MARINES TO WITHDRAW FROM FALLUJA

“A new Iraqi secu­rity force made up of for­mer Iraqi sol­diers and com­man­ders will replace the American troops now in Falluja and assume respon­si­bil­ity for the city’s secu­rity,” the New York Times reports.

The new force, known as the Falluja Protection Army, will include as many as 1,000 Iraqi sol­diers led by a for­mer gen­eral from the army of Saddam Hussein, American mil­i­tary offi­cials said. A Marine com­man­der, Col. Brennan Byrne, said the force will be a sub­or­di­nate com­mand of the American mil­i­tary…
Marines in Falluja and encir­cling the city were briefed today on the agree­ment to form a new Iraqi mil­i­tary divi­sion. The plan is sup­posed to take effect begin­ning on Friday. Some Marine units were already begin­ning to pack up today in prepa­ra­tion for the with­drawal, news ser­vices reported.
The new Iraqi force rep­re­sents an about-​​face for the American author­i­ties, who dis­banded the Iraqi army fol­low­ing the fall of Mr. Hussein. 

Quick ques­tion — three, actu­ally:
1) Have Iraqi forces shown any abil­ity what­so­ever to put down insur­gent forces? These for­mer Saddam-​​ites will prob­a­bly be more ruth­less than their pre­de­ces­sors. But will they be any more effec­tive?
2) Why have AC-​​130 gun­ships pound the hell out of the city one day, only to aban­don it the next?
3) Is the pull­back of U.S. troops from an area already known as the “Iraqi Alamo” going to be seen as a sen­si­ble, mutu­ally ben­e­fi­cial set­tle­ment, or as a com­plete and total vic­tory for anti-​​American forces?
Chris Allbritton has much more on the withdrawal’s many mean­ings.
THERE’S MORE: Why use the big gun­ships right before pulling out? “It was to pro­vide incen­tive to come to agree­ment, and to root out easy tar­gets before a deal was struck,” says Defense Tech reader TM. The insur­gents most assuredly were using the ‘cease-​​fire’ time to dig in for the next assault… Bringing in the AC-​​130s was a low (mil­i­tary) lia­bil­ity, but highly effec­tive means of bear­ing a lot of pres­sure on insur­gents with­out expos­ing US GIs.”

April 29th, 2004 | War Update | Comments Off Both comments and pings are currently closed.