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| Iraq |
| Some Fighters in Iraq Adopt New Tactics to Battle U.S. |
| 2006-11-24 |
| So they're "fighters" now. Not even militants or insurgents. NYT. FORWARD OPERATING BASE CALDWELL, Iraq — Sunni Arab militant groups suspected of having ties to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia have established training camps east of Baghdad that are turning out well-disciplined units willing to fight American forces in set-piece battles, American military commanders said Thursday. American soldiers fought such units in a pitched battle last week in Turki, a village 25 miles south of this Iraqi Army base in volatile Diyala Province, bordering Iran. At least 72 insurgents and two American officers were killed in more than 40 hours of fighting. American commanders said they called in 12 hours of airstrikes while soldiers shot their way through a reed-strewn network of canals in extremely close combat. Officers said that in that battle, unlike the vast majority of engagements in Diyala, insurgents stood and fought, even deploying a platoon-size unit that showed remarkable discipline. One captain said the unit was in “perfect military formation.” Insurgents throughout Iraq usually avoid direct confrontation with American troops, preferring to use hit-and-run tactics and melting away at the sight of American armored vehicles. Lt. Col. Andrew Poppas, commander of the Fifth Squadron, 73rd Cavalry, a unit of the 82nd Airborne Division, said in an interview that the fighters at Turki “were disciplined and well trained, with well-aimed shots.” “We hadn’t seen anything like this in years,” he said. The insurgents had built a labyrinthine network of trenches in the farmland, with sleeping areas and weapons caches. Two antiaircraft guns had been hidden away. Insurgents were apparently able to establish a training camp after American forces moved out of the area in the fall of 2005, Colonel Poppas said. Sunni Arab militants there belong to the fundamentalist Wahhabi strain of Islam and are believed to be led, at least in part, by a man known as Abu Abdul Rahman, an Iraqi-Canadian who moved from Canada to Iraq in 1995 after marrying a woman from Turki, he said. Abu Abdul Rahman was mentioned on some jihadist Web sites as a possible contender for the leadership of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia after the group’s founder, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was killed in an American airstrike in Diyala Province in June, said Capt. Mike Few, commander of A Troop, Fifth Squadron. Senior commanders training Iraqi Army units here say other rural areas of eastern and central Diyala where American forces have had little oversight have been transformed into camps similar to the one at Turki. The “graduates,” many of whom belong to an umbrella group called the Sunni Council, then spread to urban areas like Baquba, the provincial capital, said Maj. Tim Sheridan, an intelligence officer. Sectarian violence is rampant in Diyala, where Sunni and Shiite militants are vying for control. The battle at Turki began after Colonel Poppas and other soldiers flew over the area on a reconnaissance mission on Nov. 12. From the helicopters, they spotted a white car covered by shrubbery and a hole in the ground that appeared to be a hiding place. The colonel dropped off an eight-man team and later sent other soldiers to sweep the area. Gunfire erupted on Nov. 15 when one unit ran into an ambush. The fighting eventually became so intense that the Americans called in airstrikes. An American captain and a lieutenant, both West Point graduates, were killed by insurgents in separate firefights. |
| Posted by:.com |
| #15 I second the sentiment of "good" re the suggestion that the enemy will form up and fight our military units. So many sources of error or missing info that it's hard to say for sure, but the "discovery" of a training area in the manner described does confirm the sort of half-assed approach we've been taking to this fight. You heard it here first: there's no NON-military solution to any war, including insurgencies, including Iraq. The frequency with which the converse of that statement comes out of uniformed mouths (in the field, not just the Pentagon) is almost the scariest thing at the moment. Iraqis certainly don't have any reason to worship the abstractions of politics and nation-building, while their entire life experience confirms that their situation is driven by power, and will - and only fools will bet or act otherwise. |
| Posted by: Verlaine 2006-11-24 22:40 |
| #14 Methinks 0044 was being sarcastic. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2006-11-24 21:51 |
| #13 It's a double 0 number Frank. I'd be careful. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-11-24 21:21 |
| #12 I think our Pentagon has capable people - perhaps too many outside academic consultants, but hey...that's the business trend. Was Spelunking For Shitz really a Fred-name, or self identified? WTF? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-11-24 21:05 |
| #11 One of those boring things the idiots in the Pentagon train the troops to be able to pull off. You know, just another sign of their incompetance. |
