The Bush Butcher’s Bill: 17 US Military Deaths in Iraq from 1 through 9 March 2005 – Official Total of 1,581 US Dead to date (and rising)

U.S. Military Personnel who died in German hospitals or en route to German hospitals are not counted. They total about 6,210 as of 1 January, 2005.

by Brian Harring, Domestic Intelligence Reporter

Note: There is excellent reason to believe that the Department of Defense is deliberately not reporting a significant number of the dead in Iraq. We have received copies of  manifests from the MATS that show far more bodies shipped into Dover AFP than are reported officially. The educated rumor is that the actual death toll is in excess of 7,000. Given the officially acknowledged number of over 15,000 seriously wounded, this elevated death toll is far more realistic than the current 1,400+ now being officially published. When our research is complete, and watertight, we will publish the results along with the sources In addition to the evident falsification of the death rolls, at least 5,500 American military personnel have deserted, most in Ireland but more have escaped to Canada and other European countries, none of whom are inclined to cooperate with vengeful American authorities. (See TBR News of 18 February for full coverage on the mass desertions) This means that of the 158,000 U.S. military shipped to Iraq, 26,000  either deserted, were killed or seriously wounded. Ed

Haven’t we had enough of this?

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The Department of Defense announced today the death of two soldiers who were supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.  They died Feb. 26 in Abertha, Iraq, when an improvised explosive device detonated while they were on patrol.   Both Soldiers were assigned to the Army's 6th Squadron, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 4th Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Stewart, Ga. The Soldiers are: Pfc. Min S. Choi, 21, of River Vale, N.J. Pvt. Landon S. Giles, 19, of Indiana, Penn.

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. Staff Sgt. Alexander B. Crackel, 31, of Wilstead Bedford, United Kingdom, died Feb. 24 in Al Anbar Province, Iraq, from injuries sustained from enemy small arms fire.  Crackel was assigned to the Army's 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment, Camp Hovey, Korea.

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. Pfc. Chassan S. Henry, 20, of West Palm Beach, Fla., died Feb. 25 in Ramadi, Iraq, from injuries sustained from an explosion while he was conducting combat operations.  Henry was assigned to the Army's 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment, 2d Infantry Division, Camp Hovey, Korea.

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. Spc. Michael S. Deem, 35, of Rockledge, Fla., died Feb. 24 in Baghdad, Iraq, from non-combat related injuries.  Deem was assigned to the Army's Special Troops Battalion, 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Stewart, Ga.

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. 2nd Lt. Richard B. Gienau, 29, of Longview, Iowa, died Feb. 27 in Ar Ramadi, Iraq, from injuries sustained when an improvised explosive device hit his military vehicle.  Gienau was assigned to the Army National Guard's 224th Engineer Battalion, Burlington, Iowa.

2

The Department of Defense announced today the death of two Soldiers who were supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.  They died from injuries sustained in a military vehicle accident that occurred Feb. 28 in Bayji, Iraq.  Both Soldiers were assigned to the Army's 360th Transportation Company, 68th Corps Support Battalion, 43rd Area Support Group, Fort Carson, Colo. Sgt. Julio E. Negron, 28, of Pompano Beach, Fla., died in Bayji on Feb. 28. Spc. Lizbeth Robles, 31, of Vega Baja, Puerto Rico, died at the 228th Command Support Hospital in Tikirt, Iraq, on March 1.

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a Soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. Pfc. Danny L. Anderson, 29, of Corpus Christi, Texas, died Feb. 27 in Baghdad, Iraq, from injuries sustained from small arms fire. Anderson was assigned to the Army's 26th Forward Support Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Stewart, Ga.

4

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. Spc. Robert S. Pugh, 25, of Meridian, Miss., died Mar. 2 in Iskandariyah, Iraq, when an improvised explosive device detonated near his military vehicle.  Pugh was assigned to the Army National Guard’s 1st Battalion, 155th Infantry, McComb, Miss.

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The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. Spc. Adriana N. Salem, 21, of Elk Grove Village, Ill., died Mar. 4 in Remagen, Iraq when her military vehicle rolled over. Salem was assigned to the 3rd Forward Support Battalion, Division Support Command, 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Stewart, Ga.

