Desperate US Turns to Saddam General

[img]http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/dropcap/w.gif[/img]ASHINGTON, April 30 — The hastily improvised plan to send a small Iraqi force into Falluja, led by a former general in Saddam Hussein's army, is a last-ditch effort to avert a violent and politically charged urban battle, senior Pentagon officials and American commanders said Friday.

Privately, senior military officers expressed skepticism that dispatching an untested 900-man Iraqi battalion into Falluja would pacify the embattled city of nearly 300,000 people.

But the move is an important shift to a tactic that these same officers have urged for months: the immediate reconstitution of Iraqi forces under a seasoned Iraqi commander.

"What we have there is an opportunity and not necessarily an agreement," said Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top American commander in the Middle East. "The opportunity is to build an Iraqi security force from former elements of the army that will work under the command of coalition forces."

But General Abizaid, mindful of the disastrous performance of many American-trained Iraqi security forces earlier this month, cautioned that the new recruits would not "necessarily calm down the situation in Falluja tonight or over the next several days."

"It's a step by step process," he added.

Nonetheless, the tenuous plan represents a possible face-saving alternative to two onerous options the American marines confronted: a prolonged assault on the city that would leave hundreds if not thousands of civilians dead, or the continuation of a seemingly endless series of shaky cease-fires that have exposed marines to guerrilla attacks and emboldened the insurgents the longer they stood up to the superior force.

"We are doing what we can to find the least violent possible outcome to the situation in Falluja," said a senior administration official. "We've done that for three weeks, and the troops are responding only when attacked."

But this official noted that, so far, none of the interventions by Falluja civic leaders, tribal sheiks and former military officers have resolved the standoff, and he warned that military action might ultimately be needed.

On Capitol Hill, the military's plan drew tentative support from some who have criticized the Bush administration's Iraq policy.

"We have to give the deal a chance to work," said Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, the ranking Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee. "If it doesn't, then we may well have to use force, but that should be our last option. We don't want to generate more Fallujas."

It was just a week ago that Marine Corps commanders were on the brink of ordering an all-out offensive against what they estimated were 2,000 foreign fighters, former Hussein loyalists and other insurgents. But with pressure building from United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan and his envoy to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, to avoid a violent confrontation, the commanders began looking for a way out.

"It's hard to get the pendulum set just right," said one senior Defense Department official.

The new plan emerged from discussions by the top Marine commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. James T. Conway; other American officers; officials from the American-led civilian administration in Baghdad, and a group of retired Iraqi Army generals in the Falluja area.

American officials familiar with the meetings said the prospect of having the former generals reconstitute a reliable and effective paramilitary force against the insurgents was worth pursuing. These officials expressed cautious optimism that if the Iraqi generals could form a battalion-size force in a relatively short time, it could enhance the chances for resolving the standoff.

The Iraqi force will be under the command of the Marine Corps, which will keep more than 3,000 troops around the city and remain poised for a major offensive should the Iraqi force fall apart under attack, senior military officials warned. "We cannot allow Falluja to be a safe haven for Baathist militants," one Pentagon official said.

The Iraqi commander, Maj. Gen. Jasim Muhammad Saleh, is said to be the former head of the Iraqi Army 38th Infantry Division, but not even Pentagon intelligence officers had heard of him, suggesting that he was not a high-ranking Baath Party member or favorite of Mr. Hussein.

Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, spokesman for the American military in Iraq, said General Saleh had been "initially vetted" by the Marines, and had the confidence of the two top Marine generals in Iraq, General Conway and Maj. Gen. James N. Mattis.

In an e-mail message on Thursday night, General Conway said the new Iraqi unit, which he called the First Battalion of the Falluja Brigade, would be made up of "mostly former Iraqi Army officers and men," presumably from the Falluja area.

He said a small group of marines would be assigned as liaison to American forces. General Conway said General Saleh "will take mission, taskings and timings from the M.E.F. commander," referring to his own position as head of the First Marine Expeditionary Force.

Until the new Iraqi battalion demonstrates it can operate checkpoints and other positions, marines will continue to maintain a strong presence, military officials said.

Establishing strong Iraqi leadership for security forces is a top priority for American officers.

"You can't expect in this part of the world for Iraqi security forces to fight for the United States of America," General Abizaid said in an interview last week. "They need to fight for Iraq, an Iraq that has a defined leadership that's legitimate, and that's broadly supported."

Senior American officers said their goal was still to eliminate the insurgents in Falluja, collect all their heavy weapons and track down the killers of four American private security contractors.

But they acknowledged that those guerrillas and other militants might have already slipped through the cordon the marines threw around the city earlier this month. "We will get the murderers of the contractors and we will find them," General Abizaid said on Friday, "but we may not necessarily find them in Falluja."

Source: NY Times

Quantrill

2004-05-01 13:03 | User Profile

[QUOTE=Peter Phillips]They might as well put Saddam himself back in power. [/QUOTE] Why did the US ditch Saddam in the first place? He was "our guy" in the Middle East for years. He was a CIA lackey, he did what he was told, we sold him chemical weapons. Perhaps Saddam and Noriega should get together and write a book about what its like to go from the CIA's best buddy to their worst enemy overnight.

