Fiasco, The American Military Adventure In Iraq Part 17

Seeming to ooze resentment, Myers also rejected Schlesinger's finding that the general and his staff had been slow to react to events in Iraq. "We've been very good at adjusting," he insisted. "Could we have been faster, sharper, quicker? Sure, we could have been, in probably many areas it goes without saying, particularly if we have the benefit of looking backwards and not looking forward. And that's the way I would address that." Myers essentially refused to conduct the cold, hard review of the errors of the U.S. effort, from a.s.sumptions to strategy to tactics, that was so desperately needed, especially as the reasons for going to war fell apart.

To a surprising degree, those punished for the crimes committed at Abu Ghraib would be the lowest of the low-England, Graner, and the like, which is to say, a low-ranking female reservist enlisted soldier and her ex-lover. The Army repeatedly insisted that its top commanders were not at fault, and seemed to refuse to consider the possibility that that stance was wrong. Even former Defense Secretary Melvin Laird-such a longtime friend of the defense secretary that he had helped in Rumsfeld's first campaign for Congress-found that outcome unacceptable. "To stop abuses and mistakes by the rank and file, whether in the prisons or the streets, heads must roll at much higher levels than they have thus far," he wrote over a year later. "The best way to keep foot soldiers honest is to make sure their commanders know that they themselves will be held responsible for any breach of honor." But that was not the message the Pentagon or the Army chose to send.

Over the next year, additional information about abuses would continue to surface. There were many more Pentagon reviews but no independent ones, and because most of the internal reviews seemed to blame the privates while excusing the generals, a lingering air of unfairness hangs over the entire affair. Also, because the top bra.s.s seemed unwilling to confront what really happened and continued to insist that each instance was an isolated case, each additional disclosure of abuse would be cited by journalists and others to challenge the theory that a few low-ranking bad apples were entirely to blame. To anyone who knew the military, that just didn't sound right. "As former soldiers, we knew that you don't have this kind of pervasive att.i.tude out there unless you've condoned it," said retired Army Col. Larry Wilkerson, who had been Colin Powell's chief of staff at the State Department. "And whether you did it explicitly or not is irrelevant."

An unfortunate side effect of that continued suspicion was that it shadowed the courage shown by thousands of other U.S. soldiers. "We now spend ninety percent of our time talking about the Abu Ghraib stuff, and one percent talking about the valor of the troops," said Bing West, the chronicler of the Marines in Iraq.

The op-ed pages try reverse gear In the wake of the unraveling of the Bush administration's rationales for invasion, and the tarring of the U.S. military presence, expert opinion in the United States began to catch up with the facts on the ground. The op-ed pages of the New York Times, New York Times, the the Washington Post, Washington Post, and the and the Los Angeles Times Los Angeles Times in May 2004 looked almost like the reverse of the 2002 and 2003 stampedes that culminated in the gushing reviews of Powell's presentation to the UN. in May 2004 looked almost like the reverse of the 2002 and 2003 stampedes that culminated in the gushing reviews of Powell's presentation to the UN.

The New York Times' New York Times' Thomas Friedman, probably the most influential writer on foreign affairs in the United States, and one of the more prominent journalistic supporters of going to war in Iraq, sounded the alarm in early May. "This administration needs to undertake a total overhaul of its Iraq policy," he wrote. "Otherwise, it is courting a total disaster for us all." Thomas Friedman, probably the most influential writer on foreign affairs in the United States, and one of the more prominent journalistic supporters of going to war in Iraq, sounded the alarm in early May. "This administration needs to undertake a total overhaul of its Iraq policy," he wrote. "Otherwise, it is courting a total disaster for us all."

A week later, his Times Times colleague David Brooks, who had been even more hawkish back in 2002, when he argued that "Bush has such an incredibly strong case to go in there," sounded even more chagrined. "This has been a crushingly depressing period, especially for people who support the war in Iraq," Brooks wrote. "The predictions people on my side made about the postwar world have not yet come true. The warnings others made about the fractious state of post-Saddam society have." In retrospect, he added, the plan to simply remove Saddam, establish democracy, and depart the country "seems like a childish fantasy." colleague David Brooks, who had been even more hawkish back in 2002, when he argued that "Bush has such an incredibly strong case to go in there," sounded even more chagrined. "This has been a crushingly depressing period, especially for people who support the war in Iraq," Brooks wrote. "The predictions people on my side made about the postwar world have not yet come true. The warnings others made about the fractious state of post-Saddam society have." In retrospect, he added, the plan to simply remove Saddam, establish democracy, and depart the country "seems like a childish fantasy."

Fouad Ajami, a Johns Hopkins University expert on the Mideast who had been a strong supporter of invading, was almost confessional in his new tone. "A year or so ago, it was our war, and we claimed it proudly," he wrote later in May. "But gone is the hubris. Let's face it: Iraq is not going to be America's showcase in the Arab-Muslim world."

Newsweek columnist Fareed Zakaria, another thoughtful writer who had been an Iraq hawk, wrote in the magazine's May 17,2004, issue that George W. Bush's "strange combination of arrogance and incompetence" had proven "poisonous" for American foreign policy. "On almost every issue involving postwar Iraq- troop strength, international support, the credibility of exiles, de-Baathification, handling Ayatollah Ali Sistani-Washington's a.s.sumptions and policies have been wrong," he charged. columnist Fareed Zakaria, another thoughtful writer who had been an Iraq hawk, wrote in the magazine's May 17,2004, issue that George W. Bush's "strange combination of arrogance and incompetence" had proven "poisonous" for American foreign policy. "On almost every issue involving postwar Iraq- troop strength, international support, the credibility of exiles, de-Baathification, handling Ayatollah Ali Sistani-Washington's a.s.sumptions and policies have been wrong," he charged.

The crowd of proinvasion columnists perched on the Washington Post's Washington Post's op-ed page also were having emotional second thoughts. "All but the most blindly devoted Bush supporters can see that Bush Administration officials have no clue about what to do in Iraq tomorrow, much less a month from now," wrote Robert Kagan, a prominent neoconservative intellectual. "It's not even clear that he [Bush] understands how bad the situation in Iraq is or how close he is to losing public support for the war." op-ed page also were having emotional second thoughts. "All but the most blindly devoted Bush supporters can see that Bush Administration officials have no clue about what to do in Iraq tomorrow, much less a month from now," wrote Robert Kagan, a prominent neoconservative intellectual. "It's not even clear that he [Bush] understands how bad the situation in Iraq is or how close he is to losing public support for the war."

