URBAN WAR STRATEGY

Mobilized and mobile

Getting insurgents dispersed in Fallujah and other strongholds keeps U.S. troops in motion - and danger

BY MATTHEW MCALLESTER
STAFF CORRESPONDENT

November 11, 2004

FALLUJAH, Iraq - It was time to move on from the buildings Apache company had been using as its base overnight.

Mortar shells had rained down all night, shaking the amateurishly constructed buildings the soldiers of the 7th Cavalry Regiment, 2nd Battalion, had turned into their base in the heart of Fallujah.

As night fell, a rocket had scored a direct hit on one building, injuring two soldiers. The other soldiers were unsettled, wondering how they had survived without a scratch, if the insurgents had their coordinates fixed or if it was a lucky strike. In the darkness, they found places to sleep still horribly close to where the rocket had fallen. It was a troubled night, with mortars and sniper fire interrupting even the soundest of sleepers.

Perhaps the greatest risk was that an incoming shell or bullet would hit the massive, unexploded bomb inside a blue BMW about 20 yards from where some soldiers slept. If that went, they told each other, walls and ceilings would tumble around them.

When the bomb disposal team arrived in the morning, Apache company loaded up their packs and weapons and boarded the Bradley Fighting Vehicles.

Apache company moved out.

Leaving the temporary base was not just a reaction; it was part of the counterinsurgency tactics the military has adopted in Iraq and is adapting for each new urban battle. Lt. Col. Jim Rainey, commander of the 2nd Battalion, said the Army and Marine units that have pushed into and around Fallujah have dispersed the insurgents from suspected strongholds. While an ideal situation would have been to cordon most of the insurgents in the northwestern Jolan neighborhood, Rainey said, dispersion has pluses.

"I think it's good because they're off balance and disorganized," he said, standing in his command tent just outside the city last night.

The scattered teams of insurgents call for frequent movement and vigilance in all directions, commanders said.

"The biggest variables are probably the all-around aspect of the fight ... the 360-degree fight when the enemy can come in from behind, to your sides and from above," said Maj. Tim Karcher, the chief strategist for this heavily armored battalion.

Insurgents move in teams of two or three, commanders said. They have a hometeam advantage, the commanders said. But that is the only advantage. The U.S. troops can fire from several points and hit the same target, Karcher said.

If the enemy is "in the second story of a building in different rooms, I can engage from different directions," he said. Within minutes, U.S. commanders can call in artillery, air or mortar strikes. They can send tanks or Bradleys, which are almost impregnable to most insurgent weapons. And they can use snipers and overwhelming numbers of highly trained soldiers.

Rainey said the U.S. military has an organizational advantage. "They have committed soldiers willing to die. They have strategists who quite frankly are pretty good. ... The difference between the enemy and the Multi-National Forces is that their five guys are five guys. Our five guys are five disciplined guys led by a great sergeant."

Today's counterinsurgent tactics require a different rulebook from the sort used during last year's invasion, when the United States took control of the entire country in three weeks. This assault on a single city of 250,000 may take almost as long. Engaging regular armies on the battlefield is much easier, commanders say, than fighting guerrillas in narrow alleyways and on rooftops.

"The mantra in the U.S. Army is slow is fast because you've got to go slow to go fast," Karcher said. "Urban combat demands more time."

Each house, each block, will be searched as the soldiers and Marines hunt down the people who sometimes seem invisible, commanders said. (Rainey noted last night that he has not seen a single person in Fallujah who wasn't fighting with or covering the coalition forces.)

"There's no reason to rush," said Marine Col. Mike Shupp, commander of Regimental Combat Team 1. "Today [we're] closing in and will clean out the Jolan neighborhood. It will be an infantry attack, house by house primarily ... a steady steamroller coming down the road at them."

Shupp, like many commanders, has for years studied urban and counterinsurgent tactics, reading up on the American war in Vietnam, British experience in Iraq and elsewhere, French anti-guerrilla tactics in Algeria. "We're being guided by all these principles," he said.

On the ground, the troops adapt quickly. As commanders keep saying, the enemy has a vote. The goal of the painstaking but violent search process is simple to Shupp: "When every bit of Fallujah and every house has been cleared and people are able to return."

At 6 p.m. Tuesday, a rocket-propelled grenade landed near the tent of the 2nd Battalion commanders and everyone rushed for flak jackets and helmets. The tent is about a mile outside the city, far from the fighting. Insurgents were attacking from the rear - not from Fallujah but from the farmland of troubled Al Anbar province.

Bradleys immediately pounded several areas with red and green tracer rounds, plumes of dust mushrooming from the desert. Snipers searched for insurgents through telescopic sights. Later, a search team discovered the body of a woman and a trail of blood several hundred yards from the base. It was not clear who she was.

One soldier seemed to have grudging respect for the wiles of the insurgents. "They're doing what they should do," said Sgt. Matthew McCreery, 24, of Corvallis, Ore. "They're attacking our logistics."

Officers said all the camps on the outskirts of the city had been attacked in recent hours.

Shortly after 10 p.m., another whoosh was followed by an explosion - an incoming RPG. In their small way, insurgents are bringing the battle to the Americans. Stay still for too long in Iraq, whoever you are, and you will almost inevitably get hit.

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