The Department of Defense announced today the death of four soldiers who were supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.  They died on Mar. 4 in Ar Ramadi, Iraq when an improvised explosive device detonated near their patrol.  The four soldiers were assigned to the 1st Infantry Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, Fort Carson, Colo. The soldiers are: Capt. Sean Grimes, 31, of Southfield, Mich. Sgt. 1st Class Donald W. Eacho, 38, of Black  Creek, Wis. Cpl. Stephen M. McGowan, 26, of Newark, Del. Spc. Wade Michael Twyman, 27, of Vista, Calif.

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The Department of Defense announced today the death of two soldiers supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.  They died March 7, in Ramadi, Iraq, when a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device detonated near their screening area.  The two men were assigned to the Army’s 44th Engineer Battalion, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division, Camp Howze, Korea. Killed were: Sgt. Andrew L. Bossert, 24, of Fountain City, Wis., Pfc. Michael W. Franklin, 22, of Coudersport, Pa.

The Bringing of American Democracy to the Youth of Iraq

Thank you, George! The Christian God loves you!

The failings of 'the army you have'

March 10, 2005
by Michael Schwartz

The latest US theory about the Iraqi resistance

In early February, a Newsweek team led by Rod Nordland produced a detailed account of current theorizing among US and Iraqi officials about the structure of the Iraqi resistance.

Here, in brief, is what these officials told Newsweek: The initial United States assault on Iraq was so successful that Saddam Hussein's plan for systematic resistance fell apart almost immediately, leaving a dispersed, unruly guerrilla movement with little or no coherent leadership. In the two subsequent years, however, the Saddamists formed a wealthy and savvy leadership group in Syria. In the meantime Abu Massab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian terrorist with ties to al-Qaeda, asserted his domination over the on-the-ground resistance. Pressure from recent US offensives drove the two groupings into an increasingly comfortable alliance. Here is how Newsweek described developments since last summer, based on an interview with Barham Salih, the Iraqi deputy prime minister:

"According to Salih, 'The Ba'athists regrouped and, in the last six or seven months, reorganized. Plus they had significant amounts of money, in Iraq and in Syria.' Those contacts and networks that Saddam's key cronies began developing months before the invasion now paid off. An understanding was found with the Islamic fanatics, and the well-funded Ba'athists appear to have made Syria a protected base of operations. 'The Iraqi resistance is a monster with its head in Syria and its body in Iraq' is the colorful description given by a top Iraqi police official ... Zarqawi's people supply the bombers, the Ba'athists provide the money and strategy."

The current situation was succinctly summarized for Newsweek by Brigadier-General Hussein Ali Kamal, the deputy minister of the interior: "Now between the Zarqawi group and the Ba'athists there is full cooperation and coordination."

This portrait has been further fleshed out in other accounts, including a New York Times report in which US Commanding General George W Casey declared that the Ba'ath Party in Syria was "providing direction and financing for the insurgency in Iraq".

This new theory about the nature of the Iraqi resistance helps to illuminate the renewed US saber-rattling against the Syrians, which began even before the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister. On January 25, for example, former secretaries of state Henry Kissinger and George Shultz, writing together for the first time, made the connection explicit in a Washington Post op-ed. They asserted that the administration of President George W Bush must have a "strategy for eliminating the sanctuaries in Syria and Iran from which the enemy can be instructed, supplied, and given refuge in time to regroup". The new theory may also help to explain why (according to such diverse sources as Newsweek and former US weapons inspector Scott Ritter) the US is considering using assassination squads to eliminate enemies. One whole category of targets for these squads (if formed) would certainly be the Syrian-based leadership of the resistance.

And then, at the end of February, came news of the first fruits of US operations based on this new insight, the capture in Syria of Sabawi Ibrahim Hassan, a half-brother and political lieutenant of Saddam, and one of only 11 of the original "deck of cards" Saddamist leaders who still remained at large. The capture vindicated the saber-rattling as well, since high-level Iraqi officials told reporters on February 28 that the "capture was a goodwill gesture by the Syrians to show that they are cooperating" with the new US campaign to decapitate the insurgency by removing its Syrian-based leadership.

