Posted on 05/03/2004 3:14:00 AM PDT by kattracks
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - The U.S. Marines besieging Falluja brought in a former Iraqi general with a history of standing up to Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) on Monday to lead a force they have charged with putting down an insurgency in the city.
After outrage among victims of the Baathist regime at their appointment of a former general in his feared Republican Guard, U.S. commanders have now brought in another ex-general, Mohammed Latif, to take overall command of the Falluja Brigade.
As U.S. commanders struggle to stamp out open rebellion in two cities and bombings that kill their soldiers daily, United Nations (news - web sites) Secretary-General Kofi Annan (news - web sites) said he expected the Security Council to authorize a multinational force to take over after Washington hands formal sovereignty to Iraqis on June 30.
Subject to further checks into his background, Latif would lead the Falluja Brigade while General Jasim Mohamed Saleh may continue to lead its 1st Battalion, a senior U.S. military official said. Saleh's uniformed men have been patrolling the streets of the violent Sunni Muslim city since Friday.
Unlike Saleh, who leaders of Iraq (news - web sites)'s Shi'ite Muslim majority accuse of taking part in the Republican Guard's bloody suppression of a Shi'ite uprising in 1991, Latif appears to have anti-Saddam credentials, U.S. military sources said.
An intelligence officer, he was exiled under Saddam and may also have spent time in prison, one said. The senior military official said Latif had been trained for a time in England.
The appointment may help counter what has been the latest setback to U.S. efforts to win the approval of Iraqis before the handover of power. While the Sunni Muslim minority that was once loyal to Saddam may have been pleased by events in Falluja, Saleh's appointment provoked anger among Shi'ites and others.
PRISON OFFICIALS DISCIPLINED
Washington has also been trying to counter damage done by the broadcast of photographs showing U.S. soldiers abusing prisoners at Saddam's once notorious Abu Ghraib prison. Seven officers and non-commissioned officers were disciplined over the affair, the senior military official said on Monday.
Six soldiers are also detained, facing criminal charges.
The Marine commander at Falluja said he accepted an offer from Saleh to raise the new force as an 11th-hour alternative to launching an all-out assault on the city of 300,000, where hundreds had already died during a month of fighting.
Senior U.S. officials in Baghdad and Washington distanced themselves from Saleh, however. Marine officers also conceded that some of Saleh's several hundred men may be drawn from the very guerrillas who had been fighting them throughout April.
The sight of masked gunmen openly celebrating "victory over the Americans" in the streets of Falluja as Saleh's force turned a blind eye and Marines pulled back from some siege positions also may have rankled with the Pentagon (news - web sites).
The chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, General Richard Myers, mounted a media offensive on U.S. television on Sunday, blasting what he called misleading reporting from the town.
"The Marines have not withdrawn from Falluja," he said, repeating the assertions of Marine commanders on the ground.
They have pulled troops back from many positions but say they remain ready to storm guerrilla positions at any time.
The Marines have given the Iraqi troops some days to achieve what the U.S. forces were unable to do last month: force the 2,000 or so insurgents to hand over heavy weapons, capture or kill some 200 foreign Islamic militants and find the killers of four American contractors whose deaths prompted the siege.
However, Saleh said there were no foreign fighters there. U.S. officials initially challenged that view. But the senior official said on Monday that Saleh may indeed have a point.
"Some probably have been killed, some probably have gotten out of the city. It may be more than some," he told reporters.
A senior general said last week that the contractors' killers had also probably fled Falluja, leaving the main target of the new force the elimination of remaining insurgents.
After April became the bloodiest month for U.S. troops in Iraq with 129 combat deaths, the U.N. appeared to offer help.
Annan said a resolution being considered by Washington could authorize a multinational force after June 30: "It's in everybody's interest to do whatever we can to stabilize Iraq."
Heavy losses and the difficulties in places like Falluja have not helped Bush's re-election campaign. But the American public got some good news on Sunday when a civilian truck driver, taken hostage after a convoy attack in Iraq, escaped.
Thomas Hamill was flying to a U.S. military hospital in Germany on Monday and would soon be reunited with his family.
The Shites "perseverence" in hate has been rewarded. They will now answer to a Sunni General (i.e. once Falluja is pacified, Iraq's ONLY proven, effective Army will be Sunni led.
Hope they're all REAL happy now down south. Instead of U.S. leadership, and Iraqi democracy, they now return to Sunni leadership, and a more tenuous democracy.
SFS
FALLUJA, Iraq - The U.S. Marines besieging Falluja brought in a former Iraqi general with a history of standing up to Saddam Hussein on Monday to lead a force they have charged with putting down an insurgency in the city.
After outrage among victims of the Baathist regime at their appointment of a former general in his feared Republican Guard,* U.S. commanders have now brought in another ex-general, Mohammed Latif, to take overall command of the Falluja Brigade.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Many in Saddam's military - including the Republican Guard - served because their family members were threatened, tortured or killed because they disagreed with Saddam.
Reuters seldom interviews Saddam's victims.
They often interview anti-American allies of Saddam Hussein.
Stand by for verification, or debunking....
Adults in charge, flexible plan - because it is the real world and not a socialist utopian fantasyland - ping!
Guess whose feet they lay this blunder at? - Colin Powell for advising the president not to do this.
Of course, with Al Gore - or John Kerry in charge, we could have ignored the whole uncomfortable mess, left the mass graves in silence, and continued to ignore the growing threat to our nation and the free world - as well as the cries from the daily victims.
Life's so much simpler for us in our comfy homes that way.
Clarification, from an AP recap this morn:
Latif participated in meetings with Marines last week on the creation of the Fallujah Brigade, the top Marine commander, Lt. Gen. James Conway, said over the weekend. Conway said he believed that Latif had been exiled by Saddam's regime for several years.
"He is very well thought of, very well respected by the Iraqi general officers. You can just see the body language between them. And if I had to guess at this point, when we have this brigade fully formed, he demonstrates a level of leadership that tells me that he could become that brigade commander," Conway said.
The U.S. official, speaking Monday, said the decision to make Latif in charge emerged as it became clearer that he was more influential. "Gen. Saleh as I understand it will be working at the battalion level, not the brigade level," he said.
U.S. officials have shown confusion over the identities of the generals in the Fallujah force. One U.S. officer said Saleh had been involved in an assassination plot against Saddam and that three of his children had been executed - apparently mistaking him for Mohammed al-Shehwani, a former Air Force officer who in April was named as head of the Iraqi National Intelligence Service and whose three sons were killed by Saddam. ~ More
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