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U.S. Moved to Undermine Iraqi Military Before War By DOUGLAS JEHL with DEXTER FILKINS ASHINGTON, Aug. 9 — The United States military, the Central Intelligence Agency and Iraqi exiles began a broad covert effort inside Iraq at least three months before the war to forge alliances with Iraqi military leaders and persuade commanders not to fight, say people involved in the effort. Even after the war began, the Bush administration received word that top officials of the Iraqi government, most prominently the defense minister, Gen. Sultan Hashem Ahmed al-Tai, might be willing to cooperate to bring the war to a...

TIKRIT, Iraq - A top secret military team and other American forces have conducted a series of raids in the hunt for Saddam Hussein, keeping the ousted leader on the move since his sons Odai and Qusai were killed two weeks ago, the military said Monday. Special Operations Task Force 20 - which is roaming Iraq on the hunt for Saddam and other high-profile targets - captured four key figures last week, 4th Infantry Division spokeswoman Maj. Josslyn Aberle said at a news briefing. "It's just a matter of time. He can't stay in one place very long," Aberle said....

<p>BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- The U.S. civilian administrator in Iraq predicted Saturday that Saddam Hussein will be tracked down, but warned that the threat from "foreign terrorists" infiltrating the country would persist even after Saddam is captured and the remnants of his regime are hunted down.</p>

<p>U.S. forces intensified their hunt for Saddam Hussein near his hometown of Tikrit on Wednesday as Secretary of State Colin Powell called Iraq's former leader "a piece of trash waiting to be collected.</p> <p>"Saddam is no longer bad news," Powell told Reuters. "The noose is tightening, but I can't speculate on how close one might be to actually capturing Saddam."</p>

BAGHDAD, July 29 (Reuters) - U.S. forces hunting Saddam Hussein in Iraq have captured three key figures loyal to the deposed dictator, including a bodyguard, in raids near his home town of Tikrit, the U.S. military said on Tuesday. "Members of the 4th Infantry Division detained four individuals in Tikrit. Three of those individuals are believed to be former regime loyalists," a U.S. spokesman said. "They are being questioned as we speak." Earlier, the military confirmed that a bodyguard was among those detained in the raids, the latest of several swoops in Tikrit and Baghdad by U.S. forces searching for...

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- It was a classic Special Operations mission. Intelligence sources, including Iraqi nationals, indicated that several "HVTs" -- high value targets -- the U.S. military euphemism for everything from an important site to be attacked to a terrorist chieftain or an enemy leader -- were hiding in a Mosul residence. Within hours, U.S. Central Command approved a raid on the villa by Task Force 20 -- Delta Force commandos and Navy SEALs -- supported by elements of the 101st Airborne. When it was over, Qusay "The Snake" and Uday "The Wolf" Hussein -- ranked No. 2 and No....

Task Force 20, the special forces team that has been hunting down Saddam Hussein and his supporters, played a key role in the raid that ended in the deaths of the former dictator's sons. Allied special forces are organised into Joint Special Operations Task Forces wherever they operate. JSOTF 20 includes members of Delta Force, the American equivalent of the SAS, Devgru, the US navy special forces team previously known as Seals, the SAS and the SBS. It is not yet clear whether British personnel were involved in the raid that killed Uday and Qusay Hussein. The SAS squadron in...

By Gray Beverley Telegraph Staff Writer LIZELLA - About three days before Pfc. Jessica Lynch returned home to her family in West Virginia, one of her rescuers was visiting his parents in Lizella. Lt. Col. Jean Malone - who got back from the war about a month ago - said he was surprised by the attention given to the rescue operation, which he helped coordinate as deputy operations chief for the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade. "It's kind of surprising for me," Malone said Tuesday from his Camp Lejeune, N.C., home. "We didn't realize it was that big of a deal."...

<p>MOSUL, Iraq — Saddam Hussein's sons Odai and Qusai (search) were likely killed Tuesday when U.S. soldiers stormed a house in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul (search), U.S. military sources told Fox News.</p> <p>Officials earlier confirmed that four key allies of the former Iraqi dictator had been killed inside the house, a large villa that belonged to one of Saddam's cousins.</p>

Now being reported on MSNBC

U.S. Forces Interrogating Iraqis About Pilot Missing Since 1991 Jun 24, 2003 The Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) - U.S. forces interrogating some Iraqi prisoners are seeking details about the case of Navy pilot Michael Scott Speicher, missing since his fighter jet was shot down on the opening night of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday. Rumsfeld would not say whether there were any new clues to the fate of Speicher, the only American serviceman still listed as missing from the Gulf War. "There is nothing that has been turned up thus far that I...

Peter Beaumont examines the new role of a secret unit that worked in the Balkans, Afghanistan and Colombia The most secretive military unit in the US armed forces is code-named Grey Fox. Over the past two months its role has been boiled down to a single mission: the hunt for Saddam Hussein and his sons Uday and Qusay. And if Saddam is now dead, killed last week, it is certain Grey Fox was involved: Saddam would be its biggest catch since the downfall of Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. Officially members of a unit named 'Intelligence Support Activity', Grey Fox...

Nothing more.

WASHINGTON, June 20 — A top lieutenant to Saddam Hussein has told American interrogators that the Iraqi leader and his two sons survived the United States-led war in Iraq and that he himself had fled to Syria with the sons after the conflict, Defense Department officials said today. The officials said they had not yet assessed the accuracy of the claims by the aide, Abid Hamad Mahmoud al-Tikriti, who was arrested in Iraq earlier this week. But they said that the United States regarded the information as having enormous potential significance, and that it had ignited an intense burst of...

A covert Army Special Forces unit, operating in Iraq since before the war began in March, has played a dominant but ultimately unsuccessful role in the Bush administration's stymied hunt for weapons of mass destruction, according to military and intelligence sources in Baghdad and Washington. Task Force 20, whose existence and mission are classified, is drawn from the elite Army special mission units known popularly as Delta Force. It sent a stream of initially promising reports to a limited circle of planners and policymakers in Washington pointing to the possibility of weapons finds. The reports helped feed the optimism expressed...