Problems with the new theory

This new portrait of the Iraqi resistance may be an accurate description of one aspect of the ongoing war; and its key new element - a working alliance between Saddamist exiles and Zarqawi's fighters inside Iraq - may be an important new development. But the foundation upon which these descriptions are built - that these forces now dominate the resistance, supply its leadership, or provide the bulk of its resources - is likely to prove profoundly inaccurate.

This is most easily seen by consulting - of all sources - the US Central Intelligence Agency, which issued a contrary report around the time the Newsweek article appeared. According to the CIA, the Zarqawi faction and his Saddamist allies were "lesser elements" in the resistance, which was increasingly dominated by "newly radicalized Sunni Iraqis, nationalists offended by the occupying force, and others disenchanted by the economic turmoil and destruction caused by the fighting". There is, in fact, a vast body of publicly available evidence in support of the CIA's perspective, including, for example, most first-hand accounts of the resistance in Fallujah and other cities in the Sunni triangle.

In the short, dreary history of America's Iraq war, US leaders have repeatedly acted on gross misconceptions about whom they were fighting - sometimes based on faulty intelligence, but sometimes in the face of perfectly accurate intelligence. This is, in all likelihood, another instance where they believe their own distortions, and it is worthwhile attempting to understand the underlying pattern that produces this almost predictable error.

One way to characterize this propensity to mis-analyze the resistance is to see that all the portraits thus far generated of the Iraqi resistance have been based on the assumption that it is organized into a familiar hierarchical form in which the leadership exercises strategic and day-to-day control over a pyramid-shaped organization. Such a structure is described by both military strategists and organizational sociologists as a "command and control" structure. After the battle of Fallujah, US Air Force Lieutenant-General Lance Smith even used this phrase to characterize Zarqawi's operation: "Zarqawi ... no doubt ... is able to maintain some level of command and control over the disparate operations."

This command-and-control image applies well to a large bureaucracy or a conventional army, but invariably provides a poor picture of a guerrilla army, which helps explain US military failures in Iraq. Whether or not Zarqawi maintains command and control over his forces (who are, as far as we can tell, not guerrillas) no one exercises such control over the forces that fought against the Americans in Fallujah or Sadr City and those that are currently fighting a guerrilla war in Ramadi and other Sunni cities that boycotted the recent elections.

Guerrilla wars violate the command-and-control portrait in two important ways: local units must, by and large, supply themselves (since an occupation army would be likely to interdict any regular shipments of supplies); and they are likely to have substantial autonomy (since hit-and-melt tactics do not lend themselves well to central decision-making).

This lack of command and control is a curse and a blessing. On the negative side, lack of central coordination means that guerrilla armies are normally doomed to small, disconnected actions - a severe limitation if the goal is to drive an enemy out of your country. On the positive side, they are less vulnerable to attacks on supply lines and to the targeting of commanding officers - two key strategies of conventional warfare.

The resistance in Iraq reflects this dialectic of guerrilla war. The mujahideen in Fallujah, for example, seem to have been notoriously decentralized; even local clerical leadership reportedly achieved only a tenuous discipline over the troops. This same lack of discipline, however, made it impossible for the US to identify and eliminate key leaders. During the second battle for the city in November, their hit-and-run tactics allowed them to hold out for more than a month against a force with overwhelming technological and numerical superiority.

The command-and-control portrait is not a useful tool when it comes to analyzing a large component of the Iraqi resistance, and it is of little use if it is applied to the movement as a whole.

The drumbeat of command and control

Nevertheless, the US military has assumed such a structure at every juncture in the war.

In the autumn of 2003, when the resistance first began to trouble the occupation, US military strategy was based on the conviction that the resistance was led by Saddam Hussein and the "deck of cards" leadership. Here we see command-and-control logic applied for the first time.

By mid-December 2003, the occupation forces had arrested or killed the vast majority of the men on that deck of cards, while Saddam's sons Uday and Qusay Hussein had died in a spectacular gun battle, and Saddam himself had just been captured in a dirt dugout. Occupation authorities confidently predicted that the Ba'athist "bitter enders" were done for and the resistance would subside, since without its leaders, local fighters were expected to be rudderless and ineffective.

