Word: ragtag
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...military says it's fighting back. This past week the army command sent in 15,000 regular army troops, helicopters, tanks and armored vehicles to battle Fazlullah's ragtag band of some 500 militants. The goal is to push them back into their mountain redoubts where the winter snows might keep them out of the way long enough to secure low-lying villages. When the fighting is over, says Fazli Raziq, he will return. But his wife Zaibi feels the violence will not end: "I know in my heart that there will never be peace." For her, and for many...
...This week the military launched an operation to reclaim control of Swat, sending in 15,000 troops, helicopters, tanks and armored vehicles to battle a ragtag army of some 500 militants. The goal is to push them back into their mountain redoubts, far from the civilian population. "We will bottle up as many of them as possible, and then eliminate them," says General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, Director General of Military operations. The army says that hundreds of militants have already been killed. That's a number militant spokesman Sirajuddin, who only has one name, dismisses as "totally rubbish. Only...
...political figure in the country. Al-Sadr is less accessible, a fuzzier figure than al-Hakim. The U.S. intelligence community has only a vague sense of how much control he has over his disparate movement, which includes everything from Iranian-trained guerrillas, referred to as "special groups," to ragtag teenage criminal street gangs who claim the Mahdi mantle. He has been spending a lot of time in Iran lately, where he is said to be receiving advanced religious training. The future of Iraq is likely to be decided by the struggle for power between the Hakim and Sadr families. That...
...Burma's top brass wasn't always so universally despised. Formerly a ragtag band of freedom fighters, the military helped the country free itself from British colonialism. Aung San, the father of democracy activist Suu Kyi, is revered both as an independence hero and as the founder of Burma's army. After independence in 1948, this group of beleaguered soldiers transformed itself into a professional force, opening the West Point-inspired Defense Services Academy. The military also burnished its legitimacy in another way, claiming to be the only force that could keep the country together. Burma is composed of more...
...country's martial links began long before these two generals rose to power. Formerly a ragtag band of freedom fighters, the military helped Burma free itself from British colonialism. Aung San, the father of imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureate and democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi, is revered both as an independence hero and as the founder of Burma's army. After independence in 1948, this group of rather beleaguered soldiers transformed itself into a professional force. A Defense Services Academy modeled after West Point opened its doors. The Defense Services Institute took over colonial-era business concerns like shipping...