The Abu Ghraib scandal drove the Washington Post Washington Post editorial page into vocal opposition-not to the war itself, but to the Bush administration's handling of postinvasion Iraq. The Post's editorialists long had been bothered by the administration's approach, and especially by Rumsfeld's. "We believe that there has been more progress in Iraq than critics acknowledge, but also that the administration has made serious mistakes," the editorial page into vocal opposition-not to the war itself, but to the Bush administration's handling of postinvasion Iraq. The Post's editorialists long had been bothered by the administration's approach, and especially by Rumsfeld's. "We believe that there has been more progress in Iraq than critics acknowledge, but also that the administration has made serious mistakes," the Post Post had said in an October 2003 editorial. During the month of May 2004, the had said in an October 2003 editorial. During the month of May 2004, the Post Post carried thirteen editorials on the subject, most of them lengthy. The first struck a theme to which the newspaper would return repeatedly: "The rule of law matters." The second one struck the counterpoint, hanging the blame around the neck of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld: "The foundation for the crimes at Abu Ghraib was laid more than two years ago, when Mr. Rumsfeld inst.i.tuted a system of holding detainees from Afghanistan not only incommunicado, without charge, and without legal process, but without any meaningful oversight mechanism at all." carried thirteen editorials on the subject, most of them lengthy. The first struck a theme to which the newspaper would return repeatedly: "The rule of law matters." The second one struck the counterpoint, hanging the blame around the neck of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld: "The foundation for the crimes at Abu Ghraib was laid more than two years ago, when Mr. Rumsfeld inst.i.tuted a system of holding detainees from Afghanistan not only incommunicado, without charge, and without legal process, but without any meaningful oversight mechanism at all."

The Pentagon's response to the Post Post editorial page's campaign was to accuse it of being as bad as the torturers. Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita wrote in a letter to the editor, "The editorial page's campaign was to accuse it of being as bad as the torturers. Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita wrote in a letter to the editor, "The Post's Post's continued editorializing on narrow definitions of international laws and whether our soldiers understand them puts the continued editorializing on narrow definitions of international laws and whether our soldiers understand them puts the Post Post in the same company as those involved in this despicable behavior in terms of apparent disregard for basic human dignity." It was a remarkable way for the Pentagon to treat an editorial page that had been a political ally in the Iraq war. in the same company as those involved in this despicable behavior in terms of apparent disregard for basic human dignity." It was a remarkable way for the Pentagon to treat an editorial page that had been a political ally in the Iraq war.

Yet it would prove to be an oddity of the Iraq war that, despite the loss of such supporters, President Bush would win reelection six months later, as his opponent, John Kerry, seemed unable to articulate a clear stance on the war.

The New York Times New York Times asks some questions asks some questions The newspaper that would be most affected by postinvasion reconsiderations was the New York Times, New York Times, which for a year had resisted looking under the rock of Judith Miller's coverage. It is an old saying in the public relations business that bad news is like dead fish: It doesn't improve with age, it only begins to stink more. That axiom proved doubly true for the which for a year had resisted looking under the rock of Judith Miller's coverage. It is an old saying in the public relations business that bad news is like dead fish: It doesn't improve with age, it only begins to stink more. That axiom proved doubly true for the Times, Times, whose resistance to review was becoming embarra.s.sing by the spring of 2004. whose resistance to review was becoming embarra.s.sing by the spring of 2004.

On the heels of her reckless prewar coverage of Iraqi WMD, Miller had traveled to Iraq and cut a wide swath. Embedding with an Army unit searching for weapons of ma.s.s destruction, she filed a series of articles in the spring of 2003 that suggested that large amounts of stockpiles were about to be uncovered. Like the Bush administration, Miller seemed to believe what she was saying about WMD. It was almost as if she were operating in a parallel universe. On April 21, she reported that members of a search team had been told by an Iraqi scientist that "Iraq [had] destroyed chemical weapons and biological warfare equipment only days before the war began." Two days later, the lead on her story was that American forces "have occupied a vast warehouse complex in Baghdad filled with chemicals where Iraqi scientists are suspected of having tested unconventional agents on dogs within the past year." On May 4, she reported that experts had "found sources of radioactive material." Later that week they concluded that they had found "a mobile biological weapons laboratory." Then, she reported, they found another radiation source.

When Mission Exploitation Team Alpha, the unit to which she was attached, was rea.s.signed, she even sent a note to the Army protesting the move. "I intend to write about this decision in the NY Times to send a successful team back home just as progress on WMD is being made," she wrote in an e-mail.

More than a half-dozen military officers said that Miller had played an extremely unusual role as an embedded reporter, effectively operating as a middleman between Chalabi's organization and the Army unit, MET Alpha. Through the Chalabi connection, she also got MET Alpha involved in interrogating deposed Iraqi officials, a U.S. military officer said. Zaab Sethna, an INC adviser, would later dispute that account, but U.S. military officers said that Miller had played an unusually obtrusive role for a journalist. "This woman came in with a plan," one officer said. "She ended up almost hijacking the mission."

A staff officer on the 75th Exploitation Task Force, of which MET Alpha was a part, said, "It's impossible to exaggerate the impact she had on the mission of this unit, and not for the better."

The New York Times' New York Times' official reaction to stories about Miller's antics was a Nixonian stonewall. "She didn't bring MET Alpha anywhere.... It's a baseless accusation," the newspaper's a.s.sistant managing editor for news, Andrew Rosenthal, said. "Singling out one reporter for this kind of examination is a little bizarre." official reaction to stories about Miller's antics was a Nixonian stonewall. "She didn't bring MET Alpha anywhere.... It's a baseless accusation," the newspaper's a.s.sistant managing editor for news, Andrew Rosenthal, said. "Singling out one reporter for this kind of examination is a little bizarre."

Even more embarra.s.sing for the Times, Times, Miller also a.s.serted in an angry e-mail intended only for internal consumption that her main source for stories on Iraqi weapons of ma.s.s destruction was Ahmed Chalabi. "I've been covering Chalabi for about 10 years, and have done most of the stories about him for our paper, including the long takeout we recently did on him," she wrote to John Burns, the Miller also a.s.serted in an angry e-mail intended only for internal consumption that her main source for stories on Iraqi weapons of ma.s.s destruction was Ahmed Chalabi. "I've been covering Chalabi for about 10 years, and have done most of the stories about him for our paper, including the long takeout we recently did on him," she wrote to John Burns, the Times's Times's Baghdad bureau chief. "He has provided most of the front-page exclusives on WMD to our paper." (Miller later backed down from that a.s.sertion, telling the Post's Sally Quinn that she had been using a kind of journalistic shorthand in that note: "In my reporting experience, it is not accurate to say that he provided most of the WMD material to the Baghdad bureau chief. "He has provided most of the front-page exclusives on WMD to our paper." (Miller later backed down from that a.s.sertion, telling the Post's Sally Quinn that she had been using a kind of journalistic shorthand in that note: "In my reporting experience, it is not accurate to say that he provided most of the WMD material to the Times Times or to the U.S. government." But both she and Chalabi had made statements that undercut that revised account.) or to the U.S. government." But both she and Chalabi had made statements that undercut that revised account.) Miller's troubles were only beginning. When she returned to the United States that summer she would have several talks with I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the former Wolfowitz aide who had become Cheney's chief of staff at the White House. Those meetings ultimately would carry major legal consequences.

