Pentagon wants more troops for Iraq
By John Catalinotto

Lt. Gen. Lance Smith told a Pentagon news conference on Nov. 19 that U.S. commanders were considering boosting their troop levels in Iraq by up to 5,000.

Just the day before, a Marine commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. John Sattler, announced that the offensive in Falluja had "broken the back of the insurgency." This arrogant statement sounded like George W. Bush"s "Mission accomplished!" speech on May Day 2003. In both cases, the Iraqi insurgency exploded the lie.

According to a Nov. 18 AFP dispatch, "Marine intelligence officials have issued a report warning that any significant withdrawal of troops from the Iraqi city of Falluja would strengthen the insurgency." U.S. forces use the word "insurgent" to describe those fighting to defend their country against foreign occupiers.

A Nov. 22 New York Times editorial draws the conclusion that U.S. troop levels in Iraq should be increased, not by a mere 5,000, but by 40,000. The editorial suggests that this be done without using a draft, but it does not spell out just how that is to be done.

The Nov. 22 Washington Post quotes an unnamed "senior military intelligence officer" as saying, "Our assessment is that the insurgency remains viable. One of the things we see the insurgents doing is moving to areas where we don"t have a lot of presence." This means all across the central part of Iraq.

According to a recent report by Inter Press Service correspondent Dahr Jamail, "the Iraqi resistance now controls large areas of Ramadi, Samarra, Haditha, Baquba, Hiyt, Qaim, Latifiya, Taji, Khal diya, and Baghdad, along with fighting in the holy city of Kerbala."

And daily reports of the killing of U.S.-trained Iraqi troops by resistance fighters and attacks on occupation convoys demonstrates that the Iraqi insurgents, as guerrillas frequently do when facing a heavily armed occupation army, are retreating and then striking where the enemy is weaker.

U.S. atrocities reflect a criminal war

Although the Pentagon claims military success in Falluja and says that the U.S. has completely occupied the city, other reports contradict this.

Defenders of Falluja are controlling 60 percent of the city and are encircling dozens of U.S. soldiers in the Jolan neighborhood, according to eyewitnesses who managed to sneak out. They say the southern part of Falluja is still under the control of the resistance. (Xinhua, Nov. 21)

Dahr Jamail in Baghdad, Al Jazeera and resistance sources also confirm continued fighting in Falluja itself.

Meanwhile, the U.S. has continued to lose "hearts and minds" of the Iraqis by committing war crimes and other atrocities. The Pentagon claims it has killed 1,600 "insurgents" in Falluja. But many are civilians.

In Baghdad on Nov. 18, during Moslem Friday prayers, about 50 U.S. and 20 Iraqi puppet troops in five Humvees and several trucks raided the Abu Hanifa mosque. The troops killed four people and wounded from nine to 20 more.

Someone called Jamail from the mosque. "They are holding our heads to the ground, and everyone is in chaos," he said over a cell phone. "They cannot see me talking to you. They are roughing up a blind man now." (dahrjamailiraq.com)

This was the first time the U.S. had raided a mosque in Iraq during prayers.

There continue to be repercussions and questions regarding the video of a U.S. Marine shooting a wounded and helpless Iraqi. Right-wing web sites in the United States have tried to portray the reporter, Kevin Sites, as some sort of anti-war activist who somehow sneaked into the front lines. Sites has reported receiving threats.

A look at Sites"s blog, kevinsites.net, makes it obvious that the reporter bends over backward to try to present the young Marine"s point of view, while still giving a thorough description of combat conditions in Falluja.

This is Sites"s message to the Marine: "So here, ultimately, is how it all plays out: when the Iraqi man in the mosque posed a threat, he was your enemy; when he was subdued he was your responsibility; when he was killed in front of my eyes and my camera--the story of his death became my responsibility."

Neither Sites nor his ultra-right critics nor the military brass draw some other obvious conclusions: When Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq, he was committing a crime against peace, the greatest war crime. When the U.S. occupied Iraq illegally, this inevitably aroused a popular resistance. When the brass order troops to make war on the people of Iraq, U.S. troops will start to consider every Iraqi their enemy. They will fear the Iraqis. And some will inevitably commit atrocities, exactly as they did in Vietnam.

The Times wants the Pentagon to recruit more youth--if not by directly drafting them, then probably by enticing poor youth with better pay than they could get in dead-end jobs in civilian life. But Falluja is teaching young people here that joining the military means risking your life, risking your limbs and risking becoming a war criminal.


Reprinted from the Dec. 2, 2004, issue of Workers World newspaper