Daily military news feed (real world)

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

No Timetable Set For U.S. Troops


Associated Press
January 26, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq's interim prime minister said Tuesday it would be "futile" to set a timetable now for withdrawing American troops from his country - echoing earlier comments by the head of the leading slate of candidates in Sunday's election.

The assessment leaves unclear one of the key questions ahead of this weekend's election: Whether the promised first step toward democracy will speed up the day when U.S. troops can leave.

For now, it appears the issue hinges on how quickly the U.S. military can help train Iraqi security forces to protect their own country.

Amid signs the Bush administration fears that training lags, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said Tuesday that Iraqis would be capable of taking control of Baghdad and major cities only "when we reach a decisive point of a well-trained (Iraqi) force."

"By reaching this point, we will be able to start an essential decrease of multinational forces presence," Allawi said.






He gave no indication when that point could be reached, saying only: "I will not set final dates" for the withdrawal of international forces "because setting final dates will be futile and dangerous."

There has been speculation that whoever takes power after the election might ask the Bush administration to begin negotiating a timetable for a U.S. departure. That has been a demand of Sunni Arab insurgents, as well as members of the Sunni clergy.

Allawi may not remain prime minister after the election, of course. Yet none of the other major political figures contesting the election has publicly called for setting such a timetable.

The issue is sensitive because even though most Iraqis would like to see the end of their country's occupation, mainstream political figures realize their own futures would be jeopardized if the fledgling Iraqi forces could not protect a new government.

"All Iraqis don't want foreign troops in the country," the head of the leading Shiite cleric-endorsed slate, Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim, said recently.

But only the elected government can decide that issue, Hakim said.

"This case should be discussed by the new government in an objective way," he said. "It should determine whether there will be a need for a timetable."

Another top candidate on the same list, Ahmad Chalabi, a former exile and one-time Pentagon confidante, said that while no Iraqi wants U.S.-led coalition forces to remain in Iraq, "the alliance would not seek the troops' immediate withdrawal after the vote."

President Bush also has refused to set a deadline, saying a U.S. pullback will depend on how long it takes to train Iraq's security force.

There are signs the Bush administration is prepared to keep troops in Iraq for a significant time. The president plans to soon ask Congress for another $80 billion for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the U.S. Army's top operations officer, Lt. Gen. James J. Lovelace Jr., said this week that the service assumes it will keep the current level of 120,000 soldiers in Iraq for at least two more years.

The Pentagon has said it hopes to train about 135,000 Iraqi police, 60,000 members of the national guard and 25,000 army members.

Bush's secretary of state nominee, Condoleezza Rice, last week estimated the number already trained at more than 120,000. But Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., scoffed at her numbers, saying that based on numerous trips to Iraq: "If you speak to the folks on the ground, they don't think there's more than 4,000 actually trained Iraqi forces."

Rice acknowledged that desertions and poor leadership among Iraqis were hampering efforts.

After the Pentagon sent a retired general to the region to assess the training, defense officials say U.S. commanders are devising a plan for as many as 10,000 soldiers and Marines to accompany Iraqi units as advisers and trainers. The hope is that after the elections, some U.S. troops will focus less on fighting insurgents and more on training Iraqi forces.

The decision about when Americans leave "should be decided after the elections when there is stability," said Rawa Hamed Abbas, 22, a private attorney serving as an election observer in Hillah, in the Shiite south.

"Obviously, our new Iraqi security forces are not able to maintain safety."

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BAGHDAD, Iraq - A rocket hit the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad on Saturday, killing two Americans who worked there and wounding four others on the eve of Iraq's landmark elections, a U.S. Embassy official said.

The rocket fell into the Embassy's compound, near the building itself in the heavily fortified Green Zone in central Baghdad, according to the embassy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

One civilian and one Navy sailor, both assigned to the embassy, were killed in the rocket attack, a military official said, also on condition of anonymity.

Of the four injured Americans, two were military, one was a civilian and the fourth was as yet underdetermined, the military official said.





Embassy spokesman Bob Callahan confirmed the embassy had been hit in an attack, but could give no details about casualties.

The second Embassy official, speaking anonymously, then confirmed that two had been killed and four injured.

Earlier Saturday night, sirens wailed briefly at one point from the Green Zone, but it was not clear if they were linked to the attack.

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By Joseph Giordono, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Monday, January 31, 2005



RAMADI, Iraq — Security concerns, roadside bombs and a series of brief gunbattles kept most Ramadi citizens from participating in Sunday’s historic Iraqi elections.

One U.S. soldier was killed and at least two others injured by a roadside bomb around 3 a.m. Sunday, according to military officials. In another attack at noon, a Humvee patrolling less than 200 meters from a polling station was hit by another bomb, sending a huge plume of smoke into the sky.

The Humvee crew all escaped with minor wounds, but the explosion touched off long bursts of machine-gun fire from Iraqi and American troops manning security positions at the nearby polling site, a large grammar school compound.

According to soldiers who were observing from a nearby rooftop position, the second roadside bomb was planted by a teenage boy who ran into the street and dropped a large plastic bag just moments before a U.S. patrol drove through.

For long minutes after the explosion, ammunition from the Humvee continued to cook off and fire into the air.