Jack Shafer, the media critic for Slate, Slate, the on-line magazine, became a powerful critic of Miller's stories, observing that she seemed to have agreed to a series of unusual coverage rules, that her sourcing was awkward at best, and-worst of all-that her stories weren't standing up. Where, he asked, were the editors, and when was the the on-line magazine, became a powerful critic of Miller's stories, observing that she seemed to have agreed to a series of unusual coverage rules, that her sourcing was awkward at best, and-worst of all-that her stories weren't standing up. Where, he asked, were the editors, and when was the Times Times going to address the issue? "Miller was one of the more eager consumers of defector baloney," he wrote in April 2004, "but the newspaper of record has yet to untangle the lies from the Iraqi defectors and exiles that Miller dutifully published." going to address the issue? "Miller was one of the more eager consumers of defector baloney," he wrote in April 2004, "but the newspaper of record has yet to untangle the lies from the Iraqi defectors and exiles that Miller dutifully published."

First, in May 2004, more than a year after the invasion of Iraq, the Times Times responded with an official once over lightly. It declined to name the people it was writing about, though they were reporters whose names were readily available at the top of each article examined. Though the review didn't say so, five of the six articles it called into question had been written or cowritten by Miller. Seemingly more solicitous of the sensibilities of the responded with an official once over lightly. It declined to name the people it was writing about, though they were reporters whose names were readily available at the top of each article examined. Though the review didn't say so, five of the six articles it called into question had been written or cowritten by Miller. Seemingly more solicitous of the sensibilities of the Times's Times's staffers than of its readers, the article backed into the point, beginning by saying that in checking its work, "we found an enormous amount of journalism that we are proud of." This was rather like an airline beginning a press release about a crash by listing all the flights that had landed successfully. But, it continued, "we have found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been." This review ran on page ten of the newspaper, though it was clearly going to be the most noticed staffers than of its readers, the article backed into the point, beginning by saying that in checking its work, "we found an enormous amount of journalism that we are proud of." This was rather like an airline beginning a press release about a crash by listing all the flights that had landed successfully. But, it continued, "we have found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been." This review ran on page ten of the newspaper, though it was clearly going to be the most noticed Times Times story of the day. story of the day.

A few days later, Daniel Okrent, the Times's Times's new public editor, or ombudsman, lowered the boom. He named Judith Miller and Patrick Tyler as authors of the bad stories and faulted editors for a variety of errors, such as never telling the newspaper's readers that Ahmed Chalabi's niece had been employed by the new public editor, or ombudsman, lowered the boom. He named Judith Miller and Patrick Tyler as authors of the bad stories and faulted editors for a variety of errors, such as never telling the newspaper's readers that Ahmed Chalabi's niece had been employed by the Times's Times's Kuwait bureau in 2003. The ombudsman's own reporting led him to conclude that the paper had a "dysfunctional system" of managing certain reporters. The next installment in the saga came in September, when the Kuwait bureau in 2003. The ombudsman's own reporting led him to conclude that the paper had a "dysfunctional system" of managing certain reporters. The next installment in the saga came in September, when the Times Times exorcised one of its demons with a huge review of the Bush administration's handling of intelligence about Iraq's supposed nuclear program. The story, which ran nearly ten thousand words, was among other things effectively a correction of the exorcised one of its demons with a huge review of the Bush administration's handling of intelligence about Iraq's supposed nuclear program. The story, which ran nearly ten thousand words, was among other things effectively a correction of the Times Times story on the same subject that had run in September 2002. story on the same subject that had run in September 2002.

In the New York Review of Books, New York Review of Books, Michael Ma.s.sing's verdict was that many major newspapers had erred, but that the Michael Ma.s.sing's verdict was that many major newspapers had erred, but that the New York Times New York Times stood out in particular. "Compared to other major papers, the stood out in particular. "Compared to other major papers, the Times Times placed more credence in defectors, expressed less confidence in inspectors, and paid less attention to dissenters." Shortly after leaving his post at the placed more credence in defectors, expressed less confidence in inspectors, and paid less attention to dissenters." Shortly after leaving his post at the Times, Times, Okrent would summarize its coverage of the WMD issue as "really very bad journalism." Okrent would summarize its coverage of the WMD issue as "really very bad journalism."

But Miller wasn't giving up. Speaking at the University of California at Berkeley in 2005, Miller would defend her coverage, saying that she "wrote the best a.s.sessment that I could based on the information that I had."

"Do you have any misgivings?" she was asked.

No, Miller said. "I think I did the best possible job I could do," she said. "So no, I really don't."

Iraq ultimately would prove lethal to Miller's career at the New York Times. New York Times. The last act began with others' articles in her own newspaper and in the The last act began with others' articles in her own newspaper and in the Washington Post: Washington Post: On July 6, 2003, the On July 6, 2003, the Times's Times's op-ed page carried an article by former amba.s.sador Joseph C. Wilson IV alleging that President Bush, in his State of the Union address seven months earlier, had exaggerated intelligence about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium in Niger for its nuclear weapons program. He related how he had traveled to Africa for the CIA to look into those intelligence reports, and had found that Niger's uranium mines were a small industry with "too much oversight" to permit such leakage. Eight days later, conservative pundit Robert Novak wrote a column in the op-ed page carried an article by former amba.s.sador Joseph C. Wilson IV alleging that President Bush, in his State of the Union address seven months earlier, had exaggerated intelligence about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium in Niger for its nuclear weapons program. He related how he had traveled to Africa for the CIA to look into those intelligence reports, and had found that Niger's uranium mines were a small industry with "too much oversight" to permit such leakage. Eight days later, conservative pundit Robert Novak wrote a column in the Washington Post Washington Post that, in the course of responding to Wilson, disclosed that "two senior Bush administration officials" had told him that Wilson's wife was a CIA operative named Valerie Plame, who specialized in WMD issues, and that she had helped arrange his trip to Niger. that, in the course of responding to Wilson, disclosed that "two senior Bush administration officials" had told him that Wilson's wife was a CIA operative named Valerie Plame, who specialized in WMD issues, and that she had helped arrange his trip to Niger.

