Insurgents Keep U.S. At Bay In Ramadi
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Original Source: The Associated Press
Via: Yahoo News
By Todd Pitman,
Associated Press Writer
Monday, May 22 2006

Whole neighborhoods are lawless, too dangerous for police. Some roads are so bomb-laden that U.S. troops won't use them. Guerrillas attack U.S. troops nearly everytime they venture out--and hit their bases with gunfire, rockets or mortars when they don't.

Though not powerful enough to overrun U.S. positions, insurgents here in the heart of the Sunni Muslim Triangle have fought undermanned U.S. and Iraqi forces to a virtual staelmate.

"It's out of control," says Army Sgt. 1st Class Britt Rubble, behind the sandbags of an observation post in the capital of Anbar Province. "We don't have control of this...We Just don't have enough boots on the ground."

...Today Ramadi, a city of 400,000 along the main highway running to Jordan and Syria, 70 miles West of Baghdad, has battles fought in endless circles. Small teams of insurgents open fire and coalition troops respond with heavy blows, often airstrikes or rocket fire that's turned city blocks into rubble.

They've destroyed police stations and left the force in shambles. The criminal court system doesn't function because Judges are afraid to work; tribal sheiks have fled or been assassinated.

..."We Just go out, lose people and come back," said Iraqi Col. Ali Hassan, whose men fight alongside the Americans. "The insurgents are moving freely everywhere. We need a big operation. We need control."

Some Americans say ground needs to be taken and held. Most U.S. missions typically consist of going out, coming under fire and returning to base--leaving behind a no-man's-land held by neither side that insurgents in black ski masks always pour back into.

...The scale of violence in Ramadi is astounding.

One recent coalition tally of "significant acts"-Roadside bombs, attacks, exchanges of fire-indicated that out of 43 reported in Iraq on a single day, 27 occurred in Ramadi and its environs, according to a Marine officer who declined to be named because he's not authorized to speak to the media.

And that, he said, was "a quiet day"--When nothing from Ramadi even made the news.

In Ramadi, machine-gun fire and explosions are heard every day and tracer fire or illumination flares are seen every night. Even after airstrikes have transformed already ruined buildings full of gunmen into huge balls of gray debris, Marines have marveled at surviving insurgents who've come out shooting.

...In one Ramadi neighborhood, Master Sgt. Tom Coffey, 38, of Underhill, Vt, gestured to a paved road his forces would not drive on. "They hit us so many times with IEDs (roadside bombs), we ceded it to them, " he said.

Though coalition forces answer with massive firepower, they rarely pursue attackers--for fear of falling into an ambush and because they have few troops to spare. Though U.S. and Iraqi troops conduct frequent raids and hit targets, the insurgents fight back in their own way.

When U.S. and Iraqi troops question civilians, insurgents follow in their footsteps to visit and sometimes kill suspected informants.

After U.S. troops use residential rooftop walls as observation posts, insurgents have been known to knock them down.

...After one neighborhood sweep devolved into an hour-long gunbattle, Iraqi Maj. Jabar al-Tamini returned to base and drew his finger across a satellite map of the area he'd Just fled under fire: "It's fallen under the command of insurgents," he said, shaking his head. "They control it now."

..."They don't have to win. All they have to do is not lose," said Barela, 35, Albuquerque, N.M., citing an adage about guerrilla war.

Source:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/ramadi_down