Those talking about how the British were "better" occupyers should take heed.
In Iraq, the peaceful south gets deadlier with every dayLife is dangerous enough for British soldiers without redeploymentAudrey Gillan
Monday October 18, 2004
The GuardianIn the past three months, British forces in Iraq have been attacked more often than at any time since the invasion. It is a largely untold story, however, since few British journalists have been able to get on the ground to report the situation for fear of kidnap, and it can be difficult to get access to the military.
Peter Kilfoyle, the former Labour defence minister, spoke for many at the weekend when opposing the redeployment of 650 British soldiers nearer to Baghdad on the grounds that "We are putting our troops in harm's way and subject to the vagaries of how the Americans do things". This is true, but with two caveats: our troops are already in great danger in the "peaceful" south, where armed resistance to the occupation is intense; and "how the Americans do things" already makes life very difficult for British soldiers.
Last month, I spent 12 days working between the British stronghold in Basra and the more northerly town of Amara, dubbed the "wild west". Embedded with the Territorial Army, but seeing the work of regular soldiers as well, I discovered that in these areas, and on the roads in-between, troops are being shot at with small arms, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades every single day. Six have been killed in the past two months, and one described to me how he lost his kidney on a run-of-the-mill job to pick up mail and a broken television.
Soldiers told me the reason there had not been more casualties was poor shooting, but they didn't expect such incompetence to last. In the run-up to January's proposed elections, things are likely to get worse, not to mention the predictions of increased activity during the fasting month of Ramadan.
Amara has been under almost non-stop attack since late summer when the rebel Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr declared holy war on British forces. The leadership of the town - tribal and divided in its nature - has pledged allegiance to Sadr.
In August, one unit was shot at more than any British battle group since the Korean war. In what has been dubbed the Battle of Cimic House, the Princess of Wales's Royal Regiment came under siege at an HQ set up in the downtown home of the former governor of Maysan province; in 10 days they were bombarded with 428 mortar rounds, 57 rocket-propelled grenades and countless 107mm rockets, and 86 small-arms attacks were counted. The troops fired 30,000 rounds of ammunition, more than was used in the whole of last year's "war" phase. There is no accurate record of the number of Iraqi casualties, but the soldiers I spoke to expected it to be high.
--snip--
One evening I drove with British soldiers through downtown Basra, escorting a couple of American National Guards to the Basra Palace compound. Traffic was heavy, and the larger American sat twitching in the back. He wished he had taken the "chopper" the few miles up the road. An ambulance approached, its blue lights cutting through the darkness. A soldier up on top of our Land Rover waved the ambulance on. Peering out of the window on the back door, the American panicked: "Whoa," he said, "they should have shot that guy." No vehicle, ambulance or otherwise, can drive past a US convoy for fear of suicide bombers.
--snip--
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1329857,00.html
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