BAGHDAD, 7 November 2003 — Poland suffered its first combat death in Iraq yesterday as senior defense officials in Washington said the Pentagon was preparing to rotate its forces in Iraq next year, amid plans to cut back US troop numbers to 100,000. Two American soldiers also died in attacks near the capital and along the Syrian border.
The Polish officer was wounded when insurgents attacked a convoy of 16 Polish soldiers returning from a promotion ceremony for Iraqi civilian defense trainees near Baghdad. Maj. Hieronim Kupczyk, 44, died later at a military hospital in Kerbala, the Polish Defense Ministry said in Warsaw.
None of the other Polish soldiers was wounded, according to Polish Defense Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski.
Elsewhere, one US soldier from the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment was killed when his truck hit a land mine near the Husaybah border crossing point with Syria 313 km (195 miles) northwest of Baghdad, the military said. And a paratrooper from the 82nd Airborne Division was killed and two others were wounded when their patrol came under rocket-propelled grenade and small arms fire near Mahmudiyah, 25 km (15 miles) south of Baghdad late Wednesday, the military said.
Their deaths brought to 140 the number of US soldiers killed in Iraq by hostile fire since President George W. Bush declared an end to major combat May 1. A total of 114 US soldiers were killed in action before Bush’s declaration.
The United States ordered thousands of troops to prepare for duty in Iraq next year. US officials did not give the number of American troops being called up for Iraq, but said they would include Marines as well as two regular Army divisions, the 1st Infantry Division in Germany and the 1st Cavalry Division from Fort Hood, Texas.
Marine Corps Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stressed that the troops would be part of a 2004 Iraq rotation plan, and that the 132,000 American troops now there could decrease to just over 100,000 in May.
A spokesman for Paul Bremer, the head of Iraq’s US-led postwar administration, said he was open to the creation of a new Iraqi security force to help root out guerrillas and foreign militants.
But Bremer was in talks with the Governing Council to ensure that such a force was not controlled by Iraqi political factions, was integrated into existing command structures and worked in coordination with US-led troops, the spokesman said.
The US-installed governor of Najaf, meanwhile, resigned, a day after launching a strike to protest the US-led coalition’s failure to provide security in the central city where a judge was shot dead.
“I resign because some circles believe that others could be better at the job and because a large part of the population of Najaf does not understand the interim situation we are passing through,” said Haidar Mehdi Matar Al-Mayyali.
“The people want a lot, and our capabilities are limited,” he said during a meeting with local leaders at a hotel in Najaf, 180 km (112 miles) south of Baghdad.
Mayyali called the strike after meeting with Robert Ford, representative of Paul Bremer, and an officer from the multinational force patrolling the region.
All public offices and courts in Najaf answered the call, and yesterday they were all closed except for police stations, hospitals and schools. The strike followed the slaying of Muhan Jabr Al-Shuwaili, the province’s top judge, who was kidnapped and shot dead in Najaf on Monday.
