US Employs Saddam's Old Commandos

Alastair Macdonald
Reuters
27 November 2004

NEAR ISKANDARIYA, Iraq (Reuters) - Twenty months after toppling Saddam Hussein, U.S. troops still battling his followers in the heart of Iraq's old arms industry are hitting back with a new weapon -- ex-members of Saddam's special forces. For five months, Iraqi police commandos have been based with U.S. Marines in charge of the region along the Euphrates river immediately south of Baghdad, which roadside bombs, ambushes and kidnaps have turned into a no-go area for outsiders and earned it the melodramatic description "triangle of death."

The performance of these police is a critical test of the ability of U.S. forces to hand security over to Iraqis in order to meet their goal of withdrawing while leaving Iraq stable. U.S. officers in the area say they are increasingly optimistic. "The hardest fighters we have are the former special forces from Saddam's days," Colonel Ron Johnson, commander of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, told reporters late on Friday. Praising their local knowledge and fighting skills, Johnson singled out one man who fought against him at Nassiriya, the hardest battle of last year's brief war against Saddam's army. "If I could have an Iraqi security force guy who's honest, reliable and dependable, it's worth five Marines," he said.

"They're aggressive, they're tough," said Captain Tad Douglas after a raid in the town of Latifiya on Saturday in which the bulk of his force was an Iraqi police "SWAT team." "Ninety-five percent of our intelligence is from the SWAT," he said of the local knowledge that saw nine people detained. "We have been...living with them for five months. We've put a lot of time into working with them."

U.S. raids to capture or kill insurgents are now mounted almost exclusively alongside commandos from the Ministry of Interior and a SWAT team from the provincial capital Hilla. "Our goal since September has been never to go anywhere on our own," said intelligence officer Major Clint Nussbaum. "This is police work, not finding a tank battalion in the desert."

IRAQI PRESENCE This week, Johnson has stepped up raids against insurgents in an operation code-named Plymouth Rock, hoping to maintain pressure on Sunni insurgents in the aftermath of their rout at Falluja, just upstream of his area. More than 100 people have been detained in four days in night-time raids on their homes.

Of Johnson's 5,000-strong force in the region, which was once the heart of Saddam's arms industry and base of the Medina armored division of the elite Republican Guard, some 2,000 are Iraqi, the rest made up of Marines and 850 British soldiers. At the Marine camp near Iskandariya, 30 miles south of Baghdad, the Iraqis are a clear presence, wearing the khaki jumpsuits of Marine scouts and almost ubiquitous black mustaches. Like special forces troops anywhere they are less than forthcoming about their work. None were comfortable speaking with a reporter.

Iraqi forces in other regions have had mixed success. This month, thousands of police in the northern city of Mosul fled or changed sides when Sunni Muslim insurgents took charge. Johnson acknowledges the loyalties of some Iraqis in his force may be divided but says they "want to be on the winning side" and is confident that, in time, U.S.-led troops will end what he sees as limited and decentralized violence by at most a few thousand disgruntled Saddam supporters and local bandits.

Iraqi police here have stuck to their posts despite killings of comrades in bomb attacks and murders of off-duty officers: "They don't cut and run, despite their losses," Johnson said. Citing intelligence that he says shows broad support for democracy, Johnson forecast local turnout of 45 percent or more at an election due on Jan. 30 -- despite probable violence. Clearly exasperated by the "triangle of death" tag, he said: "I'm getting more optimistic every day."

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Citation: Alastair Macdonald, "US Employs Saddam's Old Commandos," Reuters, 27 November 2004; Original URL: http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=6933057