Word: lieut
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Outside, Mitchell links up with Lieut. Robert Carnahan and two six-man squads from White Platoon carrying M16s, heavy SAWs (squad automatic weapons) and 240-Bravo machine guns. Flanking them are three Bradley fighting vehicles. Mitchell, 34, briefs his men that a passing farmer has told a sentry about 10 men sweeping around for an ambush. On his command, the Americans run north through the choking red dust and throw themselves on the ground against a nearby railway track. "Jesus, we can't see s___!" says Carnahan. The squads hold their positions as the bradleys scan the area with thermal...
...Marines fan out, searching houses. A loudspeaker blasts a message in Arabic: Stay in your houses. We are here to help. "This is a place taken out of thousands of years ago when Jesus was walking the earth still," says Corporal Omar Monge, 20, driver for the battalion commander, Lieut. Colonel Bryan P. McCoy. A village elder approaches the battalion translator. Tell everyone not to be scared, he is told. But tell them if they shoot one bullet they will be very scared. We will shoot 2,000 bullets back...
What's more, the Iraqi leader has relied heavily on the Fedayeen to launch hit-and-run strikes. The Fedayeen and other Iraqi irregulars have employed deceptive tactics like shooting at allied forces while waving white flags. "The enemy has gone asymmetric on us," complains Lieut. Colonel Bryan McCoy, commander of the 3rd Brigade, 7th Marines. "There's treachery. There are ambushes. It's not straight-up conventional fighting." On Saturday, U.S. Marines recovered the bodies of seven missing U.S. troops who appeared to have been executed and then dumped in shallow graves outside Nasiriyah...
...that as the battle for Baghdad is joined in coming weeks, the U.S.'s unusually tight restrictions on target selection may be relaxed. Notes a Pentagon official: "We won't announce it." In the chaos of the battlefield, the old rules of engagement have already been tossed out. Lieut. Colonel Wes Gillman, commander of Task Force 130 of the 3rd Infantry Division, told his men, "If you see an Iraqi in civilian clothes coming toward you--even with a stick--shoot...
...problem growing, at least proportionally? The answer, in part, is that enemy fire is less of a problem. "We have so overwhelmed our enemies that the ratio has climbed," says Lieut. Colonel Chris Hughes of the 101st Airborne Division. "It is a direct reflection of the fact that our enemies have not been able to inflict serious damage on us." It's also a reflection of the way weapons systems have advanced faster than recognition capabilities. A target can be hit with precision long before it can be identified. The accuracy and lethality of modern U.S. weapons systems are also...