For a federal official to leak the name of a covert intelligence operative may have been a crime. The subsequent investigation led Justice Department lawyers to want to talk to reporters who had had contact with Bush administration officials. One of them was Miller. She declined to cooperate, so in 2004, a federal court held her in contempt. Ultimately, she was jailed for refusing to testify. After eighty-five days behind bars in the federal facility in Alexandria, Virginia, Miller changed her mind, announcing that Libby had told her she could name him, and appeared before the grand jury. On September 30, 2005, she testified that her source had been Libby, Cheney's aide. She wouldn't share her notes with Times Times reporters writing about the situation. Jill Abramson, the newspaper's tough managing editor, all but called Miller a liar in print, following a dispute over what the two had said to each other. Within a few weeks Miller's career at the reporters writing about the situation. Jill Abramson, the newspaper's tough managing editor, all but called Miller a liar in print, following a dispute over what the two had said to each other. Within a few weeks Miller's career at the Times Times ended. ended.

Congress stirs In the spring of 2004, Congress briefly embraced a more significant role in overseeing the management of the Iraq war. Congress was awakened by the Abu Ghraib prison torture scandal, and by the realization, forced by mounting casualties and persistent widespread violence, that the administration line wasn't playing out. At an unusually contentious hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Hillary Clinton issued a virtual indictment of Wolfowitz: Given your track record, the New York Democrat asked, why should we believe your a.s.surances now? "You come before this committee... having seriously undermined your credibility over a number of years now. When it comes to making estimates or predictions about what will occur in Iraq, and what will be the costs in lives and money,... you have made numerous predictions, time and time again, that have turned out to be untrue and were based on faulty a.s.sumptions." As Wolfowitz sat before her at the witness table, she quoted his previous testimony from the run-up to the war in which he had a.s.serted that the Iraqi people would see the United States as their liberator, that Iraq could finance its own reconstruction, and that Gen. Shinseki's estimate that it would take several hundred thousand troops to occupy Iraq was "outlandish." Wolfowitz ignored most of Clinton's comments in his response, but told her that in disputing Shinseki's estimate he had been siding with Gen. Franks, who was closer to the action in Iraq.

Wolfowitz took on a somewhat haunted look during this period. In private meetings he sometimes seemed profoundly fatigued. He could be disjointed when defending his views, in striking contrast to his challenging stance of the previous summer and fall. One friend said that Wolfowitz had begun to worry that he would be scapegoated for Iraq.

Wolfowitz took another pounding when he appeared before the House Armed Services Committee in June 2004. Rep. Skelton looked at Wolfowitz and said he had no doubt that the administration intended to stay the course. But, he added, "There's a difference between resolve, on the one hand, and competence, on the other." That comment, unusually pointed from the soft-spoken Skelton, set the tone of the hearing. "I see two Iraqs," he continued. "One is the optimistic Iraq that you describe, and we thank you for your testimony. And the other Iraq is the one that I see every morning, with the violence, the deaths of soldiers and Marines." Watching CNN with his breakfast each day and hearing announced the small towns that had been the homes of soldiers killed in Iraq, Skelton was beginning to suspect that rural America was suffering disproportionately in this war. The previous day, five soldiers had died-from Glade Spring, Virginia; Cleburne, Arkansas; Hardin, Kentucky; Whitfield, Georgia; and Harris, Texas. "I must tell you, it breaks my heart a little more every day."

"You said I presented an optimistic picture," Wolfowitz responded. "Maybe it's optimistic compared to the total gloom and doom that one otherwise hears, but I in no way mean to minimize the security problem." It is important to remember, Wolfowitz added, that Saddam hadn't acted alone in his evil acts. As he did so frequently when his back was to the wall on Iraq, Wolfowitz played the n.a.z.i card. "He had some thousands of people in his so-called Mukhabarat, the so-called intelligence service, which is probably best described as the modern-day equivalent of the n.a.z.i Gestapo. He had other even more horrendous killers in something called the Fedayeen Saddam, which I guess is like the Hitler Youth, or like the SS perhaps." Later in the hearing he even went so far as to say some Iraqis might have been worse than the n.a.z.is: "We are dealing with several thousand people who are as bad or worse than the n.a.z.i Gestapo."

What the hearing would be most remembered for was Wolfowitz's own attack- on the American press corps in Baghdad. There was lots of good news to report, he insisted, but the reporters somehow were too cowardly to get out there and cover it. "Frankly, part of our problem is [that] a lot of the press are afraid to travel very much, so they sit in Baghdad and they publish rumors," he said. "And rumors are plentiful." It wasn't a particularly logical statement, and Wolfowitz would back down from it two days later, issuing a letter of apology.

Gen. Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, insisted that "great progress" was being made on all fronts in Iraq. "I think we're on the brink of success," he told the House Armed Services Committee.

Ultimately, that was enough for Congress, which again backed away from the subject of Iraq. There was little follow-up investigation or oversight. There were, for example, no hearings with returning division commanders. In retrospect, the hearings of May and June 2004 were a spasm before the election season. They made it appear that Congress was paying attention, but they did little to affect the course of events on the ground or to produce more information for the American people. "I know a bunch of folks on the Armed Services committees," said a former Bush administration official who was deeply involved in defense issues, and especially in the handling of Iraq. "If any of those folks had called me and asked me to speak to them candidly about Iraq, I would have. But no one ever did."

At Fort Bragg, North Carolina, Capt. Ian Fishback, who had served with the 82nd Airborne Division near Fallujah, watched Pentagon officials give congressional testimony with growing disbelief. Rumsfeld "testified that we followed ... the letter of the Geneva Conventions in Iraq, and as soon as he said that I knew something was wrong," Fishback said later. In Iraq and in Afghanistan, where he had also served, he remembered bewilderment about how prisoners should be treated. "I am certain that this confusion contributed to a wide range of abuses including death threats, beatings, broken bones, murder, exposure to elements, extreme forced physical exertion, hostage-taking, stripping, sleep deprivation, and degrading treatment," he later wrote. "I and troops under my command witnessed some of these abuses in both Afghanistan and Iraq."

Fishback, who had been cla.s.s president, football MVP, and "most likely to succeed" in high school in Newberry, Michigan, talked to West Point cla.s.smates about it over the following weekend, and to a chaplain he respected, and then decided to approach his chain of command. His company commander wasn't welcoming: "Don't expect me to go to bat for you on this issue if you take this up," he recalled being told. (It was an unfortunate phrase to use, given that one of the allegations was that a soldier in Fishback's unit had amused himself by beating a prisoner with a baseball bat.) Next Fishback talked to his battalion commander, who sent him to a military lawyer who rea.s.sured him that, while there were some gray areas, the law had been followed. Unsatisfied, and feeling that Army soldiers deserved better, Fishback continued to ask questions. Ultimately, after seventeen months of pushing the issue internally, he would contact Sen. John McCain, who had questioned Rumsfeld's handling of detention issues. "We owe our soldiers better than this," Fishback wrote.

