealing with a very young population, 18- to 21-year-olds," he said. "Spiritually they're at real formative years. That's when they're on their own for the first time and getting to ask the big questions in life, and I get to be there as a rabbi saying, 'Hey, this is what Judaism has to offer.' It's a great job."

Elson doesn't perform religious rites for non-Jewish soldiers, but he does provide spiritual succor and guidance for troops of any faith.

"We minister to our own, we provide for others, and we care for all," he said.

Military chaplaincy is a unique sort of rabbinate, said Rabbi Nathan Landman, deputy director of the JWB Jewish Chaplains Council, the primary agency that recruits and serves military chaplains.

"One of the most fulfilling aspects is that most people in the American military come not from the large cities of great Jewish concentrations, but from more rural areas," said Landman, who served as a chaplain in the U.S. Air Force.

"A rabbi in uniform has an opportunity to create a positive attitude toward Jews among those who have never encountered them before on a large scale," he said.

Elson had just such an opportunity in Iraq.

Military chaplains do not carry weapons. Instead, they are assigned "chaplain's assistants," soldiers who shadow them constantly as bodyguards. Elson's assistant was a Southern Baptist.

"He said, 'I recognize you're one of God's Chosen People, and I'm going to take care of you,'" Elson recalled. "And that he did."

Shortly after the war began, after securing the Ramallah oil field in Iraq, Elson's regiment fought its way through a gauntlet of Iraqi soldiers in the town of Nasariyah, taking heavy enemy fire and casualties.

When they finally emerged on the northern side of the city, they were ambushed by units of Iraq's Special Republican Guards. An intense firefight erupted.

"It was there that, for the first of three times," the chaplain's assistant "literally covered me with his body and returned fire," Elson said. "He was awarded the Navy Marine Corps Bronze Star for his bravery that day.

"When this firefight was all over and we had the chance to comfort the wounded and take care of our dead, I sat in the Humvee almost in a daze," Elson said.

"I was scared and I was wet. It had rained and hailed all day and all night," he continued. "For 24 hours there was hail, there was rain, there was a sandstorm. I actually remember going to my battalion commander and saying, 'Look, we have the hail, the dust. If I see locusts, I know we're in real trouble.' "

Now finishing his eighteenth year in the U.S. military, Elson was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal for his service in Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Elson, who is married with three young children, also has served in Okinawa; Charleston, S.C.; Naples; Newport, R.I.; Albany; and at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. He now is stationed in California.

As he addressed the JTS audience, the Marines with whom Elson served - "my guys," he called them - were taking part in the battle for Fallujah, a hotbed of the Iraqi insurgency.

It's "horrible" sitting back in the United States wondering about the fate of his minions in the Marines, Elson said, but it has given him time to reflect on his Iraqi experience.

"It's changed me. It's made me realize the wealth Judaism has, and that, in almost any situation, there's something that Judaism has to offer," he said. "I felt very rabbi-ish in Iraq. Both this trip and the last trip, I felt that, my entire life, I was preparing for that. I was really honored to be able to go and serve with them. They're my congregation. Great men and women."

Elson can now add one more figure to his unusual Iraqi battle mathematics: four months. That's the amount of time remaining until "his guys'' are scheduled to come home.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 07:24 PM

January 10, 2005

Quiet celebration, post-holiday reality
Lull in Ramadi action holds

By Gordon Trowbridge
Times staff writer

RAMADI, Iraq — For the Marines of Fire Base Snake Pit, Christmas Day was ham and sweet potatoes, calls home on the satellite telephone, the company commander in a Santa suit.
The day after Christmas was back to reality: A long patrol through the mud- and trash-choked alleys of this city, one of the friendliest havens for insurgents — and thus one of the most troublesome cities in Iraq for U.S. forces.

Snake Pit, a former Iraqi government compound on the main highway through Ramadi, is home to Echo Compamy, 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines. The afternoon of Dec. 26, 2nd Lt. Ryan Schramel led the company’s 2nd Platoon through a post-holiday sweep of a neighborhood on Ramadi’s west side, knocking on doors, handing out handfuls of candy to children, asking about rebel activity.

