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G.I. Dies, Others Are Wounded in New Ambushes in Iraq

June 28, 2003
By EDMUND L. ANDREWS






BAGHDAD, Iraq, June 27 - American soldiers came under fire
again today across Iraq, with one soldier shot in the head
and wounded while shopping and another killed in an ambush
late last night near the southern city of Najaf.

Meanwhile, Army troops searching for two missing soldiers
found their Humvee early this evening, according to an
official who spoke on condition of anonymity. The discovery
came after soldiers had detained three men for questioning
in the case, but the official said the Humvee showed no
signs of blood or any immediate clue as to what had
happened to the soldiers.

Pentagon officials said they themselves had scant details
on the men's disappearance. "All we know right now is we do
have two soldiers who are missing from their appointed
place of duty," Gen. Peter Pace, the vice chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in Washington. "We do not know
the specifics of what happened or why."

The Army identified the missing soldiers as Sgt. First
Class Gladimir Phillippe, 37, of Linden, N.J., and Pfc.
Kevin Ott, 27, of Columbus, Ohio.

The latest attacks were similar to those carried out with
increasing frequency over the last several weeks, and well
beyond the cities just north of Baghdad that were
strongholds of support for Saddam Hussein and where most of
the early attacks took place.

In Washington, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said
the attacks did not rise to the level of organized
guerrilla warfare. "I don't know that I would use the
word," he said after a closed meeting with senators on
Capitol Hill.

Mr. Rumsfeld said many of the attackers were common
criminals, as well as the remnants of Mr. Hussein's
Fedayeen Saddam and Baath Party."They are out doing things
that are unhelpful to the coalition, and the coalition is
taking every step possible to root them out," he said.

One of today's incidents occurred in Kadhimiya, one of the
busiest shopping districts in Baghdad. An area populated
primarily by Shiite Muslims, Kadhimiya has been one of the
most peaceful neighborhoods of Baghdad and has not been
known for anti-American hostility.

In today's attack, an unknown assailant shot a soldier in
the head and badly wounded him while he was trying to buy
video discs from a sidewalk vendor. Several witnesses said
they heard a shot ring out, saw the soldier's body lying on
the ground and began to flee out of fear that American
soldiers nearby would retaliate with more gunfire.

The shooting occurred about 11 a.m., just a few hundred
yards from a mosque that attracts thousands of worshipers
for Friday Prayers.

According to the United States Central Command, a soldier
was killed in a small town near Najaf while investigating a
car theft.

Najaf, a holy city for Shiite Muslims, had also been
comparatively peaceful until the last few days. Though many
there were unhappy about the presence of American
occupation forces, the city is both geographically and
culturally distant from the Sunni-dominated cities north of
Baghdad.

There were other violent incidents today. Unidentified
attackers fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a logistics
convoy near the city of Balad, about 60 miles north of
Baghdad, injuring one soldier. According to The Associated
Press, an Army truck hit an explosive device north of
Baghdad and several wounded Americans had to be evacuated
by helicopter.

At the 28th Combat Support Hospital, about 40 miles south
of Baghdad, doctors were grappling for a second day with
near record numbers of wounded, Iraqis as well as
Americans. "People don't understand what a dangerous
environment it is here just to be walking around," said Dr.
Denver Perkins, the hospital's chief of staff. Though many
of the incoming patients are being treated for illnesses
and accidental injuries, he said, the current surge of
emergencies stems primarily from attacks on soldiers.

On Thursday, an exceptionally heavy day, eight soldiers
were injured and one was killed on the road to the Baghdad
International Airport, when their Humvee drove over what
appears to have been a remote-controlled bomb.

Though not significant from a military standpoint, the
attacks have made American troops much jumpier and more
vulnerable to making deadly mistakes. A few days ago,
American soldiers entered a neighborhood here known as New
Baghdad just as an Iraqi man was firing a gun in the air.

Residents said that the Iraqi man was not aiming at
anybody, but that the American soldiers quickly fired at
the man, killing a bystander, and eventually fired dozens
of bullets into the walls and windows of stores along the
street.

Meanwhile, American military officials are also struggling
to prevent acts of sabotage against electrical power
plants, water pumping stations, sewage systems and
pipelines that transport oil and gas.

Today, most of Baghdad had little or no electric power for
the fifth straight day. The widespread power failures have
forced people to live without fans or air-conditioners as
temperatures rise to more than 110 degrees Fahrenheit. The
loss of power has also disrupted water supplies and sewage
systems, both of which rely on electric pumps.

"We cannot work, we cannot do anything," said Sultan Ali
Kazimi, a jewelry trader in Kadhimiya. "How is it that all
the military bases have electricity and we don't? They
promised to deliver us these things, but they have not
delivered on those promises."

To help the reconstruction effort, five national security
policy experts, led by a former deputy defense secretary,
John Hamre, left Washington for Iraq this week at the
invitation of the Pentagon.

Mr. Hamre heads the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, which published two detailed reports this year on
the rebuilding effort in Iraq. The reports came to the
attention of Mr. Rumsfeld, who aides said was impressed
enough to help arrange the 12-day trip.

A senior Defense Department spokesman, Larry Di Rita, said
the team's mission in no way impugned the work of L. Paul
Bremer III, the top American administrator in Iraq, who
also invited the team. "This team wasn't dispatched to
rescue Bremer because Bremer doesn't need rescuing," Mr. Di
Rita said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/28/international/worldspecial/28IRAQ.html?ex=1057767390&ei=1&en=839f89cc64161f82


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