U.S. Troops Dying at Rate of Over 1 a Day

Star-Telegram ^ | Tue, Feb. 03, 2004 | ROBERT BURNS

[RJCogburn]

American soldiers are dying at a rate of more than one a day in Iraq, despite some commanders' recent claims to have broken the back of the insurgency.

The toll in January was 45 - five more than in December - despite hopes that deposed President Saddam Hussein's capture would stop the killings from roadside bombs and other attacks.

The number of deaths in January will rise to 47 when the Pentagon changes the status of two soldiers who are missing and believed to have died in the Tigris River on Jan. 25. That would make the second highest monthly total since last April when daily combat from the U.S.-led invasion was under way.

All told, 528 U.S. troops have died in the war, including three so far this month. The worst month was November, when 82 died. In October there were 43, September had 30, August 35.

Of 39 deaths in January that the Army attributed to hostile action, 23 involved attacks with homemade bombs, which the military calls "improvised explosive devices," and which have been the insurgents' weapon of choice, according to a review of Pentagon casualty reports.

The Army has put great emphasis on defeating the threat from homemade bombs, often detonated along roadways used by Army convoys. Usually a remotely transmitted signal sets them off.

To counter the threat, more soldiers are using Humvee utility vehicles with extra armor, and troops are wearing an improved version of body armor that provides more protection against bomb shrapnel. Some vehicles also are equipped now with devices that jam the electronic signal used to detonate the bombs.

Most of the attackers are thought to be remnants of the Baath Party that ruled Iraq under Saddam for more than three decades, although some may be foreign terrorists.

When U.S. troops captured Saddam near his hometown of Tikrit on Dec. 13, some thought that would take the punch out of the resistance. By early January, U.S. commanders were publicly emphasizing that the number of attacks on U.S. troops had declined, as had hostile deaths.

Maj. Gen. Charles H. Swannack Jr., commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, told reporters on Jan. 6 that "we've turned the corner" in the counterinsurgency effort in his area of responsibility, the western part of Iraq, which includes a part of the "Sunni Triangle" west of Baghdad.

The number of attacks on his forces had declined by almost 60 percent in the past month, he said then.

Two weeks later, Maj. Gen. Raymond Odierno, commander of the 4th Infantry Division, said, "The former regime elements we've been combating have been brought to their knees." His troops operate in an area north of Baghdad that includes Tikrit, a focus of anti-U.S. violence.

But in fact, many of the fatal attacks against U.S. forces in January were in Swannack's and Odierno's areas. On Jan. 24, for example, three soldiers from Swannack's force were killed in an improvised explosive device attack in the town of Khalidiyah, east of Ramadi, in the Sunni Triangle. Three days later, another such attack near the same town killed three more soldiers. Still another who was severely wounded in the same attack died in a hospital two days later.

On Jan. 31, three soldiers from Odierno's 4th Infantry Division were killed when their vehicle was hit by an improvised explosive device while traveling in a convoy in the city of Kirkuk.

The depth and effectiveness of the insurgency is difficult to measure with only statistics, which tend to fluctuate over time. It appeared a few weeks ago that many U.S. commanders had hoped the dropoff in guerrilla action would usher in a less violent period for U.S. troops.

That has not happened.

In an eight-day span, Jan. 9 to Jan. 16, only three American soldiers died, and two from nonhostile causes.

But in the two weeks after that, 26 died - all but three in hostile action.

L. Paul Bremer, U.S. civilian administrator of Iraq, said Tuesday he still believes security has improved.

"I think the situation has improved importantly since the capture of Saddam Hussein," he said.

In the four weeks after Saddam's capture, the number of insurgent attacks against American troops throughout Iraq did fall to an average of 18 per day from 23 per day in the preceding four weeks.

But on Tuesday, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, deputy chief of operations for the U.S. military in Baghdad, told reporters that the daily average had climbed back to 23 in the past week.

