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| Iraq-Jordan |
| The battle of Fallujah |
| 2004-11-29 |
| Capt. Sean Sims watched artillery shells fall and explode in a blast of sand and rubble, close enough to hear but too far to see what they hit. It was Sims' first daylight look at the rebel-held city of Fallujah on Monday afternoon, just hours before he would lead his men deep into its heart. A Marine Harrier jet screamed overhead. A Mark-19 automatic grenade launcher nearby let loose - bomb-boom-boom - sending grenades to burst in the distance. As commander of Alpha Company, of the 1st Infantry Division's Task Force 2-2, Sims drew a mission the U.S. military had sought to avoid since the start of the Iraq war: house-to-house fighting in an urban landscape that gave rebels many places to hide, significantly offsetting the superior firepower of U.S. troops while risking civilian casualties and vast property destruction. It would be the most intense urban combat for U.S. troops since the 1968 battle for Hue, in Vietnam. Sims' men would win the battle, yet no one would feel like celebrating. Killing the enemy, they learned, was sobering. More so was the loss of friends. Sims would not come back. It would be interesting to sit down with some Ernie Pyle and see how these stories compare. It is interesting that all three stories start out focusing on an officer. I suspect the reporters simply cannot relate to the enlisted men and so gravitate to those closest to them. Interesting that they found two who died. I wonder if this means officers are disproportionatly casualties or if the embeds were placed in really forward units. Of course, we get the degredation of the effort by comparing it to Vietnam or Abrams shooting at youngsters in tennies. Overall, I get a very negative feeling from these articles, but that may be as much that combat is not often an uplifting experience as that the reporters are rooting for the other side. |
| Posted by:Mrs. Davis |
| #5 Interesting. That shows officers below the 11% level of VN. Also interesting that the Army rate is higher than the Marine at every level except the lowest. Clearly the officers were out front here. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2004-11-29 3:42:53 PM |
#4 Rough figures (only clean data), April 2003-approximately 10 days ago.
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| Posted by: Fred 2004-11-29 2:20:44 PM |
| #3 Ed, Thanks. This source shows the rate of officer deaths in Viet Nam was 11% of total deaths versus 16% in this battle. I don't know what the rate has been for the overall campaign. It is not good to see any deaths, but the high rate of officer deaths means that they are leading and, I hope, saving the lives of their men by their forward presence on the battlefield. It is a tragedy to lose such great leaders so early in their lives, but they should stand as an inspriation to us all. |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2004-11-29 9:31:16 AM |
| #2 "U.S. may have won, but at a great personal cost" We didn't win, we may have won. And it was a pyrrhic victory anyway. Or not exactly-- the correspondent can't quite argue it was actually a loss in disguise, so he talks about "great personal cost." Funny choice of words: not "human cost" but "personal cost". This is the language one uses for consumers or housewives. Nothing heroic or grand about our soldiers, no sirree. La MSM resistance continue. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-29 9:14:26 AM |
| #1 I believe 8 officers died out of 50-some in this battle. That is disproportionate to their numbers, but is a consequence of officers and NCOs leading from the front. It is a much better better system than so many other armies where the officers are first to flee and leave the privates to be slaughtered. The results (~2000 dead and 1000 enemy captured) speak for themselves. |
| Posted by: ed 2004-11-29 8:58:56 AM |