Orlando Sentinel (Florida) April 04, 2003
Enemy Fighters May Be Left To Stew Awhile In Baghdad
By Matthew Hay Brown, Sentinel Staff Writer
Dodging small-arms fire and mortar blasts, U.S. Marines jumped on rooftops and tore through houses Thursday in building-to-building combat with Iraqi fighters in the city of Al Kut.
On the way into town, the Marines noticed the streets were littered with combat boots, apparently discarded by paramilitaries hoping to blend in with the civilians. At one point, a group of Iraqis armed with Kalashnikov rifles charged a group of U.S. tanks.
"They came charging in a human wave, 10 to 15 guys with AKs, that we mowed down," Marine Lt. Col. B.P. McCoy said.
The skirmishing in Al Kut, along the Tigris River, was a mere glimpse of the kind of guerrilla-style urban warfare that could await U.S. troops as they move toward the coming battle for Baghdad.
With troops fighting their way to the outskirts of the capital, commanders now face their most important strategic decision since they launched the attack two weeks ago:
Do they continue to pound away from the perimeter, gaining time to gather reinforcements and secure the rest of the country while giving the people of Baghdad a chance to overthrow the regime themselves?
Or do they charge ahead, taking on Saddam Hussein's most loyal and effective soldiers in street fighting that likely would cause high U.S., Iraqi and civilian casualties -- and corresponding damage to the American image in the country officials say they are trying to liberate and rebuild?
"We have to do this in a way other than busting in doors," retired Army Gen. John Abrams said. "That is when the catastrophic losses begin to grow."
While U.S. plans remain a secret, Pentagon officials suggest that coalition forces now are likely to pause at the edge of the capital to let pressure build on the regime.
"When you get to the point where Baghdad is basically isolated, then what is the situation you have in the country?" Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, asked Thursday. "You have a country that Baghdad no longer controls, that whatever's happening inside Baghdad is almost irrelevant compared to what's going on in the rest of the country."
IRAQ'S HOME-FIELD ADVANTAGE
Iraqi strategists have been preparing for battle, reportedly dressing their best fighters in civilian clothes, planning attacks from residential areas, rigging buildings and bridges with explosives, burying tanks to avoid detection from the air, perhaps even readying biological or chemical weapons.
Those measures would enhance the regime's home-field advantage in Baghdad, a sprawling city of 5 million spread across an area roughly the size of Los Angeles, and where house-to-house fighting in unfamiliar terrain could blunt the superior technology and firepower of U.S. troops.
That is the battle Saddam's regime wants.
"The enemy must come inside Baghdad, and that will be its grave," Iraqi Defense Minister Sultan Hashem Ahmed has warned.
U.S. officials have tried to lower expectations about how quickly the city could be taken.
"We don't think that the fighting is over yet," Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks said Thursday at U.S. Central Command in Qatar. "There are still options that are open to the regime, including weapons of mass destruction. We take that very seriously."
With the coalition well within the "red zone" -- the area radiating out from Baghdad in which commanders fear Iraqi forces might deploy chemical weapons -- troops were expected to remain in chemical protective gear, even as temperatures soared past 100 degrees.
One coalition scenario envisions launching small commando teams to perform quick, focused missions, such as neutralizing presumed weapons of mass destruction or striking at senior Iraqi leaders, including Saddam himself.
A larger effort might involve sending in combat engineers supported by infantry to clear out roadblocks and other obstacles, followed by more infantry and tanks supported by air power to take the city.
Coalition troops already have faced more resistance than expected in the southern cities of Basra, Najaf and Nasiriyah, where guerrilla fighters reportedly have ambushed the attackers, faked surrenders and opened fire, and staged attacks from civilian neighborhoods or key holy sites.
'A NIGHTMARE SCENARIO'
Even before that experience, retired Marine Gen. Joseph Hoar, a former chief of the U.S. Central Command, said combat in Baghdad could be "a nightmare scenario."
"In urban warfare, you could run through battalions a day at a time," he told the Senate Armed Services Committee in September.
"The result would be high casualties on both sides, as well as in the civilian community. U.S. forces would certainly prevail, but at what cost, and at what cost as the rest of the world watches while we bomb and have artillery rounds exploded in densely populated Iraqi neighborhoods?"