Before the explosion, 75 people — including Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq poll workers and special police commandos protecting the site — had voted at the school in eastern Ramadi, U.S. military officials said. At midmorning, the nearby streets had been full of curious residents watching voters walk to the polling station. After the explosion and gunfire, the streets were deserted and no other voters came.

Ramadi’s 400,000 residents were subject of a harassment campaign by insurgents, who promised death to anyone who voted Sunday.

At another polling site in the Sofiya district of Ramadi, the polls were more active. More than 100 people had voted by early afternoon, officials said. There were eight polling stations in the city of Ramadi, U.S. and Iraqi officials said, and they estimated that about 1,000 people cast ballots during the day.

“I’ll never forget this day,” said Pfc. Branden Bell, a 19-year-old infantryman from Napa, Calif., who had been manning the polling entrance closest to the second Humvee explosion.

Bell and another soldier with Company C, 1st Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment felt small pieces of shrapnel land on their position after the explosion.

The first Iraqis to vote in Ramadi were the security forces and election workers, who began casting their ballots just after the polls opened at 7 a.m. The first two civilian voters came in at 8 a.m., and they were followed shortly after by a group that included two women.

In a tent near the polling station entrance, three female soldiers from the 2nd Forward Support Battalion — which deployed from South Korea along with 4,200 other U.S. troops last fall — helped perform security checks on the female voters who arrived.

Iraqis who voted said through interpreters they were proud to have participated in a day they thought would never happen. The first two women who voted — arriving in long black robes and headdresses — repeatedly said thanks to Allah and shook nearly every hand in sight.

When one of the women placed her ballot in the large plastic collection bin, she turned her eyes and palms skyward, uttering a short prayer.

Soldiers and Marines in Iraq certainly knew they were part of something historic, despite the low turnout in Ramadi.

“I had grandfathers who fought in Korea and World War II, and I don’t think they really knew they were doing something special at the time,” said Marine Lance Cpl. Christopher Green, a dog handler attached to the 1-503rd for election day.

“But I think guys know this is big. This is something important.”

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By Vince Little, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Sunday, January 30, 2005


YOKOTA AIR BASE, Japan — Roughly half of Yokota’s force commitment to Operation Unified Assistance, the U.S. military’s tsunami-relief campaign in South Asia, is back home.

Four C-130s assigned to the 374th Airlift Wing — carrying about 80 troops total — returned Friday. A day earlier, another 50 airmen arrived from Utapao, Thailand, where they helped form the 374th Air Expeditionary Wing and established a regional distribution hub for humanitarian-assistance missions immediately after the Dec. 26 catastrophe that has claimed more than 140,000 lives across South Asia.

About 120 airmen and four C-130s from Yokota remain in the region. Base officials said it’s unclear how long they’ll stay.

“Our people did an incredible job,” said Col. Mark Schissler, who stepped off one of the C-130s Friday afternoon after serving as the air expeditionary wing’s commander.

“We flew every day we were there. The airplanes, these 40-year-old flying machines, performed magnificently. And the crews figured out how to get in and out of some pretty tough airfields. They did everything safely, and we got things going within the first couple of days.”

Flight crews logged 2,500 hours and hauled 4 million pounds of humanitarian aid — mostly food, medical supplies and water — to the affected areas.

The airmen — representing the maintenance, medical, civil engineering and communications fields — were dispatched to various locations during the monthlong deployment, including Colombo, Sri Lanka; Banda Aceh, Indonesia; and Phuket, Thailand.

Most appeared groggy Friday after a grueling nine-hour flight from Utapao, but satisfied with what they had accomplished.

“We were set up and online in about one-sixteenth the time it normally takes,” said Chief Master Sgt. Kevin Van Gordon, who was maintenance chief for the 36th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron in Utapao. “We were set up and flying within 10 hours. This is what we do. It’s why we exist, and there was a mission to be done.

“We’ve exercised with the Thai and Australian militaries before, but never been in a humanitarian-type situation. The relationship we had between ourselves and the Thais, zero glitches. It was smooth.”

Schissler, who got panoramic views of the tsunami-ravaged areas from above, said the utter destruction wrought by the walls of water that crashed into coastlines was almost unimaginable. In Banda Aceh, he saw towns where “90 percent of the people had died.”

“It really sunk in before I got back,” he said. “The devastation was severe, almost too hard to describe. Miles of coastline were destroyed from the sea inland. Up to about three miles, everything that existed was gone. That meant all of the people in that area perished, too.

“The earthquake and tsunami destroyed everything. It was very hard to look at.”

U.N. relief agencies are distributing the bulk of humanitarian relief supplies as the U.S. military scales back its operations, Schissler said.

“It will take years for them to recover,” he said. “Our part was to cover the emergency. The crisis is abated. We made a difference.”

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WASHINGTON - President Bush called the Iraqi election a resounding success and promised that the United States will help Iraqis fight continuing insurgency as they build a democratic government.

"There's more distance to travel on the road to democracy," Bush said Sunday, four hours after the polls closed. "Yet Iraqis are proving they're equal to the challenge."

The president mentioned that some were killed while voting, but he focused his brief remarks on the success for Iraq and its citizens. He told of one voter who lost a leg in a terrorist attack last year but still made it to the polls to vote for peace.

