Word: combative
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...still hate this place," a soldier told me as I set out to embed with his unit in north Baghdad last week. For many of the soldiers in the 2nd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, this is a second or third deployment. Even so, they say it's significantly quieter this time than the last time. Sitting in Baghdad traffic, I watched as the gunner in the MRAP casually tossed a Red Bull out of the turret to an Iraqi pedestrian. The man on the sidewalk caught it as the U.S. soldiers giggled. Later at a dining facility...
...methodically into Gaza Saturday evening, each preceded by an armored bulldozer and supported by helicopters and drones giving Israeli commanders real-time images of the battle space for thousands of yards ahead of the lead bulldozer. Although Hamas had hoped to draw Israeli forces into hand-to-hand combat in the narrow warrens of Gaza's densely populated cities and refugee camps, the Israelis appear instead to be heading for the high ground, looking to seize strategic hilltops that would allow them to better control those parts of Gaza in which Hamas fighters are mingling with the civilian population...
...deployed along the northern border with Lebanon is intended to let Hizballah know that Israel has the resources to respond forcefully to any attempt by the Lebanese radical group to attack in solidarity with its allies in Gaza. The reserves also give Israel the capacity to free more combat units from duties elsewhere, like guarding settlements...
...announcing that one is turning over a new leaf is different from actually changing entrenched realities. The question now is whether the new constraints placed on the U.S. military by the security pact will indeed visibly shift leadership to the Iraqis by June - when U.S. combat troops are supposed to be out of Iraq's cities. Another question: What will the consequences of that shift in command responsibility be in terms of security and keeping order in Iraq? (See pictures of a detention center in Baghdad...
...soldiers say they have already been cooperating with their Iraqi counterparts. "I think there is going to be zero difference between what we do now and Jan. 1 and beyond," said Lieut. Colonel John Vermeesch just before the end of 2008. Vermeesch commands some 880 U.S. combat troops spread across five joint Iraqi-U.S. bases in northwest Baghdad. He is one of the battalion commanders in the 2nd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, a 4,000-troop force that arrived in Baghdad in mid-October to start a 12-month tour. They say they started complying with...