Nation & World News
13 U.S. Marines killed as fighting spreads in Iraq
U.S. forces faced combat in
at least four Iraqi cities,
raising concerns that the
attacks are well-planned
By Matthew Schofield
and David Swanson
Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT)
RAMADI, Iraq — Three days shy of
the one-year anniversary of Baghdad's
fall, intense combat spread to at least
four more cities in Iraq on Tuesday,
killing at least 13 U.S. Marines.
Some of the fiercest fighting, which
was witnessed by a Knight Ridder
journalist, took place in Ramadi,
where eight Marines from Echo Com
pany, 2nd Battalion, 4th Regiment,
were killed when a multi-pronged as
sault caught the Marines by surprise as
they were conducting routine patrols
on foot at about 9 a.m.
The attackers fired rocket-propelled
grenades, mortar and assault rifles in
what appeared to be a well-coordinat
ed attack by at least four groups of
fighters numbering between four and
15 members each.
Two other Marine companies were
also ambushed in Ramadi. There was
no word on their casualties.
By the end of the day, U.S. troops
seemed to have taken control of most
contested areas, but the fighting was
far more extensive than at any time
since Saddam Hussein fled Baghdad
on April 9, 2003.
Battles also were reported in
Nasiriyah, Kut and Karbala, cities that
had been peaceful. Fighting contin
ued in Baghdad's Sadr City, Fallujah
and Amarah, as well as other cities.
The list of coalition members in
volved in the combat grew: In addi
tion to Americans, troops from Italy,
Spain, Great Britain, Ukraine and
Poland were attacked.
No official death toll was released,
but in addition to the U.S. Marines
who died in Ramadi, at least five were
killed in Fallujah, according to local
officials. One Ukrainian soldier was
reported killed during fighting in Kut,
and two Polish soldiers died during
battles in Karbala.
Iraqi deaths during fighting Mon
day and Tuesday appeared to number
around 100, including 40 killed
overnight in Sadr City, Baghdad's
sprawling Shiite slum. Italian soldiers
killed 15 Iraqis in fighting in
Nasiriyah, and British troops killed 12
Iraqis inAmarah.
Two South Korean workers were re
portedly kidnapped in southern Iraq.
In Washington, Bush administra
tion officials cast the violence as the
work of a small section of Iraq's Shiite
majority, not a mass rebellion.
That stance reflected U.S. hopes
that the unrest doesn't catch on more
widely among Shiites, which along
with the year-old resistance from
once-dominant Sunni Muslims,
would imperil the U.S. rebuilding
mission in Iraq.
State Department spokesman
Adam Ereli dismissed anti-American
cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, referring to his
militia as "his small number of fol
lowers." Ereli said, "We don't see them
as representative of a religious cause
but rather as representative of politi
cal gangsterism."
An official bulletin from the U.S.
led coalition expressed concern, how
ever.
"These groups have become more
sophisticated and may be coordinat
ing their anti-coalition efforts, posing
an even more significant threat," the
Coalition Provisional Authority's op
erational threat update said Tuesday.
The Arab satellite television net
work Al-Jazeera reported that U.S.
Marines in Fallujah were fighting Shi
ite supporters of al-Sadr, and not the
Saddam loyalists they typically en
counter in the town. If true, the devel
opment would be astounding: Shiites
and Sunnis are centuries-old Muslim
rivals.
In Washington, Secretary of De
fense Donald Rumsfeld reported that
Fallujah was under American control
and that several people wanted in
connection with the deaths of four
civilian security workers last week had
been taken into custody.
Meanwhile, al-Sadr, the 30-year-old
cleric whose militia was behind much
of the recent violence, switched sanc
tuaries, slipping from an ancient
mosque in his hometown of Kufa to
the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf, about
10 miles away.
U.S. officials said Monday that they
were seeking to arrest al-Sadr in con
nection with the murder last year of a
pro-American Shiite ayatollah who
was hacked to death in the shrine.
On Tuesday, a coalition official re
vealed that two other charges had
These groups have be
come more sophisticated
and may be coordinating
their anti-coalition efforts,
posing an even more
significant threat."
Coalition Provisional Authority
operational threat update
been lodged against al-Sadr — one in
connection with stealing from
mosque collection boxes and the oth
er regarding the murder of a pregnant
woman believed to have been killed
by al-Sadr bodyguards.
Official information about specific
battles was difficult to come by.
Spokesmen for the U.S. Marines de
clined to say where their units were
fighting.
An informal count found at least
23 Americans have died since the
fighting started Sunday.
The U.S. Army announced Tuesday
that two soldiers were killed Monday
and a third on Tuesday in three sepa
rate attacks by rocket-propelled
grenades in ambushes near Baghdad's
most revered Shiite shrine.
Witnesses in Sadr City said 40 Iraqis,
most of them al-Sadr followers, died as
they fought LJ.S. troops and Iraqi police
for control of police stations.
The witnesses said the fighting
started at about 8 p.m. and lasted un
til midnight.
"The Americans had so much force,
so much strength," said one witness.
"Many wondered what Sadr's follow
ers thought they could possibly do
against such strength. Many died."
Throughout Tuesday, U.S. troops pa
trolled the poor suburb by helicopter
and tank, and tension remained high.