“We usually don’t get much [information] from these sweeps,” said Schramel. “It’s more a matter of presence, letting them know we’re here and we’re going to be around.”

Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, is one of the most dangerous areas in Iraq for the Marines and soldiers based here. Just before Christmas, insurgents chased Iraqi police out of their station and neighboring government building before blowing up both structures.

And while Marine commanders say they have begun to see signs that local residents are turning against the insurgency, firefights and roadside bombs are constant dangers.

The Marines attempt to combat the insurgency with patrols such as the one the day after Christmas, a three-hour stroll through a residential area near the police station attacked the week before Christmas.

The patrol’s beginning gives some idea of what the Marines have to deal with.

They stepped off from their observation-post compound, into a 100-yard-wide field of ankle-deep mud — a drainage field, the Marines said, for sewage from nearby homes.

While parents warily looked on, neighborhood children ran to the Marines with outstretched hands, pleading, “Mister, Mister!” while reaching for candy.

Marines dealt out packages of candy and cookies, some taken from Christmas care packages sent from home.

Schramel stopped at several homes, knocking on locked outer gates before asking through an interpreter if there had been insurgents about.

“Same story every place,” Cpl. Kyle Farwell, one of the platoon’s squad leaders, said after one fruitless interview. “Nobody’s seen anything.”

Echo Company had spent a quiet Christmas, part of what the Marines said has been a lull in activity since the November assault on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah, just to the east. Maj. Gen. Richard Natonski, commander of the 1st Marine Division, stopped by in time to see Lance Cpl. Adam Suave taking part in firing-range drills, dressed not in cammies, but like the company commander on this holiday, in a bright red Santa suit.

Despite a meal of Christmas ham, stuffing and cranberry sauce trucked in from a nearby base for the occasion, several of the young men, and many more experienced Marines, said the time away from home hit harder on the holiday.

“It’s hard on us,” said Gunnery Sgt. Adebol Osinowo, a father of three who listed a catalog of exotic locales where he had spent Christmas during his Marine career. “But it’s even harder on the families.”

Staff writer Gordon Trowbridge is covering I Marine Expeditionary Force operations in Iraq. Keep up with him and staff photographer L.G. Francis on their Web blog at www.marinecorpstimes.com.

Ellie

thedrifter

01-07-05, 08:48 PM

thedrifter

01-07-05, 11:16 PM

Official: Iraq War a PR Problem in Japan

By NATALIE OBIKO PEARSON, Associated Press Writer

TOKYO - The dispatch of Japanese troops to Iraq (news - web sites) — a deeply unpopular move here — is a public relations problem caused by ungrounded fears about the region's stability, Japan's defense chief said Friday, vowing to turn around public opinion.

Japan's pro-U.S. government extended a one-year humanitarian mission in the southern Iraqi city of Samawah last month, approving a plan to keep the 550 troops there to purify water and rebuild infrastructure for another 12 months.

"The extension is very, very unpopular," Defense Agency chief Yoshinori Ono acknowledged at a news conference on Friday.

"Through the eyes of the Japanese people, the situation in Samawah is very bad, dangerous," he said. "It is a public relations problem."

His comments came as a new batch of soldiers prepared to leave for Iraq on Saturday for a six-month mission to relieve colleagues in Iraq and Kuwait. Japan has a total of 1,000 troops in the region helping reconstruction efforts.

Many Japanese fear the troops will get caught up in fighting or make Japan a terrorist target. Public opinion polls have shown that nearly 60 percent of Japanese voters opposed the extension.

Critics also say the deployment violates the spirit of the country's pacifist constitution, which foreswears the use of force to settle international disputes.

The government argues that the dispatch is needed to help stabilize Iraq, secure vital Middle East oil flows to Japan and strengthen ties with the United States, a top ally.

Ono, who visited the Japanese camp in Samawah last month, said he was convinced the situation there was stable and that the troops' efforts were welcomed by the local Iraqis.

He said he regretted not having reporters accompany him on his trip and said he was exploring the possibility of allowing media into the Japanese camp in order to give the public a better idea of the situation there.

Ellie