As a rule, units are said to suffer a 30 percent casualty rate in urban combat, according to the Marine Center for Emerging Threats and Opportunities in Quantico, Va.
The lesson is not new.
"If troops are attacking cities, their strength will be exhausted," the Chinese philosopher Sun Tzu wrote 2,500 years ago. "The worst policy is to attack cities. Attack cities only when there is no alternative."
LESSONS FROM SOMALIA
Pentagon planners are haunted by the memory of Mogadishu.
In the midst of a 1993 operation to deliver food to starving civilians, U.S. Army Rangers and elite Delta Force soldiers entered the Somalian capital to capture key lieutenants of the warlord Mohamed Farah Aidid.
Once inside the crowded city, the soldiers found themselves vulnerable to guerrillas able to attack from close quarters with automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades. The downing of two helicopters opened a general firefight that left 18 servicemen and more than 1,000 Somalis dead.
Saddam is said to have distributed videotapes of Black Hawk Down, the 2002 film about the incident, to his troops as guidance for taking on U.S. forces. The regime seems to have organized its strategy around luring the coalition into the capital, in the apparent hope of exacting casualties and drawing out the war.
"American doctrine is not geared to urban fighting," said William Hopkinson, an analyst with the Royal Institute for Strategic Studies in London. "Urban fighting is very messy and fairly primitive.
"If you are not terribly sophisticated in your equipment, bringing your opposition down to the same level and making them fight room-to-room with hand grenade and rifle is a step in the right direction."
Pentagon officials say they have learned from Mogadishu. Now infantry troops attempting an urban assault are backed up by tanks, aircraft and artillery. Coalition troops have trained in mock cities in the United States and in Kuwait.
U.S. commanders also have consulted with their colleagues in the British army, experienced in street-level fighting in Northern Ireland, and the Israeli Defense Forces, which has waged urban warfare in Lebanon and the occupied territories.
The United States has purchased nine armored bulldozers from Israel, which used them to open the narrow alleyways of the Jenin refugee camp to allow tanks to enter in April 2002.
In Jenin, 23 Israeli soldiers and 52 Palestinians were killed in fierce fighting. Palestinian fighters drew Israeli troops into buildings they had rigged with explosives or led pursuers into sniper fire. In one ambush, 13 Israelis were killed.
Camp residents also are sharing their experience from the battle. Atta Abu Irmeileh, a leader of Yasser Arafat's Fatah group in Jenin, said survivors were calling friends in Iraq.
"We are a little place, a little refugee camp," he said, "and our gunmen used simple means, simple weapons, just rifles and homemade mines."
'GIVE HIM NO CHANCE'
With an unknown number of Special Republican Guard, Special Security Organization, Saddam Fedayeen and other fighters in Baghdad, Iraqi forces are expected to be more formidable.
On Thursday, the regime sounded an ominous note. In a statement he said came from Saddam, Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf on Thursday urged Iraqis to fight coalition forces with their hands.
"The nation and the people are facing danger, and we must fight and be steadfast until we defeat the enemy and achieve victory," al-Sahhaf said on Iraqi television. "We must choose the means and methods that tear off the ranks of the enemy and give him no chance to take his breath."
GRAPHIC: DIAGRAM: Urban warfare
Armies typically lose up to 1/3 of their forces to death and injury
when they fight in cities.
WHAT ATTACKERS FACE
Radios: Structures can block signals, making it difficult to call for help
Obstacles: Roadblocks, fire walls, smoke screens can slow advance, confuse attackers
Snipers: Use small-,large-caliber weapons, grenade launchers
Buildings: Require many soldiers to search, secure
Danger for tanks: Vulnerable in city streets; need foot soldiers to protect them from ambushes
Traps: Bodies, cars, rubble; buildings may be booby-trapped; civilians used as cover
Underground: Defenders can hide, regroup in sewers
.
WHAT ATTACKERS CAN DO
Get detailed knowledge of area
Reconnaisance, infiltration
Disrupt enemy communications; distract enemy
Make independent quick decisions if troops get isolated
Surprise night attacks; concentrate firepower to quickly disrupt defenses
SOURCES: GlobalSecurity.org, U.S.Army, The Guardian
KNIGHT RIDDER TRIBUNE
Copyright © 2003, Sentinel Communications Co.