Instead the disparate parts of the resistance became stronger, and in April 2004 emerged with a victory in Fallujah - after a siege of the city, the marines pulled back without taking it - and a bloody standoff in Najaf. By then, US intelligence had discovered Abu Massab al-Zarqawi and declared that he was actually the linchpin of the resistance.

Once again, a command-and-control portrait of the enemy remained dominant, and the second battle of Fallujah was fought in good part on the basis of that theory: to disrupt or destroy the Zarqawi leadership group. But despite the expulsion of the guerrillas (and just about the entire population of Fallujans) from the city, the rebellion quickly spread to other cities and intensified, refuting the claim that the decapitation of the movement would be incapacitating.

The command-and-control theory has, in fact, turned out to be as resilient as the resistance itself. US commander Lieutenant-General Thomas F Metz, for instance, explained the post-Fallujah battle of Mosul to the New York Times by saying that Zarqawi and/or his leadership team had moved to that city and fomented the uprising, ignoring the indigenous character of the mujahideen who were fighting there. Later, it would be announced that Zarqawi had set up a new "nerve center" south of Baghdad and a major new search-and-destroy operation would be mounted there.

Even after these actions failed to quell the fighting, the occupation forces clung to command-and-control logic. General Kamal, for example, told Newsweek, "Even if Zarqawi continues to elude capture, nailing al-Kurdi [one of Zarqawi's lieutenants] was a critical score. It might - just might - eventually help change the course of this war." Similar statements were made a month later when Saddam's half-brother, identified as a key leader and funder of the insurgency, was captured in Syria.

Evident in all of this is the faith that US military leaders have in a strategy of identifying and targeting the supposed leaders of the insurgency. Despite the direct evidence of an increasingly ferocious movement, the capture of a key leader, it has repeatedly been claimed, could "change the course of the war".

Why the US military can't abandon 'command and control' logic

So why does the US military relentlessly build its anti-insurgency strategy around the idea of decapitating the leadership of the Iraqi resistance? The answer lies just beneath the surface of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's now-infamous statement, "You go to war with the army you have."

This is a comment pregnant with meaning for organizational sociologists, because it illustrates a familiar pattern of organizational problem-solving. If a product is not selling well, for example, an engineering organization might conclude that better engineering of the product was in order; a manufacturing firm, that more efficient production technology was needed; and a marketing company, that better advertising would do the trick. This sort of organizational idee fixe has led to some truly horrendous failures in business - and military - history. For example, when a flood of automobile buyers began to demand fuel-efficient cars during the first oil crisis in the early 1970s, the US automobile industry did not have the capacity to produce such vehicles. Instead of investing vast resources in developing that capacity, it tried to use its superior marketing skills to win Americans back to luxurious gas-guzzlers. That is, the Big Three auto makers "went to war with the army they had" and convinced themselves that they were facing a marketing problem. The results: a permanent crisis at General Motors (during which it lost world leadership in the industry), a fundamental restructuring of Ford, and the demise of Chrysler.

Or take the French in World War II. They knew about the new German tanks that had made World War I trench warfare obsolete, but the French army was only equipped to fight in the trenches. So they "went to war with the army they had", devising a trench-war strategy that they managed to convince themselves would contain the German Panzer divisions. They lost the war in three weeks.

The US is also fighting with the army it has. This army is the best equipped in the world for advanced conventional warfare - with tanks, artillery, air power, missile power, battlefield surveillance power, and satellite imaging to support highly mobile, well-equipped and superbly trained soldiers. No supply route is safe from its firepower, and no conventional army would be likely to hold its ground long against a US assault. But the most intractable part of the resistance in Iraq is fighting a guerrilla war: they do not have long supply lines and they rarely try to hold their ground.

Guerrilla armies hide by melting into the local population. (Everyone knows this, including, of course, US military men.) To defeat them, an occupying force must have the intelligence to identify guerrillas who can disappear into the civilian world; and it must station troops throughout resistance strongholds in order to pounce upon guerrillas when they emerge from hiding to mount an attack. US military strategists know this, too. But these lessons - painfully drawn from Vietnam - can't be implemented by the army that Donald Rumsfeld sent to war.

