US/IRAQ: Many frontline troops are suffering battle fatigue as the war reaches a critical phase, writes Tom Clonan.
The security situation in Iraq is at a critical juncture. With the US presidential election entering its final phase and Iraqi elections in the pipeline, there has been an intensification of resistance in recent days from within the Sunni Muslim community.
The upsurge in violence over the last 72 hours has seen numerous bomb attacks on Iraqi police and administrative targets along with rocket and mortar attacks on US military targets. Indeed, yesterday saw the death of the first US diplomat to be killed in the fighting in Iraq during an attack on the heavily defended Green Zone in central Baghdad.
Many in the US military believe the latest violence represents a desperate "last stand" on the part of the Sunni resistance movement prior to elections in January that would see the majority Shia community achieve power and autonomy in Iraq - for the first time in the country's troubled history.
The current Sunni insurgency, designed to disrupt such elections, consists of an assortment of former Ba'athists and former Iraqi military and Republican Guard members. It also includes a number of Sunni religious fundamentalists or "Jihadis" aligned to groups like al-Qaeda and Abu Musab al Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad groups. Anticipating the current security crisis, Centcom has taken steps in recent weeks to isolate this loose coalition and to destroy the nucleus of Sunni resistance within the Sunni Triangle by way of air and ground assault on towns such as Fallujah and Ramadi.
Consistent with the classic military doctrine of "divide and conquer", the US military recently secured a shaky cessation of hostilities with Shia paramilitary groups such as the Badr Brigades and Moqtada al Sadr's notorious Mehdi army. This has allowed the hard-pressed US military to divert combat troops from Shia trouble spots such as Najaf and Karbala and to redeploy them north to the Sunni Triangle.
However, many of these reinforcing units had their rotation dates to the US cancelled in April of this year and having endured constant combat in Iraq for almost a year are now overstretched and battle-weary.
Overall, due to a "teeth to tail ratio" of approximately 1:4 in Iraq, Centcom have only around 30,000 such combat troops available to them at any given time. The remainder of their troops consist of headquarters staffs, communications, logistics and other support units.
Complicating matters is the fact that approximately 40 per cent of the total US force in Iraq are inexperienced reservists. As a result, many frontline troops are experiencing battle fatigue to the extent that in recent weeks, some soldiers have begun to refuse to carry out orders given by their superiors.
In the light of these factors, the decision by the British government to deploy combat troops of the 1st Battalion of the Black Watch to reinforce the US assault on Fallujah is a very significant development. From a military point of view, Britain's deployment of almost 1,000 fresh combat troops to Latifiyah and Iskandariyah - a very sensitive part of the US area of operations - represents a major contribution to America's plans to crush Sunni resistance within Iraq in advance of next year's elections.
In political terms it will assist President Bush in his efforts towards re-election by reassuring American voters that US troops are not alone in bearing the lion's share - in terms of dead and injured - of the burden of the liberation of Iraq.
The material and symbolic significance of Britain's latest contribution to Bush's war in Iraq will not have been lost on Margaret Hassan's abductors. At the height of Ramadan, in a last-ditch stand against the coalition's assault on the heartland of Sunni resistance, her captors will have been looking for a British hostage with the potential to generate the maximum impact, in terms of terror, on the British public.
The propaganda value of such a captive could only be realised in terms of the political damage it would inflict on Tony Blair - already under pressure from a British public becoming increasingly disenchanted with the war in Iraq. The ultimate objective would be to destroy Tony Blair's leadership of the British Labour Party and ultimately to damage the Anglo-American coalition in Iraq.
For these reasons, Margaret Hassan fits the bill perfectly. Not only was she the holder of a British passport, she was also an individual with an international profile. Unlike previous hostages who were relatively unknown, Margaret Hassan's charitable work and reputation guaranteed her captors international political and media attention should she be abducted.
In short, Mrs Hassan's abduction has everything to do with Britain's involvement in the war in Iraq and nothing whatsoever to do with her status as an Iraqi or Irish citizen. Those who would suggest otherwise would do well to consider the facts - and the feelings of the families of other Irish hostages. In such hopeless and anarchic circumstances, the Irish government is to be commended for its attempts to assist Irish citizens who find themselves in such invidious and horrifying situations.
Dr Tom Clonan is a retired army officer. He is a Fellow of the Inter University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society, Loyola University, Chicago.