"The world is hearing the voice of freedom from the center of the Middle East," Bush said. "In great numbers, and under great risk, Iraqis have shown their commitment to democracy."

He called the leaders of three key U.S. allies in the Middle East - King Abdullah of Jordan, Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt - Sunday afternoon to talk about building on the Iraqi election and to support democracy among the Palestinians.




Insurgents in Iraq struck polling stations with a string of suicide bombings and mortar volleys, killing more than 40 people, including nine suicide bombers. Bush also said he mourned the loss of U.S. and British forces on election day, including troops killed when a British military transport plane crashed.

"Terrorists and insurgents will continue to wage their war against democracy, and we will support the Iraqi people in their fight against them," Bush said. "We will continue training Iraqi security forces so this rising democracy can eventually take responsibility for its own security."

Bush did not take questions from reporters or mention any military withdrawal.

In a statement, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass, said Bush "must look beyond the election" and start bringing troops home.

"The best way to demonstrate to the Iraqi people that we have no long-term designs on their country is for the administration to withdraw some troops now" and negotiate further withdrawals, Kennedy added.

Earlier Sunday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would not say whether U.S. forces will leave the country in great numbers after the vote. She said the United States will discuss the continued need for outside security forces with the newly elected Iraqi government.

So far, more than 1,400 U.S. troops and many thousands of Iraqis have lost their lives. The United States is spending more than $1 billion a week in Iraq.

Rice said the election went better than expected, but did not elaborate on U.S. predictions for turnout, violence or other measures.

In Iraq, officials said turnout among the 14 million eligible voters appeared higher than the 57 percent they had predicted. Complete voting results are not expected for days.

Polls were largely deserted all day in many cities of the Sunni Triangle. In Baghdad's mainly Sunni Arab area of Azamiyah, the neighborhood's four polling centers did not open at all, residents said.

"It is hard to say that something is legitimate when whole portions of the country can't vote and doesn't vote," Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., Bush's re-election challenger in November, said on NBC's "Meet The Press."

Even with lower turnout among Sunni Arabs, the government can be representative of all Iraqis, Rice said. She also minimized concerns that a Shiite-dominated government will morph into a theocracy.

"I'm sure that they will have a healthy debate about the role of Islam, about the role of religion in that society," Rice said on CNN's "Late Edition."

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

BAGHDAD, Iraq - As votes were counted in a national election where turnout might have been higher than expected, Iraq’s interim leader on Monday called on his countrymen to work together toward peace, saying: “The terrorists now know that they cannot win.”

“We are entering a new era of our history and all Iraqis — whether they voted or not — should stand side by side to build their future,” interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said in his first news conference since Sunday's election.

"I will begin a new national dialogue to ensure all Iraqis have a voice in the new government,” he added. “The whole world is watching us. As we worked together yesterday to finish dictatorship, let us work together towards a bright future -- Sunnis and Shiites, Muslims and Christians, Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen.”

Final results aren’t expected for days, but the country is already focusing on goals almost as challenging as the election itself: forming a new governing coalition, then writing a constitution and winning trust.

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Associated Press
February 3, 2005


CAMP KOREAN VILLAGE, Iraq - U.S. Marines held a memorial Wednesday for 31 service members killed in the crash of a transport helicopter during a swirling sandstorm in Iraq's vast western desert - the U.S. military's single biggest lost of life here since the March 2003 invasion.

Filing past their fallen comrades' combat boots, rifles and helmets, Marines took turns kneeling in front of the display. One wept, burying his face into one of his hands. Others hugged each other.

One marine played "Taps" on a bright gold trumpet as hundreds of others stood in stiff salutes and two helicopter gunships flew overhead through a bright blue sky.

The CH53E Super Stallion transport helicopter crashed shortly after midnight on Jan. 26 during a fierce sandstorm near the Syrian border, killing 30 Marines and one Navy sailor.




The hulking aircraft was transporting Marines to this base near the Iraqi town of Rutbah for security operations in preparation of last weekend's elections. The cause of the crash is still under investigation, but officials have said it does not appear the helicopter was downed by hostile fire.

During Wednesday's memorial, a Marine strummed on a guitar before placing the instrument beside the row of upright rifles.

Most of the victims of the crash - 26 Marines and the sailor - were from Hawaii's Kaneohe Bay base. All had arrived in Iraq in September to support the U.S. military's siege on the former insurgent-base of Fallujah in November.

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Bush To Seek $419.3 Billion For Defense
[glow=red,2,300]WASHINGTON - President Bush will ask Congress for $419.3 billion for the Pentagon for next year, 4.8 percent more than this year's spending, as the administration seeks to beef up and reshape the Army and Marine Corps for fighting terrorism.

The request will not include money for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Congress already has appropriated $25 billion for those wars this year, and the White House is planning to request another $80 billion soon.

The president plans to roll out his military spending proposal Monday as part of a roughly $2.5 trillion federal budget. But documents obtained by The Associated Press on Friday show that he will request $19.2 billion more for the Defense Department than its $400.1 billion budget this year.

However, his request is $3.4 billion below the $422.7 billion the Pentagon estimated in January that it would need for next year.