Attacks against Iraqis also are on the rise, although it is not clear that all those are related directly to the insurgency. The two near-simultaneous suicide bombings in the northern city of Irbil on Sunday, for example, killed 101 people, U.S. military officials said Tuesday, including top Kurdish political figures.

[Red6]

You're right!!!

You can see this in the forign media and governments positions as well. A high casualty count would have been politically good for them, since in a macabre way they would use this as a justification for their moraly defeatist position.

One word sums it up. Loosers.

Red6

[Peach]

But then again, you're the one who insisted that Bush wasn't offering amnesty to illegals because they weren't getting citizenship.

Still waiting for that link to one of my posts that said that. Can't do that? Didn't think so. Because it never happened.

[Red6]

When you kick in a door and move room to room a lot of the High tech don't matter.

What made us win is not one so dramatically is not one factor but several.

As stated before. Imagine going against a all volunteer force. It wasn't even really that difficult to get out of deploying (piss hot on a urinalysis). Imagine in a battalion with over 670 people, you have a whopping 2 go AWOL while on leave!!! It was so easy to just not go. But they all do.

Training. Who can train at a Brigade level and even higher like we can? A place like NTC or the warfighters (Hood) where at an organizational level the systems are debugged, tested and synchronized at even Corps levels. Where whole Brigades manuever and higher HQ get trained is very seldom in most other militaries. A formal training system for basic trainees through COL. A system that attempts to objectivly select and train people. A normal SFC in the US Army may have over 2 years of nothing but formal training in TRADOC. Besides 4 years of ROTC a 2LT in the Infantry will get another year of formal training at Benning.

Selective. Without a high school degree you're not even concidered. No College degree- forget officer. Medical and criminal background checks are conducted and the standards are higher than most. Most MAJs and above have a masters or better.

Equipment. Absolutly the finest in the world. No one can match it. In some areas the capabilities so far exceed that of even our allies that it causes ineroperability problems. In a normal US Infantry unit you will see stuff that other countries use and reserve for a small cadre of Special Forces. NVGs for 100%, Interceptor body armor 100%, Combat optics...... Unparalelled

Experience. Look at the US involvement in Liberia, Somalia, Desert Storm, Panama, Haiti, Columbia, Afgah., Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq........ A very high percentage has seen action before. Some many times over. Do you realize that Franks and Wallace were still Vietnam vets?

Diversity! Yes, the politically correct but true point. Imagine going against someone who has native speakers in every language known within its ranks. People who could conduct strategic intelligence from within you country and blend right in. People who may be very helpful when interogating someone. Someone who may even know the area. Sound crazy huh?

Size. The AF and Navy is the biggest in the world. But even the Army is number 6 in sheer volume. That's out of 191 countries or so.

Industrial complex. Backed by the most technologically advanced and largest industrial power in the world (25% of the global economy by itself) the US can simply build whatever it needs quickly and well. Need more armored HMMWV? How many thousand you want? Oh, we went over on Tomahawk use this month? No problem. No one nation has the equipment to meet every foreseeable threat in any terrrain and equip it's forces for ALL contingencies. The US can build it though. QUICKLY!

Stable obvective and selective systems within. Promotion, retirement and so fourth. There are formal systems to promote the best qualified (not always 100%, but better than most). Concider the Saudis where you're an officer because you come from a certain family. Or Iraq, where idiots becam high ranking officers because the were loyal, not good. Even in some of our allied countries you have systems where people get promoted because of tenure (basically). In the US Army, at 10 years you might be a E-7, or an E-5. All depending on job performance.

Combine all of this and you end up with a discusting overmatch in power. Truth is, the US is just now realizing its power. The US has been isolationist in the past and not even interested in the outside world. Americans are just now realizing their countries might. People think this is new right? Fact is, during the civil war (1860s) the US had the worlds first and second most powerful forces fighting each other. Even then, it was observers from Europe who noticed the first use of trench warfare, submarine, balloons, machine gun (gatling) and more. America never thought itself a superpower. There is no Dr. Evil sceeming world domination like some think. It just kind of evolved that way. It's not one thing that makes the US armed forces great.

Red6