Chalabi bolts At the same time, the U.S. relationship with Ahmed Chalabi soured. The politician had been a longtime ally of the Pentagon, and a major source of its intelligence information; as late as January 2004, he had remained in the good graces of at least part of the Bush administration, and had been given a place of honor behind Mrs. Bush at that year's State of the Union address. But just five months later, early on the morning of May 20, 2004, Chalabi's home in Baghdad was raided. Officially the operation was conducted by Iraqi police, and was a matter for Iraqi police and the Iraqi judge who had issued a warrant. Chalabi called the raid "an act of political intimidation" and said that he believed that Bremer had been behind it. In fact, while the raid officially was an operation of Iraqi forces, it was actually conducted by the CIA and SEAL Team 6, said a senior U.S. intelligence official with direct access to that information. "We hit his place hard because he had the records of Sunni generals that were directing the insurgency" but wouldn't turn them over, this official said.

Other U.S. officials hinted darkly that there was more to the matter, and it only took a few phone calls by reporters to be told by another U.S. intelligence official that Chalabi's organization had conveyed information to the Iranian government that was considered very damaging to U.S. intelligence gathering. An American intelligence official in Baghdad had gotten drunk and told Chalabi that the Americans were routinely listening in on all his conversations and reading his e-mails, the first senior intelligence official said. He said that the American eavesdroppers then caught Chalabi telling an Iranian intelligence contact, "You have to understand, the Americans are reading your traffic."

Chalabi denied that allegation. "The whole thing is ridiculous," he told the Middle East Quarterly Middle East Quarterly in an interview later that year. "I did not give any such information to the Iranians, and no U.S. official told me cla.s.sified information." But he conceded that he had met with Iranian intelligence officials, adding that he had met with such officials from every country bordering Iraq. in an interview later that year. "I did not give any such information to the Iranians, and no U.S. official told me cla.s.sified information." But he conceded that he had met with Iranian intelligence officials, adding that he had met with such officials from every country bordering Iraq.

Chalabi also seemed nonchalant about the possibility that his organization had helped mislead the U.S. government into war. Told by another interviewer that some people who had once supported the war now felt they had been suck-ered, he said, "Okay." Asked if he felt any discomfort with the fact that many of the arguments for justifying the invasion had crumbled, Chalabi indicated that the ends justified the means. "No," he said. "We are in Baghdad now."

In his new incarnation, Chalabi began to sound like one of the Bush administration's harsher critics. "What did fourteen months of occupation achieve?" he asked rhetorically in the interview with the Middle East Quarterly. Middle East Quarterly. "The electricity still doesn't work, thousands are dead, the United States has lost the moral high ground in the Middle East, and the UN, which opposed the liberation of Iraq, has been allowed to impose Baathists back on the Iraqi people." "The electricity still doesn't work, thousands are dead, the United States has lost the moral high ground in the Middle East, and the UN, which opposed the liberation of Iraq, has been allowed to impose Baathists back on the Iraqi people."

In June, President Bush was asked at a Rose Garden press conference about the Iraqi exile leader. "Chalabi? My meetings with him were very brief," the president said. "I mean, I think I met with him at the State of the Union and just kind of working through the rope line, and he might have come with a group of leaders. But I haven't had any extensive conversations with him." Asked then whether Chalabi had misled the U.S. government, Bush said, "I don't remember anyone walking into my office saying, 'Chalabi says this is the way it's going to be in Iraq.'" Then the president chuckled.

TURNOVER.

SUMMER TO WINTER 2004.

O.

n June 28,2004, Amba.s.sador Bremer quietly handed over official control of Iraq to Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, head of the new interim government, in a small, almost secret ceremony that lasted just five minutes and was shrouded from the public by the multiple layers of security still necessary to bring safety to the Green Zone. It was conducted two days ahead of schedule in order to keep terrorists from trying to disrupt it. A few minutes later, Bremer sent his 779th and last "cable" from Baghdad. Addressed "To SecDef/To SecState/To White House NSC," it stated, "This is the final message to be transmitted by the Coalition Provisional Authority headquarters in Baghdad, Iraq, Baghdad 779."

At a NATO summit meeting in Turkey, Condoleezza Rice pa.s.sed a note to President Bush: "Mr. President," she wrote, "Iraq is sovereign. Letter was pa.s.sed from Bremer at 10:26 AM Iraq time. Condi."

Across the lower left-hand corner of the note Bush scrawled, "Let freedom reign!" Bremer boarded a helicopter to the Baghdad airport and departed the country almost stealthily, with no public ceremony at the airport and only a previously taped farewell address aired on Iraqi television. He climbed aboard an Air Force C-130 transport aircraft, and then, for security reasons, after his small farewell party left, transferred by helicopter to another plane. Contrary to official expectations when he landed thirteen months earlier, there were still few commercial flights at the Baghdad airport, and none operated by U.S. carriers.

"I knew there were big security concerns, but I figured that at the very least we'd have a ceremony with a few hundred Iraqis-something that would be televised for the country to see," one American working for the CPA said. "This was embarra.s.sing."

"He left Iraq in such an appropriate way, running out of town," sneered one former Special Forces officer who worked in the Green Zone.

"Put bluntly, CPA never got on top of it, and they did not do their job to a pa.s.sing grade level," said Charles Costello, who at the CPA was trying to establish an Iraqi government. "I thought highly of Bremer and hesitate to criticize him, and yet he took bad advice and acted on it on a couple of big issues, and failed to see, I think, that he needed to really clean out his staff about halfway through.... Even though he had the right instincts and was a very hardworking, good manager and all, in the end you've got to hold him accountable and say, 'Guess what: You guys did not get the job done.'"

Casey takes command The occupation was hardly over-there would be more U.S. troops in Iraq at the end of 2005 than there were on the day Bremer left the country. But his departure, and that of Sanchez soon afterward, were the most positive events in a long time. The biggest shift in the U.S. effort in mid-2004 wasn't in policy but in people. Bremer was replaced by John Negroponte, a career diplomat who had been the U.S. amba.s.sador to the United Nations. The change was felt immediately, both in Washington and Baghdad. The U.S. effort suddenly felt less hapless. "As soon as we got Negroponte out there, and got State involved, everything changed," said Richard Armitage, who was deputy secretary of state at the time. "We had reporting, it was orderly, things started to run." Under the new team, "we started getting reams of reporting, so we got the texture of society, we got the debate of society, we got all of it." Also, Armitage said, Negroponte's aides set out to clean up the Green Zone. "They weren't s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g in the chapel anymore. I don't know about the Blue Goose or whatever that place was"-a reference to a supposed brothel in the zone, said to have been named after a Panamanian establishment notorious among U.S. Navy sailors.

