Military

It’s going to be an interesting time watching General Schoomaker work through a plan to transform the Army. Here goes the first salvo in that “Pentagon War.”

IN ADVANCE OF Schoomaker’s swearing-in last Friday, the Army’s acting chief, Gen. John Keane who is himself retiring spoke with a list of three- and four-star generals, thanked them for their services and told them it was time to go. Sources say Keane first contacted half a dozen names, but by the end of the week the list had reportedly grown to 11 with more to come within 30 days, according to one Army source. The Army has a total of 50 three- and four-star generals. A senior Pentagon civilian called the move “housecleaning.”

TIKRIT, Iraq, Aug. 3 %u2014  U.S. soldiers hunting for Saddam Hussein in the restive territory around his home town said on Sunday they hoped to capture him alive, as another guerrilla attack gravely wounded an Iraqi in Baghdad.

“Clearly we’ll be going in to take him alive to extract the maximum intelligence,” Lieutenant Jason Price of the 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry Regiment, told Reuters in Tikrit. [MSNBC]

Even when he ruled Iraq, Saddam Hussein led a nomad’s life. As President he was too paranoid to sleep in the massive, marble-lined palaces he erected all over Iraq as monuments to his power. According to close associates, he would stay instead in small houses on the edges of his various compounds, changing location every eight to 10 hours and keeping an assistant on duty around the clock to pack and unpack his suitcases. Saddam, his former secretary says, so admired the fortitude of the Bedouin tribes that wander the Iraqi wilderness that he often headed into the mountains%u2014accompanied, of course, by caravans of aides, cooks and bodyguards%u2014to bed down among them. “He lived very simply,” says the secretary. “He didn’t need much.”

That can be a useful quality when you’re running for your life. If Saddam’s circumstances are anything like those of his sons Uday and Qusay, who died in a shoot-out with U.S. forces in Mosul two weeks ago, he is traveling with only the barest essentials: money and guns. [Time Magazine]

American troops captured one of Saddam Husseinís bodyguards and at least two other suspected associates in early morning raids on Tuesday, the U.S. military said. The reported coalition success comes amid what the United States says has been an increased flow of information on the whereabouts of Saddam and his inner circle in recent days. [MSNBC]

TROOPS STORMED three farms in Tikrit, Saddam%u2019s hometown, in simultaneous pre-dawn raids after receiving a tip that Saddam%u2019s new security chief was staying at one of the farm houses, said Lt. Col. Steve Russell, who led the operation by the of the 4th Infantry.
       %u201CWe missed him by 24 hours,%u201D Russell said, adding that residents told soldiers that the man they sought had been at one of the farm houses.
       Later on Sunday, U.S. troops attacked a house in an upscale Baghdad neighborhood on Sunday and local residents said there were rumours they were hunting for Saddam or members of his family, Reuters reported.
[MSNBC]

TIKRIT, Iraq (CNN) — U.S. forces early Sunday raided three farm houses in Saddam Hussein’s ancestral hometown of Tikrit where officials said intelligence indicated Saddam’s security chief — or possibly the deposed dictator himself — had recently been.

Another U.S. military source, this one in Tikrit itself, told CNN the raids were based on reliable intelligence that Saddam likely had been at the farms before the raids. [CNN]

What is really happening in Iraq? The media make it sound like another Vietnam, with the Iraqi population sliding towards mass resistance as Iraqi society collapses in violent anarchy. But the reality is a lot different. Attacks on coalition troops are declining, the availability of public services is increasing and public opinion towards the coalition becomes more favorable each day. The gunmen who are attacking coalition troops are being hunted down and arrested, and huge arms caches found and destroyed. [Strategy Page]