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  'I deserted Saddam's army' Iraq had a huge army, but only a fraction of its soldiers were killed or captured during the war. Hamed Nissam was one of those who took off his uniform and simply melted away. Hamed Nissam: "I held up a white flag and ran home" I was a tank driver defending Basra. It was a very old Russian tank, made in 1969.Because of the Americans' technological advantage, we were sure that we could not survive the war. We were horrified by the prospect of meeting them in battle. I was very afraid of being...

Demoralised soldiers from Iraq's Republican Guard thought Saddam Hussein was "mad" and deserted en masse before the first American tanks rolled into Baghdad, according to a colonel in the supposedly elite force. Speaking in the shabby family quarters given to Republican Guard officers in Baghdad, Col A T Said explained how the units that Saddam relied on most never had any intention of fighting for his regime. In the event, American forces were able to enter the capital with relative ease last week. They confounded predictions of prolonged, costly fighting. Saddam entrusted the Republican Guard's six divisions with the most...

<p>IRBIL, Iraq (AP) --  Deserters from the Iraqi army say they were beaten by their superiors and one says he saw 10 fellow soldiers executed by a commander, according to a Human Rights Watch report.</p> <p>Some of the 26 soldiers interviewed by the group said officers frequently warned of executions if they tried to escape, telling them during air strikes to stand fast and "die like men."</p>

<p>April 6, 2003 -- GIs delivered another humiliating blow to Saddam Hussein's rotting regime when they captured the headquarters of the Republican Guard's Medina Division southwest of Baghdad yesterday.</p> <p>Two tank companies and an infantry company of the 3rd Infantry Division waltzed into the vipers' nest of the vaunted Medinas utterly unopposed.</p>

Cheering Iraqis handed out soft drinks and offered cigarettes to U.S. Marines on Saturday, warmly welcoming the troops and making throat-slitting gestures at pictures of President Saddam Hussein. The Marines rolled into this town, 50 miles southeast of Baghdad, to tackle any pockets of resistance from Saddam loyalists bypassed as the U.S. vanguard swept toward the capital in the last two days. Instead they saw hundreds of young men heading away from the capital, apparently deserting the Iraqi army. Senior officials of Saddam's Baath Party had fled the town, residents said.

Bribes art last line of defence MEMBERS of the militia headed by Saddam Hussein’s psychopathic son Uday and assigned to some of the Iraqi forces’ most ruthless operations have been promised a cash bonus equivalent to four months’ wages for each coalition soldier they kill. The Fedayeen Saddam have been told to expect 250,000 dinars (about £50) for shooting a soldier dead and 500,000 dinars for taking one alive. The men are promised 750,000 dinars for destroying anything from a four-wheel-drive vehicle to a tank, and 1m dinars for bringing down a plane or helicopter. The figures emerged last week...

Senior intelligence officials have told Tony Blair's War Cabinet that Saddam Hussein's family have been threatening people with death to stop the regime from collapsing in its final hours. A Cabinet minister told The Telegraph last night that CIA reports showed that "maniacs" in Saddam's family were desperately trying to fight off the final defeat by threatening to shoot anyone who was prepared to surrender. "We have been totally taken aback by the ineptness of the regime. I think people have now given up, but there is nobody in authority to authorise the surrender," the minister said. "There are maniacs...

The mood changes as the marine invasion gains momentum James Meek outside Baghdad Saturday April 5, 2003 The Guardian For years, the story of the Republican Guard has been told as an epic in waiting, the story of an elite, well-equipped, motivated force, loyal to Saddam Hussein, outgunned by the US, no doubt, but ready to force America to fight and slog and shed blood if it tried to take Baghdad. In the cold light of yesterday morning, in a furrowed field by a shelled school building not far from the capital, the reality could be seen and heard. Three...

BASHUR, Iraq - He claims he refused to fight for Saddam Hussein. Now he says he is battling to survive. Mustafa Ibrahim Nasar appeared this week outside an airstrip being transformed by U.S. forces into a main staging point in the Western-protected Kurdish region. Kurdish guards would not let the 33-year-old man approach U.S. paratroopers to tell his story. "What do you want?" the Kurdish sentry barked. "I just want some help," Nasar replied in Arabic typical of Iraq's southern Euphrates River valley. "Maybe the Americans will help me." Nasar gave up without argument. He was too weak and too...

<p>ASHIRA, Iraq -- The American warplanes screamed in before dawn yesterday, unleashing a ferocious attack on the Iraqi lines. It was still dark, but the flash of continuous explosions lit up the northern Iraq sky as if it were day. Iraqi soldiers ran everywhere, looking for any kind of shelter or relief -- but found none.</p>

Iraqi Deserter Tells of Desperation By BRIAN MURPHY .c The Associated Press KALAK, Iraq (AP) - The soldier covered his face and wept. It was a deep, sudden sobbing he couldn't control. His shoulders heaved. Tears wet the frayed cuffs of his green Iraqi army sweater. He cried because he was alive. He cried because his family may think he's dead. He cried for his country. He cried because - for him - the war was over. ``I'm so sorry. Excuse me. I just can't stop,'' wept the soldier who fled Saddam Hussein's army and was taken Monday into the...