In a parallel improvement, Army Gen. George Casey, Jr., was tapped to replace Sanchez. Abizaid had been expected by some to play a bigger role in Iraq but had concluded that doing so would distract him from paying sufficient attention to the rest of the region for which he was responsible. The two immediate tactical problems he faced were Iraq and Afghanistan, he told reporters, but "the two broadest strategic problems that we have to deal with, that must be dealt with in a broad range, happen to be Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. So it was never an issue of getting the Centcom headquarters into the tactical fight-you do that at great peril to the broader mission." This is a credible argument, but it also begs the question of why Abizaid let Sanchez remain the top commander in Iraq for so long.

"Historians will remember Sanchez as the William Westmoreland of the Iraq War-the general who misunderstood the nature of the conflict he faced and thereby played into the enemy's hands," commented retired Army Col. Andrew Bacevich. When Sanchez took command, the insurgency had hardly Bacevich. When Sanchez took command, the insurgency had hardly begun, begun, while while a year later, when he left, "Iraq was all but coming apart at the seams." This is a harsh judgment but a fair one. a year later, when he left, "Iraq was all but coming apart at the seams." This is a harsh judgment but a fair one.

Like Sanchez, Casey had commanded the 1st Armored Division. He had no combat time but more political experience. Also, while Sanchez was a junior three-star general, Casey was a four-star officer, a former director of the Joint Staff, and vice chief of staff of the Army and so knowledgeable in political-military affairs, all of which gave him more heft both in dealing with the Pentagon and with his civilian counterparts. He soon formed a close working relationship with Negroponte, a welcome contrast to the debilitating strains subordinates had seen between Bremer and Sanchez.

The United States launches a counterinsurgency campaign In the wake of the personnel changes, U.S. policy also began to shift. Most notably, the summer of 2004 saw the beginning of fundamental changes in U.S. military presence and posture. On August 5,2004, Casey issued a campaign plan, a cla.s.sified doc.u.ment of about twenty-five pages, plus a series of appendices detailing aspects of the campaign. Remarkably, this was the first time that the U.S. effort in Iraq had a road map for attacking the insurgency. ("We did not have a campaign plan the whole time Sanchez was out there," recalled a senior military intelligence officer. Until Casey's arrival there had been only a kill and capture mission statement and "an endlessly debated draft of a campaign plan.") It was no accident that the British military, which had been unhappy with Sanchez and the performance of the U.S. Army, played a major role in shaping Casey's statement, remembered an officer who was involved. Casey's campaign plan essentially called for containing the insurgent violence, building up Iraqi security forces, rebuilding economically, and reaching out to the Sunni community through both coercion and cooptation, in an effort to persuade them of the inevitability of success for the U.S.-led side.

Casey's office a.s.sembled a strategy shop that reported to Maj. Gen. Stephen Sargeant, a veteran A-10 close attack jet pilot who worked the military personnel system to pull in nine of the smartest, best-educated officers in the U.S. military establishments, men who had commanded in the field and had also earned doctoral degrees at Stanford, Harvard, and MIT. Running the office was Col. William Hix, a veteran of special operations who was also the son of a CIA operative. These nine officers with Ph.D.s jokingly called themselves Doctors Without Orders, a play on the name of the French charitable organization Doctors Without Borders. But in fact they had a very clear mandate to think innovatively about how to improve U.S. strategy in Iraq.

Typical of this office was Kalev Sepp, the retired Special Forces officer. Lanky and mild-mannered, Sepp had fought in El Salvador, and gotten a Ph.D. in history at Harvard, and then he became a professor at the Naval Postgraduate School, where he specialized in counterinsurgency issues. One day in the fall of 2004, Hix took Sepp aside and asked him to write down the best practices of counterinsurgency campaigns for Casey. What works? What doesn't? What are the commonalities of successful campaigns, and what are the pitfalls seen in past failures? It was the ideal a.s.signment for Sepp, who had advised two brigades of the Salvadoran army and had read widely in the history of other counterinsur-gencies. In a thirty-six-hour binge, writing mainly off the top of his head and occasionally checking facts on the Internet, Sepp drafted a short paper that distilled the lessons of fifty-three counterinsurgency campaigns in the twentieth century, with an eye to identifying the characteristics of those that had won and those that hadn't. The study amounted to an indictment of the Army's approach to Iraq in 2003-4. Sepp listed twelve best practices of winners, and concluded that the U.S. effort in Iraq had followed only one: emphasis on intelligence. It hadn't established and expanded secure areas. The insurgents weren't isolated from the population. There was no program of amnesty and rehabilitation for them. There was no single authority, and there was no dynamic or charismatic figure leading that authority. The police were not in the lead of the fight, supported by the military. And so on.

Sepp's chart of the nine unsuccessful characteristics reads like a summary of the U.S. occupation in 2003-4. These were his hallmarks of failure: * primacy of military direction of counter-insurgency* priority to kill-capture enemy, not on engaging population* battalion-size operations as the norm* military units concentrated on large bases for protection* Special Forces focused on raiding* adviser effort a low priority in personnel a.s.signment* building, training indigenous army in image of U.S. Army* peacetime government processes* open borders, airs.p.a.ce, coastlines The U.S. occupation hit each of these bad targets squarely, except the last; the military controlled the small coastline but still faced a stream of trouble coming over the Syrian border, and had lost its total dominance of the air as insurgents demonstrated their ability to down helicopters, forcing the restriction of some flights. Hix took the study to Casey and walked him through it. Over the next year, Casey would remake his campaign in part to address the points made by Sepp and others.

Casey at first didn't entirely get it, but officers subordinate to him did, as did some of his British advisers. And he was willing to learn. In the summer of 2004, his greatest contribution appears to have been mostly one of tone-especially his work to ensure that henceforth the U.S. civilian and military efforts would cooperate rather than clash.

Training Iraqis begins again After nearly a year of indirection and collapse in the program to train Iraqi security forces, Lt. Gen. Petraeus was put in charge of it in mid-2004. Essentially, the U.S. plan was to keep a lid on Iraq until such time as newly created Iraqi forces could take over the fight. "When Dave came on there was a palpable feel of dynamism, increased pressure on us to train," recalled one Army officer, a veteran of 2003 in Iraq. Most notably, Petraeus reoriented the training of the Iraqi army. The initial thought had been to create a mechanized force at least able to deter Iran, Iraq's traditional foe. Petraeus, observing that there was an enemy already present- that is, the insurgency-focused instead on creating a lighter force able to fight it.