| Posted by: spealing forschitz0044 2006-11-24 19:35 |
| #10 JFM...it's called combined arms. Nobody in the history of warfare has come even close. |
| Posted by: anymouse 2006-11-24 16:32 |
| #9 are turning out well-disciplined units willing to fight American forces in set-piece battles Actually the Germans had turned out well disciplined units to fight the Americans in set piece battles, except that they much were better than the Jihadis and better than the Americans facing them. But it was to no avail in front of American firepower. There is the story of a captured German who was asked to compare the foes he had fought, thus he told the Russins were so and so, the British so and so. And the Americans? "It is difficult to say. In fact I didn't see them: there was too much smoke, constant artillery strikes, planes overflying me every second. I was too busy taking cover to look at them, and before I realized it I was a prisoner". This could be aprocryphal but the German troops told of the "Material Anschlage": when they counterattacked on the Eastern Front they were ever able to make some progress even if the Russians eventually ended recovering the lost ground but in Normandy they were stopped cold, even their elite Panzer SS were powerless. |
| Posted by: JFM 2006-11-24 16:08 |
| #8 are turning out well-disciplined units willing to fight American forces in set-piece battles Good. |
| Posted by: gromgoru 2006-11-24 11:41 |
| #7 SteveS hit the nail on the head. Regardless of how well trained...terrorists that act try to go toe to toe will lose...100% of the time. We are that good. Look at the taliban in afghanistan. Virtually every time they attempt any platoon size contact or greater results in massive casualties...and that's just the bodies we find. We have perfected the art of combined arms warfare. |
| Posted by: anymouse 2006-11-24 11:21 |
| #6 Except that an embed -- can't remember which it was -- recently reported that the jihadis are having a hard time fielding more than a handful of attackers at a time, and have never been able to effectively act as a unit. The insurgents had built a labyrinthine network of trenches in the farmland, with sleeping areas and weapons caches. Two antiaircraft guns had been hidden away. Wow! Two antiaircraft guns! And trenches! That'll last about five minutes against modern forces. Why are so many "journalists" impressed with even the most primitive military achievements? |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2006-11-24 11:16 |
| #5 willing to fight American forces in set-piece battles LMore or less what the NVA did at Khe Sangh with catastrophic results in front of American firepower. Now if only more Jihadis went in set piece battles so they are wiped out. In fact Americans should be softer on them in order to encourage them to it. If Jihadis are completly wiped out, then after a few set piece battles they will shift agsin to suicide bombing. |
| Posted by: JFM 2006-11-24 10:00 |
| #4 I recall passages from Alan MooreheadÂ’s book on Gallipoli. The Turks launched an attack from their trenches against the Diggers. While the Diggers were effectively dropping the Turks as the rose, it soon dawned on them, that they could allow the Turkish officers to get their men up out of their trenches and literally whip them into a formation. The Diggers thought it was better to allow the officers to act as beaters to get their target nicely formed before literally cutting the Turks down. Efficiency. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2006-11-24 08:23 |
| #3 willing to fight American forces in set-piece battles Isn't this exactly what American forces do best? The final score of 72-2 provides some hint. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2006-11-24 07:21 |
| #2 Gorb, the US is sensitive to overkill; it seems to me also that the MOAB would be perfect for such a scenario; but the old adage of,'if you can kill a man with one bullet, why waste it' applies here. This is a sign the Pentagon is 'running' the war and not the Generals on the ground! |
| Posted by: smn 2006-11-24 05:00 |
| #1 Sunni Arab militant groups suspected of having ties to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia have established training camps east of Baghdad that are turning out well-disciplined units willing to fight American forces in set-piece battles, American military commanders said Thursday. Why the fuc& did we invent the MOAB if we never intended to use it? Officers said that in that battle, unlike the vast majority of engagements in Diyala, insurgents stood and fought, even deploying a platoon-size unit that showed remarkable discipline. One captain said the unit was in “perfect military formation.” Gee. I wonder where they learned to do that. The colonel dropped off an eight-man team and later sent other soldiers to sweep the area. I am not qualified even as an armchair private. But it seems to me if you have suspicios stuff out on a farm in the middle of BFE, it might be a good idea to put it on a watch list for the surveillance drones before you send in eight guys with peashooters. Wait 'til they're holding a graduation ceremony and then do a little gate-crashing with a GPS-guided cluster bomb. |
| Posted by: gorb 2006-11-24 04:00 |