The proposal will include restructuring and expanding the Army and adding combat and support units for the Marine Corps. It reflects Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's efforts to transform the Cold War-style military into one that's more rapidly deployable to fight terrorist groups.





Under Bush's plan, defense spending would grow gradually, hitting $502.3 billion by 2011.

The proposal, according to one of the documents, supports the war on terrorism by "strengthening U.S. defense capabilities and keeping U.S. forces combat ready. It continues to implement lessons learned from ongoing operations in the war."

Those include, according to the proposal, "the need for flexible and adaptable joint military, strong special operations forces, highly responsive logistics and the best possible intelligence and communications capabilities."

The plan calls for special operations forces, which the documents described as "critical to the fight against terrorism," to add 1,200 troops. The forces would get $50 million to keep people from leaving the services.

The president also wants Congress to let him spend $750 million as he chooses to help Iraq, Afghanistan and U.S. allies opposing terrorism bolster their military and security forces. In the past, lawmakers have been reluctant to give Bush unfettered control of such funds but have generally complied.

On Thursday, Missouri Rep. Ike Skelton - ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee - said in a statement that he worried that the president's budget request, which he anticipated would be billions less than the Pentagon had predicted needing, "may weaken our efforts" in Iraq and Afghanistan "while undermining our ability to prepare for future conflicts."

Overall, the president's proposal calls for the Navy, Marines and Air Force to all receive extra funds next year, but the Army's budget would take a $300 million reduction to $100 billion even though it's bearing the brunt of the costs and fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. However, the $80 billion Bush plans to request in the coming days for Iraq and Afghanistan is expected to be tilted heavily toward the Army.

Bush plans to propose $1.6 billion to fight chemical and biological threats next year and $9.9 billion over the next five years. And, he would allocate $9.5 billion for homeland security activities next year and $147.8 billion for training, maintenance and other "readiness" programs.

Despite the overall military increase, the Pentagon's account for purchasing new weapons would actually incur a $100 million cut next year to $78 billion. The proposal underscores how huge federal deficits are affecting even the Defense Department, long one of Bush's top priorities.

The president, according to the documents, will seek $8.8 billion for its missile defense program, compared with $9.9 billion this year. The documents also showed that he would ask for $695.7 million for the Chinook helicopter for next year, compared with $869.8 million for this year. And, the B-2 stealth bomber would get $344.3 million, down from $365 million this year.

More than half the total defense increase - $10.8 billion - would be for training, maintenance and other costs associated with keeping the military ready for action. Most of the rest would go for military salaries and construction of bases and housing.

The proposal calls for increasing military base salaries by 3.1 percent and civilian salaries by 2.3 percent. It also calls for giving troops more money for housing and giving reservists better health care coverage and additional education benefits.

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[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Monday, February 07, 2005 1:19 p.m. ET

By Dan Williams

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel and the Palestinians will announce a cease-fire at Tuesday's summit in Egypt to halt more than four years of violence, officials from both sides said.


The deal was reached ahead of the landmark meeting between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

Both sides have said they hoped the highest-level meeting since 2000 would mean a halt to violence. It also signals a step toward reviving a U.S.-backed "road map" for a Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel.

"We have agreed to declare a mutual cease-fire," said Mohammad Dahlan, a close Abbas aide who has been in pre-summit talks with the Israelis.

"This cease-fire means a halt to all actions against Palestinians and Israelis in accordance with the road map," he told reporters.

An Israeli official confirmed the agreement but said the text had yet to be finalized. Signaling new U.S. commitment after Yasser Arafat's death to ending decades of conflict, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice named Lt. Gen. William Ward as security coordinator to protect the budding Middle East peace moves.

Both Sharon and Abbas had also accepted invitations to the White House in the Spring for talks with President Bush.

Ward's appointment fell short of assigning a U.S. envoy to oversee peacemaking, which Rice said she preferred to be as free of foreign mediation as possible, and underscored a belief new hopes for ending the conflict rested on halting bloodshed first.

Ward, Rice said, would "assist the Palestinian Authority to consolidate and expand their recent efforts on security and encourage resumption of Israeli-Palestinian security coordination."

In Gaza, where violence has dropped sharply, a spokesman for the militant Hamas group said it would "study the outcome of the summit" in Egypt and then decide on its course of action.

U.S. SECURITY CHIEF SERVED IN BOSNIA, EGYPT

Ward was previously commander of the NATO Stabilisation Force in post-war Bosnia and had previous assignments to Egypt, Somalia, Germany and South Korea.

Rice said he would travel to the region in the next few weeks "to make an initial assessment."

The last monitoring group involved the CIA but it stopped its work after Palestinian militants killed three Americans in Gaza in 2003.

"There should be no doubt about the commitment of the United States to this process at this time -- no doubt about the commitment of the president, no doubt about my personal commitment," Rice said at Abbas's Muqata headquarters.

Rice's predecessor, Colin Powell, made infrequent trips to the area and was last in Ramallah in 2002.

Bush has pledged $350 million in aid to the Palestinians. Rice announced $40 million would be given to them within 90 days in a "quick action program" to help create jobs and rebuild infrastructure.

Rice called on both sides to the conflict to carry out their obligations to the peace process, citing a "fight against terrorism" by the Palestinians and "no unilateral changes to the status quo" on the part of Israel.

