U.S. Sees Lesson for Insurgents in an Iraq Battle(Pentagon INSISTS Body Count Accurate)

The New York Times ^ | December 2, 2003 | DEXTER FILKINS and IAN FISHER

[Pubbie]

SAMARRA, Iraq, Dec. 1 — American commanders vowed Monday that the killing of as many as 54 insurgents in this central Iraqi town would serve as a lesson to those fighting the United States, but Iraqis disputed the death toll and said anger against America would only rise.

Accounts of a three-hour battle fought in the alleys and streets of Samarra on Sunday diverged radically, with Iraqis saying only eight people had been killed, several of them civilians.

At the morgue, Adnan Sahib Dafar, 52, an ambulance driver, pointed to a dead woman on a steel tray. The woman, Mr. Dafar said, had worked at the city's big pharmaceutical factory and had walked into the crossfire between American forces and Iraqi guerrillas that began with an attempted ambush of an American military convoy.

"Is this woman shooting a rocket-propelled grenade?" he demanded, standing over the body. "Is she fighting?" There was only one other body, that of a gray-bearded old man, in the morgue.

Speaking in Brussels at a NATO defense ministers' meeting, Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, portrayed the fight here, apparently the most deadly since Saddam Hussein was ousted in April, as a grim lesson for America's foes.

"They attacked, and they were killed," General Pace said of the insurgents. "So I think it will be instructive to them."

Speaking at the same meeting, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said such attacks were being mounted by "a limited number of people who are determined to kill innocent men, women and children." They are "being rounded up, captured, killed, wounded and interrogated," he said.

But on the streets of Samarra, an hour's drive north of Baghdad and just down the road from Tikrit, the hometown of Mr. Hussein, the lessons of the battle, and even its precise nature, seemed far from clear.

It appeared from the anger among Iraqis in Samarra that America faces a fundamental dilemma: As it steps up the pressure on the insurgents who are killing Americans and Iraqis in growing numbers, the very Iraqis they are trying to win over may be alienated.

"If I had a gun, I would have attacked the Americans myself," said Satar Nasiaf, 47, a shopkeeper who said he had watched two Iraqi civilians fall to American fire. "The Americans were shooting in every direction."

While American commanders said the Iraqi body count had come from precise reports filed immediately after a close-range battle, hospital officials said Monday that they could account for, at most, 8 dead, with most of those probably civilians.

The commanders said they were not surprised by the dearth of bodies. They do not routinely collect the enemy's dead from the battlefield, they said, and the guerrillas were unlikely to take their dead to the morgues.

The Pentagon typically does not publicize the number of enemy dead or wounded to avoid comparisons to the frequent enemy body counts in the Vietnam War, counts that ultimately proved to be a poor indicator of American military performance.

But after weeks of suffering casualties from an enemy that detonates roadside bombs from afar and fires mortars under cover of darkness, American military officials seemed to relish the opportunity on Monday to claim credit for dealing the fighters a punishing blow.

"They got whacked, and won't try that again," a senior military official in Washington said. The Pentagon insisted the body count was accurate.

The fight began when two American convoys that carry cash to two banks here rumbled into this hard-line Baathist city on Sunday with tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles and armored Humvees. Such convoys had been attacked before, and the Americans were ready.

As if on cue, the guerrillas attacked, but according to American commanders, the Iraqis suffered a devastating defeat. The battle ended, they said, with as many as 54 insurgents dead and only 5 Americans wounded.

Sunday's battle was the largest since May 1, when President Bush declared major combat over and the guerrilla war began.

[Becki]

Its far more likely that they simply didn't bring their dead to the morgue. I mean, are insurgents going to go to the local authorities and just turn over 50 bodies?

They probably dug a hole in the sand, like they did with many other mass graves, both before and during the war.

Becki

[Becki]

Assuming the number of dead is correct, and the dead civilians are actually civilians, it would require at least one man to carry away each body, which would make a minimum of 108 attackers.

That assumes only attackers would take part in that effort.

There is another thread with a report from one of the soldiers in the attack. He indicated that the entire street cleared out, with some of the men running down side streets.

If many in the town knew of the attack and didn't say or do anything, I think it is reasonable to assume they would help in the aftermath. And it could have been done under cover of darkness. Reporters didn't show up until the next day.

Becki

[Trampled by Lambs]

Assuming the number of dead is correct, and the dead civilians are actually civilians, it would require at least one man to carry away each body, which would make a minimum of 108 attackers. [more]

So are you suggesting that our guys succeeded only in taking out a woman and an old man and are then lying to us about how many they killed?