U.S.-led troops fought pitched battles with Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard within 50 miles of the capital Monday as coalition warplanes pounded the city and dozens of other Iraqi positions in advance of the battle for Baghdad. In the closest ground fighting yet to Saddam's seat of power, U.S. troops with the 3rd Infantry Division pushed into the Euphrates River town of Hindiyah on Monday. Iraqi soldiers fired from behind brick walls and hedges with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades, and U.S. troops returned fire with 25mm cannon and machine guns. At least 35 Iraqis were killed and U.S. forces captured...

Three Iraqi Soldiers Desert the Army By BORZOU DARAGAHI .c The Associated Press SULAYMANIYAH, Iraq (AP) - Hungry, poorly equipped and watched constantly, the three young friends from Basra made a pact: if they saw a chance to escape from the Iraqi Army, they would do it together. Eight days ago, while the security men who enforce military discipline in their unit enjoyed a meal, Bassam Salah Madlool, Mushriq Ahmad Hashem and Abbas Fahid Mushin saw their chance. They raced past minefields, evading radar and gunfire, and fled for 12 hours across hills, valleys and mountains until they reached Kifrey,...

Iraqi soldiers are being forced by militias loyal to President Saddam Hussein to ride motorbikes packed with explosives into coalition forces and blow themselves up, a group of Iraqi deserters said today. Five deserters, who turned themselves in but refused to be named for fear of reprisals against their families, said they had been a given a choice by members of the feared Fedayeen militia unit in the city of Basra of carrying out suicide attacks or being shot, they told reporters. However, there have been no reports of any such attempt in Basra. "They are forcing us to ride...

AUSTRALIA'S SAS soldiers have come across the first signs that Iraqi troops are deserting the battlefields, while abysmal weather conditions in Iraq could actually aid their operations. Defence spokesman Mike Hannan today said SAS forces working behind enemy lines had encountered unarmed Iraqi soldiers on their way home from the war. He said the SAS soldiers had allowed the Iraqi soldiers to return to their homes. "Our special forces continue to press on with their surveillance and reconnaissance missions deep in Iraq. "Recently the SAS have encountered Iraqi soldiers who have been unarmed, and who have been returning to their...

MASS desertions of Iraqi troops and the defection of senior figures from President Saddam Hussein’s ruling family circle were gathering pace yesterday as the countdown to war reached its final hours. Cruise missiles were being loaded on to B-52 bombers; warplanes were attacking Iraqi artillery batteries as a prelude to an all-out assault, and British and US troops in Kuwait moved into the demilitarised zone on the Iraq border ready to invade. President Bush sent Congress notification of his intention to go to war, and Tony Blair held the first full meeting of his war cabinet. But even before the...

Masses of Iraqi soldiers are deserting and senior members of President Saddam Hussein's ruling family circle are defecting as the countdown to a British and US invasion reaches its final hours. In northern Iraq, on the border with Kurdistan, up to three-quarters of some Iraqi regiments have already fled. In the mainly Shia Muslim south, Kuwaiti border guards are having to turn Iraqi soldiers back - telling them that they must wait until an attack begins before they can surrender. And in a highly significant development in Baghdad a half-brother of President Saddam, who is regarded as the dictator's closest...

NewsMax.com   Monday, March 17, 2003Iraqi Troops Reported Deserting As many as 30,000 terrified Iraqi soldiers have already deserted, according to a report in Britain's Sun newspaper. Writing from the U.S. Command Center in Qatar, Sun correspondents George Pascoe-Watson and Simon Hughes reported that intelligence sources estimate that as many as 15 percent of Saddam's army have deserted before a single shot has been fired. A senior British war planner at US Central Command in Qatar told the Sun last night: "Iraqi soldiers are scared out of their wits at what they know is over their borders.They are not stupid....

WELLINGTON, New Zealand, Mar 17, 2003 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- A former commander of Baghdad's air defenses said Tuesday that the bulk of the Iraqi military would not defend President Saddam Hussein - and that the elite Special Republican Guard will crumple when faced with U.S. forces. Shamel Majid, now living in exile in New Zealand, said Iraq's armed forces were "just waiting for a spark" to abandon the regime. His comments came moments before U.S. President George W. Bush gave Saddam a 48-hour deadline to flee Iraq or face a U.S.-led invasion. "The tyrant will soon be gone,"...

UP TO 15 per cent of Iraqi conscripts holding Saddam Hussein’s northern front line have already deserted, according to US special forces in the region. Elite US troops based in the Kurdish enclave in northern Iraq are regularly probing Iraqi lines, to draw up target lists for airstrikes. They are looking for pockets of ‘hard core’ pro-Saddam troops who can be attacked first to break the back of resistance. It is hoped the attacks will turn the trickle of desertions into a torrent, allowing Kurdish resistance fighters to drive southward to seize the Kirkuk and Mosul oil fields. Liaison teams...