She said Israel was aware of U.S. concerns over the route of its controversial West Bank barrier, which Palestinians call a land grab and Israeli leaders say stops suicide bombers, and over Israeli "settlement activity" on occupied land.

But she praised Israel's planned pullout from the Gaza Strip this summer as "historic and monumental."

Palestinians have welcomed any withdrawal from occupied territory but cite Sharon's vow to hold on to large West Bank settlement blocs in any future peace deal.

Entering the Israeli-battered compound, where Arafat was confined for nearly three years, Rice's motorcade swept past his tomb without stopping, a snub indicative of Washington's view of the iconic leader as having been an obstacle to peace

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Associated Press
February 8, 2005

WASHINGTON - The $419 billion defense budget that President Bush submitted to Congress on Monday would buy fewer planes, ships and submarines than the Pentagon previously planned, but it puts extra emphasis on anti-terror commandos and expands the Army and Marine Corps.

Spending for the budget year that starts Oct. 1 would be 4.8 percent higher than the current defense budget, although neither year's budget includes the billions spent for war operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Iraq is expected to cost $100 billion this year and a similar amount in 2006; that money is authorized and spent through a separate budgeting process.

"This budget represents the latest installment in the President's strong commitment to transforming this department to face the challenges of the 21st century," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said in a written statement. "We continue our transition to a more agile, deployable, and lethal force."

The defense budget under President Bush has grown rapidly since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, which led to the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan to topple the Taliban and hunt down leaders of the al-Qaida terrorist network, but the Iraq war has been the more costly enterprise.

In order to make room for the extra costs of warfighting, the Pentagon has cut billions from planned spending on the Air Force's high-priority fighter jet program, the F/A-22, as well as Navy shipbuilding. The F/A-22 program will be halted in 2008 after 179 planes are built - 96 short of the Air Force's goal, and the Navy will get only four new vessels - one submarine and three ships - instead of the six that the Pentagon had said a year ago it would fund in the 2006 budget.




Military personnel would get a 3.1 percent pay raise, and pay for Pentagon civilians would rise 2.3 percent.

Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, called the 3.1 percent pay raise a "bare minimum," and said the budget as a whole does too little for the troops.

Steven Kosiak, a budget expert at the private Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, said it is unlikely that Congress will make any net reductions to Bush's budget proposal for 2006.

"However, over the longer term, once a decision is made to address the ballooning federal deficit, history strongly suggests that cuts in defense spending - or at a minimum slower rates of growth in defense spending - will be part of the solution adopted," Kosiak said.

The budget includes $1.9 billion to begin paying for a new round of military base closings. Pentagon recommendations on which bases to close will be presented to an independent commission in May. The Pentagon expects to spend another $5.7 billion on this process in 2007, although at a future point the closures are expected to save billions of dollars.

The budget does not include funds to pay the estimated $286 million it will cost to retroactively increase death payments, known as "gratuities," to the families of military personnel killed in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Those payments will rise from $12,420 to $100,000 per family. The money will come from a supplemental budget request to be submitted later.

Among other highlights of Bush's proposed $419 billion in defense spending:

- Special operations forces, including Navy, Air Force and Army commandos, get $4.1 billion, in part to pay for hiring an extra 200 civilians and 1,200 military personnel, including four platoons of Navy SEAL commandos. More also will be spent on developing foreign language capabilities.

- The weapons buying budget shrinks by $100 million, to $78 billion. Last year at this time the Pentagon said it intended to increase the procurement budget by $2 billion, rather than shrink it. The Army would take the biggest cut, about $2.7 billion, while the Navy would get a $1.2 billion increase.

- Spending on defenses against attack by chemical or biological agents would be $1.6 billion in 2006 and $9.9 billion over the 2006-2011 period covered by the Pentagon budget plan. That's $2.1 billion more than the Pentagon had previously planned.

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FORT STEWART, Ga. - Army soldiers are being issued new fatigues with easy-to-use Velcro openings and a redesigned camouflage pattern that can help conceal them as they move rapidly from desert to forest to city in places like Baghdad.

"It might give you the extra second you need, save your life maybe," Sgt. Marcio Soares said Tuesday after trying on the new all-in-one camouflage uniform that is the first major redesign in Army fatigues since 1983.

Soares' unit, the Georgia National Guard's 48th Infantry Brigade, is the first to be issued the new fatigues as part of a $3.4 billion Army-wide makeover being phased in over the next three years.

The uniform will replace the standard forest camouflage - green, brown and black - and the desert camouflage - tan, brown and grey - now used by U.S. troops in Iraq.

Twenty-two changes were made to the uniforms, most notably the new camouflage pattern.

Instead of bold jigsaw swatches of colors, the new camouflage pattern uses muted shades of desert brown, urban gray and foliage green broken into one-centimeter segments. Black was eliminated completely because it catches the eye too easily.





The resulting camouflage - similar to a pattern the Marines adopted two years ago - conceals soldiers in forest, desert or urban battlegrounds, said Sgt. 1st Class Jeff Myhre, the uniform's lead designer.

"In Baghdad, you can go from the desert to vegetation to the city in 10 minutes," Myhre said. "What we realized very quickly is there's no camouflage that's the 100 percent solution for any environment."