The Americans, in fact, have neither of these resources. Anti-guerrilla intelligence, after all, requires the cooperation of the local population, which, at least in the Sunni-dominated areas of Iraq, the US has definitively alienated, largely through its use of blunt-edged conventional army attacks on communities that harbor guerrillas. And it cannot station enough troops in key locations because too small an occupation force is spread far too thinly over contested parts of the country. Estimates for the size of an army needed to pacify Iraq range upward from General Eric Shinseki's prewar call for "several hundred thousand" troops.

The US military simply lacks the tools it needs to fight the guerrillas, just as in the 1970s the Big Three auto makers lacked the production system needed to produced fuel-efficient automobiles, and the French army lacked the technology it needed to defeat German tanks in 1940. In response, military leaders are doing exactly what their organizational forebears did: They continue to develop theories about how to win the war "with the army they have". This backward logic leads inevitably to imagining an enemy that might be far more susceptible to defeat with the tools at hand; that is, an opponent with long supply lines (from Syria, for example) and a command-and-control leadership (Zarqawi and his Saddamist allies, for example) capable of being "decapitated". This portrait of the enemy then justifies a military strategy that seeks, above all, to kill or capture the theorized leaders. Such tactics almost always fail (even when leaders are captured); and in the process of failing, only alienate further the Iraqi population, producing an ever larger, more resourceful enemy.

The newest portrait of the resistance as a Zarqawi-Saddamist led amalgam will sooner or later die a lonely death - in all likelihood to be replaced by yet another command-and-control portrait of the insurgency whose features are as yet unknown. As long as the US continues to fight "with the army it has", it will also continue to generate - and act on - distorted (sometimes ludicrous) descriptions of the nature of the rebellion it faces.

Michael Schwartz, professor of sociology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, has written extensively on popular protest and insurgency, and on US business and government dynamics. His work on Iraq has appeared on the Internet at numerous sites including TomDispatch, Asia Times Online, MotherJones, and ZNet; and in print at Contexts and Z magazine. His books include Radical Politics and Social Structure, The Power Structure of American Business (with Beth Mintz), and Social Policy and the Conservative Agenda (edited, with Clarence Lo). His e-mail address is Ms42@optonline.net.

U.S. Misses Soldier Reimbursement Deadline

March 9, 2005
by Lolita C. Baldor
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Defense Department hasn't developed a plan to reimburse soldiers for equipment they've bought to fight in Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites) despite requirements in a law passed last year, a senator says.

In a letter sent Wednesday to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (news, bio, voting record), D-Conn., asked details on the Pentagon (news - web sites)'s progress setting up the reimbursement program and questioned why it was not in place yet.

"Very simply, this is either negligence on their part, because they were not happy with this when it passed, or it's incompetence," Dodd said. "It's pretty outrageous when you have all their rhetoric about how much we care about our people in uniform."

Pentagon spokeswoman Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke said Rumsfeld will respond to Dodd's letter after he has reviewed it. She had no comment on the progress of reimbursement regulations.

Soldiers serving in Iraq and their families have reported buying everything from higher-quality protective gear to armor for their Humvees, medical supplies and even global positioning devices.

In response to the complaints, Congress last year passed Dodd's amendment requiring the Pentagon to reimburse members of the Armed Services for the cost of any safety or health equipment that they bought or someone else bought on their behalf.

Under the law, the Defense Department had until Feb. 25 to develop regulations on the reimbursement, which is limited to $1,100 per item.

Dodd asked that Rumsfeld provide details on the department's progress. But he also said it was unclear what recourse he has, other than public embarrassment, to force the Defense Department to act.

Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites), D-Mass., who repeatedly decried the lack of equipment during his unsuccessful presidential campaign, said the Pentagon needs to move quickly to give the troops their reimbursement and armored Humvees.

"They should be living up to the letter of the law," Kerry said.

The latest emergency spending proposal for the war totals $81.9 billion, including $74.9 billion for the Defense Department. It includes $3.3 billion for extra armor for trucks and other protective gear — underscoring a sensitivity to earlier complaints by troops.