Peter Phillips

2004-05-01 13:39 | User Profile

[QUOTE=Quantrill]Why did the US ditch Saddam in the first place? He was "our guy" in the Middle East for years. He was a CIA lackey, he did what he was told, we sold him chemical weapons. Perhaps Saddam and Noriega should get together and write a book about what its like to go from the CIA's best buddy to their worst enemy overnight.[/QUOTE] Saddam gave generous rewards to families of Palestinian suicide bombers. The Israelis were afraid that he would eventually succeed in building nukes. He had already shown a willingness to use chemical weapons (as he did against the Khurds). So they had to get rid of him.

Saddam scared the Israelis. This despite the fact that Israel has some 300 nukes. I wonder what they will do when the Iranians get their Nukes - theyre not too far off as we speak.

Paleoleftist

2004-05-01 23:29 | User Profile

[QUOTE=Peter Phillips]*They might as well put Saddam himself back in power. *

---------------------- ... The hastily improvised plan to send a small Iraqi force into Falluja, led by a former general in Saddam Hussein's army, is a last-ditch effort to avert a violent and politically charged urban battle, senior Pentagon officials and American commanders said Friday.

Privately, senior military officers expressed skepticism that dispatching an untested 900-man Iraqi battalion into Falluja would pacify the embattled city of nearly 300,000 people. ...[/QUOTE]

This guy is obviously going to build a resistance army in broad daylight. :saddam:

I am not sure how to interpret this. On the face of it, it means the leadership of the occupation forces has gone nuts. :wacko:

Weirder and weirder and weirder and...

All Old Right

2004-05-02 04:06 | User Profile

[QUOTE=Paleoleftist]This guy is obviously going to build a resistance army in broad daylight. :saddam:

I am not sure how to interpret this. On the face of it, it means the leadership of the occupation forces has gone nuts. :wacko:

Weirder and weirder and weirder and...[/QUOTE] There is no other solution. Real conservatives begged Bush not to go in there for that reason. I always laugh at the Bush Bots on Fox saying to the Iraq War opponents, "What's your solution?" They make a situation with no possible victory, then ridicule opponents for not being able to clean up Bush's mess. They laugh and say "You don't have a solution either, do you?" They're doing that to Kerry now.

The solution was to not go in there, no matter how tempting it was to enrich all of Bush/Cheney 's friends with hundreds of billions of US tax dollars. Once it's done, the best thing to do is nothing more. The Iraqi people want to be Iraqi, not neocons. We couldn't tell that without invading Iraq? This whole thing disproves once and for all the PC assertion that all people are alike, regardless of their culture. The only solution now is to turn it over to the Iraqi's, then say they had their chance and didn't use it. The Iraqi dream now is to have Iraqis running their country.

In addition, my solution would involve not running for a second term as US President. That guy doesn't even kow that the US is a constitutional republic, NOT a democracy. If the majority ruled here, the borders would actually keep illegals out, the RKBA would not be infringed, and George Bush would not be President of the US.

Kosmos Luftwaffe

2004-05-02 16:08 | User Profile

IT'S ALL GOOD..

When this war first started and I saw how the Pentagon planners, pr people and psy-war staff where handling the situations I obviously only thought the general US decadence had come to this and that the people in charge only was generally mad, malnourished and on cocaine..

Off course this is all true, but now I know more too..

David Icke (.com) is a maniac and most probably he's an govornment agent too, but at one point he's actually right; the satanic culture surrounding the Freemasons, the (international) ruling class and the pawns we see on television.

Wach Bush and Blairs faces as they talk of freedom and democrazy. They're smiling, they're actually laughing a bit as they talk of freedom of the people.. These leaders are from a culture where they make fun of ordinary people and the illusions these are suffering under, and funny it is, even on international television..

All out war with all the worlds muslims is and has been the goal for some time. It's the only possible explanation for JewS-A actions lately, time is on the Arabs side and show-time is coming. There will be Christian propaganda and a general draft, and all the decent little lambs will come lining up at the slaughterer's..

Happy Hacker

2004-05-02 18:41 | User Profile

How could anyone rise to the rank of General and not be known by pentagon intelligence? How could anyone rise to the rank of General without being a loyal Baathist?

Is this General now a collaborator? Or, is he saving Iraqis by giving Amnericans by allowing them to save face and answering the question: What happens if you throw a war but no one shows up?

Paleoleftist

2004-05-02 18:59 | User Profile

[QUOTE=Kosmos Luftwaffe]... David Icke (.com) is a maniac and most probably he's an govornment agent too, but at one point he's actually right; the satanic culture surrounding the Freemasons, the (international) ruling class and the pawns we see on television... [/QUOTE]

That´s a very important point.

The Pope rightly calls it the Culture of Death. Take a breathtakingly poisonous book like the DaVinci Code. This is the Gnostic Underground finally coming out. Deplorably, the Church, back in the 12./13. century, didn´t completely succeed in destroying the cancer. The remnants went into hiding, Marrano-style, and their spiritual heirs have tried to destroy Christianity and the West ever since, with increasing success.

They are not Reptiles From Outer Space TM; rather, they are perfectly ordinary humans, who believe, however, that they are NOT ordinary. Rather, they believe themselves to be the Nietzschean Supermen; and everybody else is expendable.

And they have allied with (the worst part of) the Jews, both sides recognizing the destructive potential of the other.