Other changes were prompted by complaints from soldiers in the field. Jacket and pocket buttons, which can snag on nets and other gear, have been replaced with zippers and Velcro.

Pockets at the jacket's waistline were moved to the shoulders, where soldiers can reach them while wearing body armor. And the uniforms have a looser fit, with more room to wear layers underneath.

Rank, unit and name patches attach with Velcro rather than being sewn on. Infrared-reflecting squares on the shoulders make friendly troops easier to identify while using night-vision goggles.

"The only problem I have with the uniform is, once the soldiers put it on, they don't want to take it off," said Brig. Gen. Stewart Rodeheaver, commander of the 48th Infantry Brigade, which has 4,000 reservists training at Fort Stewart to go off to Iraq in May.

The Army started developing the uniform two years ago and field-tested prototypes in Iraq. The final version was rolled out June 24 - the Army's 229th birthday.

Col. John Norwood, the Army's project manager for soldier equipment, said the new uniforms will be issued in coming months to units being sent to Iraq. New soldiers entering basic training will be issued them by October, and all Army troops will be required to wear them by April 2008.

The new uniforms cost a little more - $85 each, compared with $60 for the old ones. But Norwood said the Army will save money by having to produce only one combat uniform rather than three - standard greens, desert camouflage and cold-weather fatigues.

And they should make soldiers' lives easier, too. The fabric is wrinkle-free and machine-washable, and the new suede boots do not require polishing like the old black boots.

"If you have a choice whether you teach them to polish boots or teach them how to survive in battle, we'd rather teach them to survive in battle," Rodeheaver said.

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Tomorrow's combat soldier may look more like a medieval knight than a warrior of the 20th century. Like his ancient counterpart, he will wear close-fitting body armor that will offer him unparalleled protection from head-to-toe. But that is where the similarities end...


By Antulio J. Echevarria II
Armchair General Magazine

Explosions rocked the rubbled streets of the sprawling cityscape. The sky lit up in a bright ball of flame as a 152 mm shell detonated against the third floor of a twenty-story building. The building was of pre-millennium construction, and consisted of steel-reinforced concrete and glass.

Sergeant Christie crouched with his back against the cold, concrete wall of the structure that had just been hit. Another soldier, a medic named Chavez, took cover next to Christie.

"Incoming fire, move fifty meters southwest," a computer voice in Christie's helmet warned.

Sergeant Christie immediately grabbed the other soldier by the arm. The two men bounded across the street and inside an abandoned concrete parking garage in an amazing five seconds. A few seconds later, an avalanche of enemy artillery fire pounded the ground where they had stood only moments before.

"I can't afford to lose you," Christie chided as the two soldiers knelt behind a smashed truck and caught their breath "You're the only medic for miles."

The medic offered a wide grin. "Thanks! And God bless the guys who designed these exoskeleton suits."

"I still marvel at technology," Sergeant Christie said with a wry smile. "Humans aren't the swiftest creatures on Earth, but with this exoskeleton we are a fast as cheetahs. It's a far cry from anything soldiers were equipped with in the 20th Century, eh?" [The battle narrative in this story was adapted from Battleshock, The War in 2022, a new novel by John Antal.]

Tomorrow's combat soldier, as described in the short story above, may look more like a medieval knight than a warrior of the 20th century. Like his ancient counterpart, the warrior of the future will wear close-fitting body armor that will offer him unparalleled protection from head-to-toe. But that is where the similarities end. Unlike the knight of old, this body armor, sometimes referred to as an exoskeleton, will be made of a special lightweight material that will allow the soldier to move about with tremendous flexibility while at the same time providing his bones and muscles greater support than if the suit were made of metal. The armor of the 21st century knight will have a micro-climate control system embedded in it that will circulate either air or water to enable future soldiers to function comfortably in conditions between zero and one hundred twenty degrees Fahrenheit.


The uniform will also have hundreds of tiny built-in sensors (Nanosensors) that will allow soldiers and commanders to check core body temperatures, hydration levels, sleep status, and other critical physiological information. Nanosensors inside the helmet will, for example, monitor a soldier's breath for increased nitric oxide, which is a sign of stress. Not only will combat leaders know at a glance when their soldiers are under too much stress, or require more water or sleep, they will also know exactly how much they need to restore them to peak efficiency. More importantly, when soldiers are wounded, their suits will transmit valuable information concerning the nature of the wounds, how critical those wounds are, and what kinds of treatment or medical attention they need and how soon. In another decade or so, the soldier's uniform will have the capability to morph into a splint or an artificial muscle to enable him to continue fighting or return to safety for medical attention.

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Part II

As Sergeant Christie noted, the fabric of tomorrow's uniform will function like the skin of a chameleon, able to change color in order to blend with its surroundings. It will also have special characteristics that will enable it to repel water and to protect against certain chemical and biological agents. It may even include certain kinds of "friendly" biological agents (biocides) that would automatically repair rips and tears in the uniform and that would also consume specific "hostile" biological agents such as small pox, anthrax, plague, and Ecoli.

"My heads-up display shows that the objective is five kilometers, straight ahead," Christie reported. "My display depicts that the route is clear of enemy from here to there."