Even so, training Iraqis was a fragile foundation on which to base U.S. operations, because they were nowhere near ready to take the lead role in putting down the insurgency. When Rand Corporation researchers visited Baghdad in the fall of 2004, they found there was a gap of sixty thousand between the number of trained police claimed by the top Iraqi police officer and the number cited by U.S. officials.

U.S. public attention wanes, Iraqi violence increases By the early fall of 2004, the bloom was off the new rose of the interim Iraqi government. In a September survey conducted by Iraqis and funded by the U.S. government, Iraqis blamed the U.S.-led occupation force and foreign terrorists equally. "Thinking about the difficult situation in Iraq currently, whether in terms of security, the economy or living conditions, who-in your view-is most to blame?" the pollsters asked. The occupation force was blamed by 33 percent of the two thousand respondents, and "foreign terrorists" by 32 percent. Some 45 percent of those polled said the country was heading in the wrong direction, an increase from 31 percent earlier in the summer, just after the handover of official control, though the U.S. military remained the most powerful ent.i.ty in the country. Most of those who thought it was going wrong cited the security situation.

The attention of the U.S. public seemed to be drifting elsewhere, but the violence intensified in the summer and fall of 2004. Battles were being fought in cities for a second and third time. A fierce fight in August to take back the city of Najaf from Moqtadr al-Sadr's militia attracted only pa.s.sing notice in the United States. A total of 148 U.S. troops were lost during the summer, 10 more than had died invading the country in the spring of 2003. One division alone, the 1st Cavalry, lost seventy tanks during its one-year tour in Baghdad, according to Army Brig. Gen. David Fastabend. (One of the 1st Cav soldiers. .h.i.t hard was the son of Maj. Gen. Odierno, who lost most of his left arm to an RPG shot in Baghdad in August 2004.) By September, recalled Sattler, the Marine commander, every U.S. vehicle that moved near Fallujah was shot at. In an official Army survey conducted in the late summer, 76 percent of soldiers questioned said they had been on the receiving end of rocket or mortar attacks during their time in Iraq. A year earlier only 57 percent of soldiers had said this.

More than a year into the occupation, U.S. forces were no longer surprised to be engaged in high-intensity combat. Iraq had become a real war, one that would occupy s.p.a.ce in future history textbooks far more than, say, the 1991 Gulf War, which was celebrated as a great victory at the time but now appears to have been the opening skirmish of a very long war. By May 2004, the new conflict had produced more U.S. military casualties than the Spanish-American War, and about as many wounded as the War of 1812 and the Mexican War.

On June 24, 2004, a platoon of National Guard soldiers from North Carolina was ambushed while patrolling in Baqubah. Insurgents then overran several government buildings in the central part of the city, killing a score of Iraqi policemen. A young tank commander from the 1st Infantry Division named Lt. Neil Prakash led the rescue mission. "Captain Fowler came sprinting over, all out of wind, and says, 'All right, the whole company is going to Baqubah, I've just been given the order,'" he recalled. '"Baqubah is under siege-the police station, the CMOC [Civil Military Operations Center]-all have been attacked, so we're going in.'" Prakash, in the lead tank, ran straight into a kilometer-long ambush in which his tank was struck seven times by rocket-propelled grenades, and by roadside bombs and machine-gun fire. One hit blew the navigation system off the vehicle. Another one, to the tank's rear deck, twisted a metal plate upward and blocked the turret from rotating, forcing Prakash to maneuver his tank in order to fire his guns at the enemy fighters.

"There's a shockingly loud explosion ahead, and a plume of smoke comes off Lieutenant Prakash's tank in the lead," Steve Mumford, a New York artist embedded with the unit, wrote in an account of the battle. He was in an M-113 armored troop carrier following Prakash. "The column stops. His tank has been hit with an RPG from over a wall on the left, and his gunner blasts a round through the wall."

Insurgents were also trying to toss hand grenades into the open hatches and fire into them from rooftops, so Prakash ordered his men to close all their hatches. "We just kept rolling, getting shot at from everywhere," the lieutenant later said in a statement.

Prakash was very much a product of the twenty-first-century United States. Born in Bangalore, India, he grew up in Syracuse, New York, and graduated from Johns Hopkins University in 2002, having majored in neuroscience. While in Iraq he also maintained a blog, in which he noted that he was "currently enrolled in the School of Hard Knocks."

When Prakash's platoon was ordered to establish a defensive perimeter, he took advantage of the pause to roll back to the edge of town for emergency repairs on his tank. "The mechanics beat the twisted metal plate down with sledgehammers until the turret can move," Mumford wrote. His M-113 also had been hit by an RPG. "It looked like a baseball coming straight at us," Mumford recalled one soldier saying. The hasty repairs completed, Prakash headed back into the fight and saw a truck that he thought was resupplying the insurgents. "We blasted it with a main round from about one hundred meters away," Prakash later told the Army. It apparently was loaded with RPGs and other weaponry. "The thing just blew to shreds. You could see the tubes from the launchers go flying in the air."

Prakash's platoon was told to establish a blocking position, which it held until the following morning. All told, the Army credited him and his crew with killing numerous enemy fighters and destroying eight enemy strongpoints or bunkers, plus the truck. For his actions that day he would be awarded the Silver Star, the Army's third highest decoration, after the Medal of Honor and the Distinguished Service Cross. "Lt. Prakash turned the momentum against the enemy in Baqubah on 24 June," Maj. Gen. Batiste, the commander of the 1st Infantry Division, wrote later in recommending Prakash for the medal. Looking back almost two years later, Batiste said that the action involving Prakash was typical of the division's time in Iraq from February 2004 to February 2005. "Something like that would go on for three days, then we'd get it quiet, and it would stay that way for weeks."

That fall would find Prakash heading into the second big battle of Fallujah, where his unit was sent to augment the Marines. After that fight, another soldier told him that Hollywood was going to make a movie about it, and asked who would play him. Probably, Prakash responded, Apu-the hangdog Indian immigrant who in The Simpsons The Simpsons television cartoon show manages a Kwik-E-Mart convenience store. television cartoon show manages a Kwik-E-Mart convenience store.

Air Force Senior Airman Brian Kolf.a.ge's war was different but ended with similar intensity. At about two o'clock on the afternoon of September 11,2004, the twenty-three-year-old military police officer who worked the night shift as a customs inspector at Balad air base, north of Baghdad, woke up and decided to go exercise. He walked out of his tent to pick up a bottle of water to help stave off the intense heat and was blasted sideways by the impact of an incoming 107 millimeter mortar round. He regained consciousness and tried to stand up. He couldn't. Both his legs were pretty much gone. His right arm also was destroyed. One of his friends applied tourniquets, but doctors later told him that what probably saved him from dying was that the heat of the blast had melted shut some of his severed arteries.

