Fighting in an urban
jungle By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI - Alf Laila
wa-Laila (A Thousand
and
One Nights ) tells about al-Anbar province as a place
where broken-hearted lovers sought refuge after failing
to woo women in the king's court.
In today's
al-Anbar, the largest of Iraq's 18 provinces southwest
of Baghdad, the fugitives are hiding from the ire not of
the king, but of US-led forces, and have taken up
positions in the capital Ramadi and the city of mosques,
Fallujah, 55 kilometers west of Ramadi. Sunni-dominated
al-Anbar touches the borders of Saudi Arabia, Jordan and
Syria.
Most of Fallujah's 300,000 residents
have already fled the city in advance of the US-led
assault now under way, leaving behind a hard core of
resistance fighters numbering anywhere between 1,000 and 4,000.
Fallujans have left for Ramadi or Baghdad, while the
wealthier have taken villas in Jordan. Only the very
poor citizens have remained in Fallujah, now innocent
pawns in the battle raging about them.
Unlike
Afghanistan, Fallujah does not have a mountainous
terrain where guerrillas can hide from the intense US
air and ground bombardment. Neither do they have
underground bunkers, nor jungles, as in Vietnam.
All they have are thousands of abandoned houses.
Fallujah is an old town where in each mohallah
(neighborhood) clusters of houses are jammed together,
with roofs and walls overlapping. This is the resistance
fighters' best chance, as they can move from house to
house and rooftop to rooftop in search of new positions
without having to expose themselves to US firepower.
Already, though, many houses have been razed.
Should fighters chose to flee, they will be
aided by the desert and the nearby borders. Most will be
familiar with trails across the shifting sands.
People from al-Anbar
say they do not know of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi being
in the area. The Jordanian linked to al-Qaeda has been
widely attributed by the US as being responsible for a number of
attacks in Iraq and to be a leading figure in
the resistance. The US says the heavy bombardment of
Fallujah over the past weeks was aimed at taking out his
"safe houses", even though many civilian casualties have
resulted.
However, an unknown number of
foreign jihadis are known to be fighting under the command
of former members of Saddam Hussein's personal army
and Republican Guard. The guerrillas are said to be
equipped with high-tech weaponry, including satellite-jamming
devices and satellite communication equipment, and other
intelligence devices. They are also said to be experts
in the use of improvised weapons, with large stockpiles
of explosives.
They are scattered
throughout Fallujah, and US air supremacy is their
biggest disadvantage. People on the ground estimate that
should door-to-door fighting begin in earnest, they
could suffer a 1:12 loss of life ratio compared with US-led
soldiers. At the same time, they do not have adequate
medical facilities to treat their wounded.
The
resistance in other parts of the country can expect to
gain momentum in the face of events in Fallujah,
including the Shi'ite south, and Baghdad, Mosul, Tikrit,
Baqubah and Samarra. Operation Phantom Fury is only in
its first round.
Syed Saleem Shahzadis
Bureau Chief, Pakistan, Asia Times Online. He can be
reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com.
(Additional reporting by B F Shakir from Ramadi,
55 kilometers west of Fallujah.)
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Fighting in an urban
jungle 