Whereas the medieval knight had his field of vision drastically reduced whenever he lowered his visor, the 21st century warrior will have unprecedented awareness of what is going on in his immediate vicinity and well beyond. His close-fitting headgear, known as the Modular Integrated Communications Helmet, or MICH, will have a visor with a heads-up display similar to those used by combat pilots. By touching a few buttons, tomorrow's soldier will be able to view video and thermal imaging, global-positioning data, maps, tactical reports, and ammunition status. His head's-up display will show him the positions and movements of his comrades, and in many cases those of the enemy as well, in daylight or at night.


The Modular Integrated Communications Helmets will have see-through, heads-up displays similar to those found in the cockpits of modern-day combat aircraft, and will have video, thermal, and map displays.

MICH will also have microprocessors and embedded antennae that can provide computer data and radio communications compatible with more than fifty types of radio systems. He will be able to call up field manuals for quick reference and have instant access to classified Web sites. High-and-low-noise headsets and microphones located along the exterior of the helmet will enhance the ability of tomorrow's knight to hear what he needs to hear, blocking out the unwanted din of battle so that he can better receive the commands of his leaders. The MICH and its embedded electronics will be completely waterproof and submersible.

"There it is!" Sergeant Christie exclaimed. "Our objective is just ahead, just on the other side of this river."

"That's a wide, muddy river and we'll have to swim against the current," Chavez remarked.

"No problem!" Christie answered. "In an exoskeleton suit even my grandmother could swim this creek. You go first and I'll cover you."

Chavez nodded, checked his gear, and then plunged into the deep, swift-running current. His suit instantly changed color to match the chocolate-brown mud toned hues of the river. Almost invisible to the unaided eye, Chavez swam carrying his heavy pack and smart rifle. The micro-machines of his exoskeleton combat suit magnified his human strength and he quickly swam against the powerful current to the opposite bank of the river.

Chavez's suit glistened slightly with an electro-magnetic shimmer as he moved out of the water and took up a firing position on the shoreline.


"Okay, Sarge, your turn," Chavez whispered into his helmet transmitter. "Far bank secure. No enemy indicated on my heads-up display."

Sergeant Christie heard Chavez's voice within his MICH, "On the way!"

Most of the technology needed to manufacture the body armor, exoskeleton, and helmet of tomorrow's combat soldier is in the not-so-distant future; not ten or twenty years away, but merely five or six years from now. The U.S. Army's Soldier Center at Natick, Massachusetts, has been working on a new "Land Warrior" system for several years. Several prototypes are already under development. Military leaders want to have the first versions of the new combat ensemble fielded by 2008, a challenging goal. Other, more sophisticated versions of "Land Warrior-like" systems, like the ones described in this story, will be developed by 2015.

Warfare is evolving and you can be on the front lines of change by following the development of new warfighting concepts in the next edition of the Armchair General's Future Warrior. I look forward to being your guide. Join Sergeant Christie in subsequent articles as he demonstrates the weapons, vehicles, remote-controlled robots, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), and other systems now under development.

The battle narrative in this story was adapted from Battleshock, the War in 2022, a new novel by John Antal.

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Northrop Grumman has successfully completed the first phase of flight testing for a demonstrator version of a new medium altitude endurance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). Soldiers in urban battle zones could receive more timely and complete information about enemy forces from low-flying unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) with the technologies being developed.

This work could lead to an autonomous system that coordinates the delivery of data from UAVs and other military reconnaissance assets and intelligence sources. For example, a soldier with a handheld computer would request information about suspected enemy positions, and the system would prioritize the requests and direct individual UAVs to obtain the information and deliver it. These technologies could someday be adapted for other military applications and missions.

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Currently, soldiers engaged in urban warfare have no direct access to reconnaissance and surveillance data, nor can they control the high-altitude aircraft and satellites that collect it. In addition, those platforms cannot provide information with the detail and timeliness required in a rapidly changing urban combat zone.

HURT technology would allow the warfighter to directly request information critical to individual needs. HURT stands for heterogeneous urban RSTA (reconnaissance, surveillance and target acquisition) team.

"A HURT system would give the warfighter the ability to ask for reconnaissance imagery unobtainable by high-altitude or fixed sensors," said H.R. Keshavan, Northrop Grumman's HURT program manager. "Low-flying UAVs could see around or even inside buildings to provide more up-to-date information."

During the program's first phase, Northrop Grumman's Integrated Systems sector will serve as prime contractor to demonstrate that "coordinated autonomy" can be achieved. For example, the HURT system must be able to simultaneously order the UAVs to conduct wide-area surveillance while dispatching an individual vehicle to a location requested by a soldier for a close-up look.

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The flights of the Hunter II prototype were conducted from December 27 through January 12 in Arizona and were designed to demonstrate the UAV's endurance, communications and air-to-ground surveillance capabilities, and are part of the company's ongoing effort to enhance the U.S. Army's warfighting capabilities using autonomous unmanned air systems.

"Hunter II builds upon the combat-proven Hunter system that has gained a stellar reputation for reliability and durability," said Rick Crooks, Northrop Grumman's manager of business development for tactical UAV systems.

"In addition to offering extended range and endurance capabilities, it will feature a software architecture that can easily accommodate new payloads and data handling requirements; state-of-the-art avionics; a weapons capability and communications subsystem that will allow it to share data seamlessly with current battlefield networks."

