re: fallujah - for jwm Another example of support or the...

re: fallujah - for jwm Another example of support or the contention that foreign insurgents are contributing less towards the "troubles" than locals....

From the ABC website

The World Today - Monday, 8 November , 2004 12:18:00
Reporter: Alison Caldwell
ELEANOR HALL: To Iraq now and US-led forces are poised on the outskirts of the rebel stronghold city of Fallujah, awaiting the go ahead to launch a major assault on the city, as reports emerge that American and Iraqi government forces have already seized the city's main hospital without a fight.

Earlier today the Iraqi interim Prime Minister declared a state of emergency around the country, giving the government the ability to impose curfews, ban meetings and bug communications.

The decision to declare martial law has received a mix reaction in the city west of Baghdad, with the few residents who are still there demanding to know how it will improve conditions for them on the eve of a military bombardment.

Analysts are also concerned that the assault may prove ineffective, given that most of the insurgents have left and moved on to other cities which were in the same position as Fallujah not so long ago.

Alison Caldwell reports.

(Sound of explosions)

ALISON CALDWELL: Loud explosions were heard again in Fallujah overnight, as residents braced themselves for the expected onslaught from coalition forces. US troops have now effectively isolated the city, stopping all traffic in and out of the rebel stronghold, west of Baghdad. The lockdown followed the declaration of emergency rule across most of the country.

Speaking at a press conference in Baghdad earlier, Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said martial law would send a powerful message to the insurgents.

He was asked if the window for peace in Fallujah was now closed.

IYAD ALLAWI: It is closing absolutely, we can't wait indefinitely and we have made our case very clear that we have nothing… on the contrary the Fallujah people have been asking us to intervene as fast as can to salvage the people.

ALISON CALDWELL: The Fallujah offensive will mark the first battle for Iraq's new army. It includes a mix of former members of Saddam Hussein's army as well as Kurdish peshmerga guerillas who once fought them.

Earlier in the day as they gathered on the outskirts of the city with their American counterparts, they were left in doubt no about the importance of the task ahead.

Sergeant Major Carlton Kent.

CARLTON KENT: Once they tell us to go, and they give us the word, if they tell us to go, you gonna make history. This is another (inaudible) city in the making and you tell the dogs, you soldiers, you sailors and we've got airmen, y'all gonna do it.

ALISON CALDWELL: Iraqi reaction to the state of emergency has been mixed. Iraqis in Baghdad have welcomed martial law, one man said whatever pressures it poses on the citizens, for now democracy can wait.

On the streets of Fallujah though, for the residents who have chosen to stay, it's a different story.

"The state of emergency implies arrests, detentions and executions," this man said, "it will create complete chaos in the country."

Jabbar Tihar is equally concerned.

JABBAR TIHAR (translated): What we want is for it to be beneficial for the Iraqi citizens, not for the American occupying forces and those who collaborate with them.

ALISON CALDWELL: Others couldn't see how martial law would make any difference for them.

VOX POP 1 (translated): The schools are closed, the hospitals are closed, the children are not going to school, the shops are closed, the market is closed, we are stranded in Fallujah, the situation is very bad. There is no safety, no electricity, the streets are empty. Fallujah is deserted, the emergency services here are very poor.

ALISON CALDWELL: Meanwhile military officials have revised down the number of insurgents who are still in Fallujah, from 5,000 to just over 1,200. Many have moved to cities such as Ramadi and Samarra.

Last month Samarra was the scene of one of the last major American led offensives. Over the weekend insurgents there launched coordinated bomb and mortar attacks, killing at least 30 people, mainly Iraqi police officers.

A senior military official said, quote, "a resurgence of the insurgency" had occurred due to a lag in providing sufficient Iraqi police. The situation in Samarra raises questions about the goals and effectiveness of the planned assault on Fallujah.

Former director of the Pentagon's Defence Intelligence Agency, Retired Colonel Pat Lang, served in Vietnam. He says the number of insurgents in Fallujah has changed, owing to an improved understanding of what the coalition is up against.

PAT LANG: I think what they're doing is they're recategorising insurgents. I mean, a certain number have surely left in the knowledge that if the marines and the army assault the place, that they'll probably experience a great… a very high number of casualties.

But in addition, I think they've a better grip now, in the command over there, on the idea that the number of foreign insurgents, the real international Jihadi types is much smaller than they thought before.

So it's something around the area you're talking about now, but most of the people who are out to fight us in Fallujah are locals, they're local Sunni Arabs, who are really upset about the idea that they're going to be… they think are going to be deprived of the rather disproportionate share of power they always had in Iraq, given their numbers.

But they've experienced that since time immemorial. So I think the numbers are being readjusted in that light.

ALISON CALDWELL: It's been said, really, that when the marines and the army go in it won't take very long for them to actually take control of the city.

PAT LANG: I think that's probably true. They've been practicing for this now for weeks and they're going to have quite a lot of fire support, both air fire support and artillery, and they've laid out sectors they're going to advance into, toward objectives in the centre of the city.

And the rule for a commander in this situation is you clear your zone as you go forward, of opposition, so I would think there's going to be a lot of them and they're going to have a lot of fire support, so I wouldn't think this would take more than three or four days. I'd be surprised if it does.

The real problem, of course, is that they then have to hand over control to the Iraqi police and National Guard, people like that, whose ability to control places like Fallujah is absolutely key to the success of the Allawi government. So far they don't seem to be working out very well in places like Samarra, but we'll have to see.

ELEANOR HALL: Retired Colonel, Pat Lang, the former director of the Pentagon's Defence Intelligence Agency, speaking to Alison Caldwell