BAGHDAD, 3 October 2003 — The US commander in Iraq said yesterday the US-led forces were facing a deadlier foe on the ground, as troops traded fire with gunmen in the flash point city of Fallujah nearly six months after the coalition ousted Saddam Hussein from power. “The enemy has evolved and he is a little more lethal, a little more complex, a little more sophisticated and in some cases a little more tenacious,” Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez said.
The general said his soldiers were dying on an average of three to six a week, with another 40 being wounded over the same period. Sanchez said he did not think US troops would be leaving the country any time soon despite his forces laying the groundwork for Iraqi sovereignty, which in principle should free US forces to go home.
“It will definitely be years. We never said it would be anything less than years,” Sanchez said, as he surveyed Iraq’s deadly security situation.
A soldier was killed late Wednesday in a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) attack in Samarra, 100 kilometers north of Baghdad, at the same time as another was struck down by small arms fire in the capital. The attacks came just four hours after a bomb claimed the life of a soldier in Tikrit, the hometown of Saddam. Their deaths brought to 88 the number of soldiers killed in Iraq since US President George W. Bush declared major hostilities over on May 1.
Fresh attacks were launched on US troops yesterday, with witnesses saying at least three Americans were injured in separate incidents, but the US Army was not immediately able to confirm the reports.
In Fallujah, west of Baghdad, a witness said two US soldiers were wounded and four Iraqi civilians hurt by return fire shortly after midday when a 10-man patrol was hit by a drive-by shooting. A US Army spokeswoman said the violence started when a crowd gathered in front of the mayor’s office and an Iraqi sprayed gunfire at them and at the building.
The 82nd Airborne Division was called to the scene but there were no immediate reports of casualties, she added. One witness, Hossam Ali, told AFP “unidentified assailants drove past them in a car and opened fire on them,” in the center of Fallujah, a bastion of Sunni Muslim conservatives where anti-US attacks are frequent.
“Two US soldiers were wounded” in the incident, that occurred at 12:45 p.m. (0845 GMT), he said adding that the car fled the scene of the attack. “US troops returned fire and hit four people, including a woman, a child, a man who was passing by and a member of the Iraqi police,” said Ali, who was walking down the street at the time of the incident.
Iraqi police Lt. Jassem Mohammad confirmed that four civilians were rushed to hospital after they were hurt by gunfire in Fallujah, 50 kilometers from the capital. But the officer was not able to identify the source of the gunfire. Following the shootout, a man riding a motorcycle fired an RPG at the municipal building, but missed his target and then fled on foot, said municipal security guard Mohammad Qassem.
In nearby Khaldiya, an eight-vehicle military convoy hit a land mine. There were no casualties, although the blast ripped a water main, witnesses said. Witnesses also reported an RPG attack on an American convoy by Fallujah late yesterday, but there did not appear to be any casualties.
Meanwhile, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said yesterday he wanted Turkish Parliament to decide “rapidly” whether to send Turkish peacekeeping troops to Iraq to help Washington maintain security there. In an apparent concession to its NATO ally, the United States earlier agreed on joint action with Turkey against hundreds of Turkish Kurdish rebels holed up in northern Iraq, which could include military action.
“We want a decision from the assembly rapidly on sending the troops,” Erdogan told the local news channel NTV. The United States has made it clear in the past that it would be in charge of any military operations in Iraq and is wary of any Turkish involvement in action against Kurds there.
