Word: commandeering
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Near a colonel's bunkered command post, soldiers fill empty shell casings with water from tank trucks. The sound of outgoing Iraqi artillery is constant, there is little fire coming from the Iranian side. Some of the men sleep beneath slanting canvas hutches. Others spread carpets on the sand and pray toward Mecca. When one enemy round explodes several hundred yards away, they continue their prayers without flinching. "During the [last] battle," says the colonel, with undisguised pride, "they were in their tanks for 36 hours, buttoned down all the time, and fighting. That...
...Islam, and they want Basra," he explains, "because they know the Shi'ites here will welcome them with open arms. The Shi'ites are not saying anything these days. They are waiting for the Iranian army to get here before they show their true feelings." All the commanders at the first line of Iraq's land defenses are loyal members of Saddam's Baath Party, and the men they command all belong to the Sunni sect, the ancient rivals of the Shi'ites...
Still, this time the Iranian high command abandoned its suicidal tactic of human wave assaults and adopted a more conventional deployment of armor and artillery to confront the Iraqis. The Iranian forces pushed eleven miles inside Iraqi territory before they were stopped by a ferocious counterattack near the strategic Iraqi port of Basra. For the spoils of a few miles of sun-baked marshland, some 2,000 Iranians lost their lives. Iraq now says that more than 21,000 Iranian troops have been killed in the abortive drive on Basra, while Iraqi casualties, though not publicized, are estimated...
...National Bank until he became Vice President in 1978, De la Espriella was regarded as a competent financial manager. He poses no threat to the dominant influence of the National Guard. Upon his assumption of office, he quickly obeyed a summons to a meeting of the guard high command...
Still, some of the stars continue to draw, and a very few continue to command huge salaries. Frank Sinatra, for instance, attracts not only customers, but high-rolling customers. During the eight days he played Atlantic City's Resorts International this past June, the drop was $6.5 million larger than it had been during the same period in 1981, more than enough to justify his staggering fee of $50,000 a show. "We didn't fork over the kind of money we gave Sinatra because we're nice guys," says Resorts Executive Vice President H. Steve Norton...