The fighting was also intense
overnight in Fallujah, despite a 7 p.m.
to 6 a.m. curfew imposed by Ameri
can forces.
Officials in Fallujah said five U.S.
Marines were killed in the fighting. By
noon Tuesday, locals said the town,
about 35 miles west of Baghdad, was
under American control. As the day
passed, they said the Americans
moved back toward the perimeter of
the city.
Tanks sat on the highway leading
to the city from Baghdad, with bar
rels pointing toward oncoming traf
fic and the town. A Red Crescent am
bulance weaved through the coils of
razor wire at the barrier, transporting
four dead Iraqis to Baghdad, where
the electricity was working and they
could be kept cool. Marines at the
checkpoint were stern, refusing even
to reveal their hometowns or chat
about stateside news.
"Nobody is going in," one said, fi
nally. "If people want to leave, they
can leave, but nobody goes in."
Town residents said U.S. Marines
were on every comer.
"The town was in hiding, the town
was gone, nobody was moving," said
Dr. Hibaa Wazan, who spent the past
several years treating patients at the lo
cal hospital. She added that the day
time quiet followed a very loud night.
"The bombs started falling as soon
as the curfew was set last night," she
said. "All night, there was a constant
gunfire, and several times an hour,
there were very loud explosions."
Wazan said they evacuated all the
patients capable of being moved, leav
ing only a few of the very ill to be
cared for. The strain through the
night, when one bomb landed out
side the hospital doors, persuaded her
to accompany a heart attack victim
out of the city to a Baghdad hospital
— and to not return.
But the fiercest fighting for Ameri
cans was at Ramadi.
In the aftermath of the ambush,
U.S. Marines stepped warily around
Iraqi bodies, looking for any more of
their comrades. American Cobra and
Chinook helicopters thumped over
head, and Bradley fighting vehicles
rumbled on the roads.
Marines acknowledged they were
surprised as they moved through the
town on foot. The attackers were well
armed and well coordinated and
seemed to come from nowhere.
The Marines responded with mas
sive fire, armor and air support over
the next five hours. Fighting went
house to house, with Marines at one
point leaping from one rooftop to the
next as they chased and caught some
of the fighters.
Marines later read the names of eight
comrades who had died in combat.
Iraqi casualties appeared to be much
higher; four bodies were still lying in
the dust while Americans went corpse
by corpse looking first for their own.
At one spot near the shot-out shell
of a U.S. Hurnvee lay the body of one
attacker, clad in a surplus U.S. flak
jacket. Hie head was partially melted
or blown away.
An Iraqi man working as a transla
tor paced toward one of the bodies,
kicked it, then turned away.
(c) 2004, Knight Ridder/Tribune
Information Services. Schofield
reported from outside Fallujah,
Swanson from Ramadi. Carol
Rosenberg in Baghdad and Warren
Strobel in Washington contributed
to this report.
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Officials say rebellion
may be turning point
U.S. officials are calling the
rebellion in Iraq on Tuesday
the work of a minority and
downplaying the violence
By Warren P. Strobel
and John Walcott
Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT)
WASHINGTON - Bush adminis
tration officials sought Tuesday to
cast the rebellion in Iraq as the work
of a minority, saying plans to trans
fer sovereignty to Iraqis on June 30
remain on target despite spreading
violence.
Privately, however, senior officials
said the spreading battle between
the United States and followers of
anti-American cleric Muqtada al
Sadr could be a turning point in the
yearlong U.S. effort to pacify and re
build Iraq.
The U.S. approach is to launch
targeted raids against al-Sadr's fol
lowers, but not to mount a major
military strike on the cleric himself,
the senior officials said.
The officials conceded the crack
down is a gamble. If the raids degen
erate into a battle between coalition
forces and Shiites — which, they
concede, is what al-Sadr wants —
then the Shiites, who make up
roughly 60 percent of Iraq's popula
tion, could turn against the U.S. oc
cupation.
The officials spoke on condition
of anonymity because they aren't
authorized spokespersons and be
cause their views are at odds with
the administration's efforts to re
main upbeat.
The Shiite attacks represent a new
level of resistance to the U.S. pres
ence in Iraq. Most of the violence
until this week has been perpetrated
by members of Iraq's Sunni minori
ty, who were dominant under the
regime of Saddam Hussein.
Publicly, Bush administration of
ficials attempted to play down the
significance of the growing violence.
"Sadr and his small number of
followers — we don't see them as
representative of a religious cause
but rather as representative of politi
cal gangsterism," said State Depart
ment spokesman Adam Ereli.
Secretary of State Colin Powell
said in a radio interview that "the
major problem we're having in the
south right now is from Sadr. ... I
don't think they reflect the views of
all of the Shias in the south.... Other
clerics in the south have not come
out in support of what Sadr is do
ing."
Aides to President Bush reiterated
they have no intention of changing
the June 30 deadline for handing
over sovereignty to an interim Iraqi
government.
Separately, Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld said U.S. com
manders in Iraq would get more
troops if they requested them. There
currently are about 135,000 U.S.
military personnel in the country.
"They will decide what they need
and they will get what they need,"
Rumsfeld said at a news conference
in Norfolk, Va„ with NATO Secre
tary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer.
(c) 2004, Knight Ridder7Tribune
Information Services.