"The pain was really bad," he later told the Washington Post's Washington Post's Clarence Williams. "I was like, 'Give me some f.u.c.king pain killers or put me to sleep.'" He woke up two days later in a bed in Walter Reed Army Medical Center. "I was charred so bad, one of the doctors didn't even know I was white." Clarence Williams. "I was like, 'Give me some f.u.c.king pain killers or put me to sleep.'" He woke up two days later in a bed in Walter Reed Army Medical Center. "I was charred so bad, one of the doctors didn't even know I was white."

Despite the increase in violence, the abuse of detainees by troops appears to have declined in 2004, compared to the previous year, if the number of cases brought by the Army against soldiers is any indication. Cynics might say that this was because the Army was less inclined to bring cases, but in reality it likely occurred because U.S. tactics and training had improved as the Army adjusted to fighting an insurgency-and certainly because U.S. soldiers and their commanders had been sensitized to the issue.

Still, cases did occur. On October 24, 2004, Sgt. 1st Cla.s.s Jorge Diaz, a senior sergeant in a company of the 1st Infantry Division, held a 9 millimeter pistol to the head of a teenager who he had been told was guarding an insurgent weapons cache, and then Diaz hit and choked him. He then forced the youth to hold a smoke grenade from which the pin had been removed. He later released the boy. The next day, Sgt. Diaz was in the courtyard of a house in the village of Albu Shakur, north of Baghdad, watching over three prisoners whose hands were cuffed behind their backs. He had been told that one of them was the leader of an insurgent group. Frustrated that the men wouldn't talk, he had his men stand one of them up, told them to step back, and then shot the Iraqi in the face with his M-4 rifle, killing him. "I'm going to go to h.e.l.l for this," Diaz said later, according to subsequent testimony. Eight months later he was found guilty of unpremeditated murder, maltreatment of a prisoner, and impeding an investigation, and he was sentenced to eight years in prison. "He just lost it," said Batiste, the division commander.

Second Fallujah: November 2004 The key element in Gen. Casey's campaign plan was to eliminate safe havens for insurgents before the first round of parliamentary elections in January 2005. The biggest of those was in Fallujah. The battle to retake that city started just after the U.S. presidential election in November 2004. It was a once-and-for-all attack to send a message to the rest of the cities in the Sunni Triangle: You don't have to like the Americans, but if you tolerate the presence of the insurgents, this will be your fate.

Second Fallujah, as some in the U.S. government called it, was a fierce battle, but careful preparation prevented it from becoming a civilian bloodbath. While covered adequately by journalists, it probably received less attention than it should have. If a battle of this intensity had occurred during the spring 2003 invasion, reporters would have treated it like another D-Day. But by the fall of 2004, after eighteen months of roadside bombings, kidnappings, suicide attacks, and lengthy battles in Samarra, Baqubah, Fallujah, Najaf, and then again in Najaf and Samarra, journalists were fatigued and probably numbed somewhat to the violence.

The new battle followed months of military planning and political measures. The force a.s.sembled for the a.s.sault was more than three times the size of that in April, and included two Iraqi units. Another lesson learned from April was that the insurgents responded by attacking supply lines, so the Marines conducted a huge logistical buildup, stocking a mountain of food, ammunition, fuel, and other provisions that would enable the severed bases near the city to operate at full bore for fifteen days without being resupplied. In addition to using stocks on hand, some eleven million rounds of ammunition were brought in. Also, U.S. units were dispatched to the Iraqi-Syrian border to close ports of entry to all military-age males who might seek to reinforce the insurgents. Meanwhile, a concerted effort was made to encourage civilians to leave the city-the U.S. count was that by the time the offensive was launched, only 400 civilians remained, out of a city of perhaps 250,000. "It almost looked like the town was abandoned," remembered Col. Michael Shupp, commander of the 1st Marine Regiment, which would play a major role in the a.s.sault. Also, the interim Iraqi government was prepared to support the attack in its public statements.

"This was a truly epic fight," said Capt. Winslow, the Marine historian who was there. It featured, he said, "two groups willing to die for what they believed in: U.S. Marines and extremist insurgents." On the insurgent side, "we had people coming in from all over the world-franchise players and free agents." On the Marine side, there were determined young men, "educated, trained, comfortable with technology, and wanting to show these guys what we're made of."

On the cold, rainy day of November 8, several big 2,000-pound bombs were dropped on the railroad tracks on the northern edge of the city, signaling the beginning of the attack. Soon afterward some 6,500 Marines, 1,500 Army soldiers, and 2,000 Iraqi troops launched an a.s.sault on Fallujah that lasted about ten days. On top of that there were 2,500 Navy personnel in support roles-medics, doctors, Seabees, and air liaison officers. "It was huge," more than three times the size of the force used in April, said Toolan, who in August drafted the battle plan for Second Fallujah. It was probably the toughest battle the U.S. military had seen since the end of the Vietnam War more than three decades earlier. It certainly was the hardest combat seen by U.S. troops during thirteen years of military operations in and around Iraq. "The fighting was intense, close and personal, the likes of which has been experienced on just a few occasions since the battle of Hue City in the Vietnam War," Sattler and Lt. Col. Daniel Wilson, one of his planners, later wrote in the Marine Corps Gazette. Marine Corps Gazette.

Marine units moved into the city from an unexpected direction-not from the east, where they had a big base and where many of the hundreds of insurgent bunkers had been built to face them, but from the northwest. The 3rd Battalion of the 5th Marines "advanced south, with three companies and tanks abreast, in a systematic, block-by-block clearing movement called 'the squeegee,' preceded by rolling mortar and artillery fires, with airstrikes employed whenever a hard point was encountered," West, the former Pentagon official and expert on urban warfare, who was embedded with the Marines, wrote in the Marine Corps Gazette. Marine Corps Gazette. An Army artillery unit fired what it called shake-and-bake missions-using incendiary white phosphorous smoke rounds to flush out entrenched insurgents, and then high-explosive rounds to kill them. An Army artillery unit fired what it called shake-and-bake missions-using incendiary white phosphorous smoke rounds to flush out entrenched insurgents, and then high-explosive rounds to kill them.

The Marines compared the fighting to the Vietnam War, but in some ways the battle of Second Fallujah better evoked the island combat in the Pacific in World War II, in which the j.a.panese defenders knew they had no escape and so fought suicidally, from holes and fighting positions with no exit routes. Like the Pacific war, the fighting in Fallujah also had an episodic feel, going quickly from relative quiet into a blaze of violence, followed by weeks of mopping-up operations