"Hunter II's high commonality with the current Hunter system will also allow it to exploit and work easily with current U.S. Army equipment, soldier training systems and logistics infrastructure," added Crooks.

The twin-boom Hunter II, an enlarged version of the combat-proven Hunter UAV, will offer customers a "medium-range, medium-altitude" system to complement the company's current high-altitude, long-endurance RQ-4 Global Hawk aerial reconnaissance system; its shorter-range, lower-altitude RQ-5A Hunter tactical UAV and its Fire Scout vertical take-off and landing tactical UAV.

It will also take advantage of past and current U.S. Department of Defense investments in those and other UAV systems such as DARPA's Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems and the Army's Fire Scout Class IV UAV for its Future Combat Systems.


Combat-proven: Hunter II builds upon the combat-proven Hunter system (above) that has gained a stellar reputation for reliability and durability.


The company plans to conduct additional test flights of the Hunter II demonstrator through the first quarter of 2005. Those flights will be used to integrate and characterize the performance of additional payloads.

Hunter II's modular architecture is designed to accommodate future advances in avionics technology, navigation systems, weapons management or air vehicle manufacturing and payload integration derived from the company's other UAV programs, including the U.S. Air Force's Global Hawk, the Army's Hunter Fire Scout -being developed for Army and U.S. Navy use, and the stealthy X-47 Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems, currently in development for a joint Air Force/ Navy/DARPA team.

While these initial flights will utilize small UAV systems, the technologies developed under HURT could eventually be used with larger unmanned systems such as Northrop Grumman's RQ-4 Global Hawk, RQ-8 Fire Scout vertical takeoff and landing tactical UAV and X-47B Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems (J-UCAS).

Key members of the HURT development team include Honeywell Laboratories, SRI International, Teknowledge Corporation and AeroVironment as well as researchers from NASA, the U.S. Army and academic institutions.

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Christian Science Monitor
March 7, 2005

HIT, Iraq - Sgt. Jim Beere of the 23rd Marine Regiment Bravo Company knows something about protecting people.

Back home he's an undercover cop in Oakland, Calif., where he works on a special-victims unit tracking rapists and child molesters. He's usually responsible just for himself and, at most, the safety of a partner.

But early on Feb. 22, he saved his own life and quite possibly the lives of a dozen other marines from Bravo Company who were taking a well-deserved catnap after an all-night operation in the city of Hit.

The split-second decisions by marines like Sergeant Beere are often made in the fog of war. During the same operation, his platoon accidentally killed two unarmed Iraqis who failed to obey orders to stop. Each situation reveals just how much pressure and how little time troops have to determine whether approaching cars mean them harm.

At about 5 a.m., the streets of the city were all but deserted when a sedan turned onto the road leading to the marines' temporary headquarters in a schoolhouse. The driver began to speed up toward the Abrams tank guarding the road, so the machine gunner opened fire with two long bursts that sent the car careening into a sewage canal in the middle of the road.





The driver, who was hit three times but still alive, rolled out of the car, and marines ran over to investigate. He was a Syrian who claimed in perfect, almost unaccented, English that he'd been forced to drive the car. (He later died on the way to the hospital.)

Beere then went over with another marine to check out the car.

As the marine in front of him leaned in the passenger-side front door to take out an AK-47 propped against the steering wheel, a man lunged out of the muck in the canal on the driver's side and went for a rocket-propelled grenade launcher in the back of the car. Beere quickly pulled his buddy back and to the side, swiped his pistol from his holster, and shot the man five times. The man fell back into the canal.

Beere took a few steps away to catch his breath and, turning back, saw the man coming out of the canal again, this time hitting a "clacker" in his hand - a detonating unit for mines and improvised bombs. Beere shot the man four more times, and he fell dead.

"I thought that was it for me, I really did," Beere said a few minutes later. He says he expected the whole car to go up in a ball of flames. "The best I can figure is that he had a mine down there with him and was trying to blow up all the explosives in the car. I think the wet ruined the detonator," he says.

In this case Beere was right: the trunk was loaded with explosives. But troops don't always make the correct decisions. The marines of Bravo Company, who are finishing a six-month tour in Iraq, have fired on and killed unarmed Iraqis in cars on more than one occasion. In each case, they say, confused drivers either ignored or didn't notice warning shots and shouts to slow down as their cars sped toward Marine positions.

But with the suicide car bomb a favored insurgent weapon at checkpoints - in December, 9 Iraqis were killed and 13 were wounded by a suicide bomber at a checkpoint south of Baghdad, while in October, 16 people were killed and 40 were wounded by a car bomber at a Baghdad checkpoint - the troops aren't inclined to take chances. And their rules of engagement let them open fire if they feel threatened.

Such confusion, and the civilian casualties they create, are part of the tactic of using suicide bombers since it serves to drive a greater wedge between US troops and ordinary Iraqis.

"You feel awful when it happens," says one Bravo marine, who remembers treating an Iraqi who probably lost his arm after being shot by this marine's unit. "But I don't doubt the decision to shoot."

Marines interviewed for this story said they were willing to risk civilian casualties if it meant potentially saving the lives of their comrades.