Victims of circumstance
The U.S. faces some tough choices as the civilian toll grows in Iraq
That may sound preposterous to Americans, but it is a widely held view on which the insurgency feeds. Says Michael O'Hanlon, a scholar at Washington's Brookings Institution, "Why is the resistance estimated to be four times stronger today than it was? Why do people who didn't fight us a year ago choose to fight now? In some cases it is because their brother got killed."
During the initial invasion of Iraq, the military was squaring off against the remnants of the Republican Guard and irregular militias. In those fights, a combination of precision weapons and careful soldiers minimized--though hardly eliminated--civilian casualties. Now that America is supposed to be stabilizing and rebuilding the country, Iraqis expect U.S. forces to maintain order, provide security, and avoid killing civilians. But as the fight has undergone a metamorphosis into an urban guerrilla war--a scenario that was dreaded by military planners before the invasion of Iraq--precision weapons have grown less useful and arguably less precise.
Nevertheless, the United States has continued to rely on airstrikes, a tactic that is becoming increasingly controversial. The United States has used fearsome AC-130 gunships to attack individual safehouses in crowded areas. The Pentagon says the strikes will continue as the military works to retake towns controlled by insurgents. Take the example of the September 13 strike on Fallujah. The military said it was a precision attack with warplanes and artillery that destroyed a hideout where associates of Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab Zarqawi were meeting. But hospital officials told reporters that women and children were among the dead. They also said an ambulance carting wounded from the scene was destroyed by American forces, another image shown repeatedly on Arab TV.
Because of such incidents, State Department officials have quietly urged the Pentagon to curtail airstrikes--and some government officials portray Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld as too reliant on airpower. Using airstrikes in places like Fallujah is "the dumbest possible thing anybody could ever dream up," says a U.S. official who previously served in the military. "[The Pentagon] has this leadership that believes precision munitions are manna from heaven. They do not understand what is happening. This is the worst counterinsurgency effort I have seen in 40 years."
The military says the strikes have been effective and have minimized American casualties. Generals insist that Arab television--and to a lesser extent American media--have exaggerated the civilian toll. Part of the problem is that those who seem to be innocent bystanders sometimes are not. U.S. officers suspect some insurgents use children for reconnaissance missions or to distract soldiers. And there may be some truth to the suspicion; one insurgent, who calls himself Kaznow, told U.S. News that he has a group of kids as young as 8 in Fallujah who have been used to help in attacks. "One child can prepare a bomb while other children joke with the troops," Kaznow boasts.
Military officials say that in many cases they have no choice but to use airstrikes. It is often a matter of perspective. Arab journalists grilled an American general in Iraq last week about why a helicopter armed with rockets was used to destroy a disabled Bradley around which insurgents, civilians, and reporters had gathered. To Iraqis the attack seemed senseless: Was destroying a vehicle worth taking civilian lives? In Washington, Army officials said they could not let insurgents get the Bradley's communication gear. Many Bradleys are equipped with "blue force trackers" that show the location of American vehicles. If insurgents captured the tracker and could make it work, all American soldiers would be at risk. Using a ground force to retrieve the device would very likely have endangered soldiers and led to more civilian causalities. "Somalia, Somalia, Somalia," says an Army officer. "You send in a group and they get surrounded? It's a bad situation."
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