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| Iraq |
| A Day After Bush Assurances, 1 dead, 10 U.S. Soldiers Hurt in Iraq< |
| 2003-07-03 |
| A day after President Bush asserted that coalition forces in Iraq were prepared to deal with any security threat, American troops came under attack again today, with 10 soldiers wounded in three separate incidents. "We're still at war," Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez of the Army, the commander of coalition forces in Iraq, said in a news conference today. While saying that the attacks did not appear to be centrally or even regionally coordinated, he asserted that there had been an "increase in sophistication of the explosive devices used" against American forces. In a strategy apparently designed to undermine the resistance, the American administrator of Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, announced this afternoon that the State Department was offering a reward of up to $25 million for either the capture of Saddam Hussein or information confirming his death. The reward for similar information about Mr. Hussein's sons, Uday and Qusay, is $15 million apiece. "Until we know for sure, their names will continue to cast a shadow of fear over this country," Mr. Bremer said in his weekly address to the Iraqi people. The $25 million reward for Mr. Hussein is the same amount offered for Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda. This morning's attacks occurred in diverse locations: a Sunni area west of Baghdad that staunchly supported the former regime, a Shia neighborhood in Baghdad and the center of the city. In the Baghdad neighborhood of Kadhimiya, a soldier from the First Armored Division on foot patrol at 2:30 a.m. local time was wounded after a gunman opened fire. The soldiers returned fire, killing the gunman and wounding a 6-year-old boy with him, according to an American military spokesman. In the city of Ramadi, about 65 miles west of Baghdad, six soldiers were wounded when their two-vehicle convoy drove over an improvised explosive device at 6:30 a.m. The city's Sunni Muslim residents were among the core of Saddam Hussein's base of support, serving as army officers and officials in his government. Ramadi has become a center of resistance to the American-led occupation. It is only about 30 miles west of Falluja, where an explosion at a Sunni mosque killed at least six people on Monday night. A coalition investigation blamed the explosion on a bombmaking class being held in a building adjacent to the mosque, but many residents accused the Americans of firing a missile into the mosque and promised revenge against American troops. In Baghdad, just before 10 a.m. local time, a man on foot fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a three-vehicle military convoy moving down Haifa Street, a busy thoroughfare in central Baghdad. One Humvee was struck, wounding three soldiers, witnesses and a military spokesman said. Witnesses also said that in response, soldiers in one of the other vehicles opened fire indiscriminately, seriously wounding, and possibly killing, at least one Iraqi driver nearby. Blood pooled next to the slain driver's blue Volkswagen Passat soon after the attack. The attack suggested that the urban warfare that had so concerned military planners before the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime was materializing in unexpected forms. The attack against the three-vehicle convoy on Haifa Street was at least the second rocket-propelled grenade assault in broad daylight in Baghdad this week. In both cases, the attackers escaped. Whether out of fear or sympathy for their cause, bystanders and witnesses have done nothing to help coalition forces apprehend attackers. On Wednesday, President Bush challenged Iraqis who were attacking American-led forces and said the assaults would not cause the United States to leave prematurely. "There are some who feel like - that the conditions are such that they can attack us there," Mr. Bush said. "My answer is, bring them on. We've got the force necessary to deal with the security situation. |
| Posted by:Mike in Tokyo |