U.S. Fights Highly Trained Militants in Iraq

By EDWARD WONG FORWARD OPERATING BASE CALDWELL, Iraq, Nov. 23 — Sunni Arab militant groups suspected of ties to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia have established training camps east of Baghdad that are turning out well-disciplined units willing to fight American forces in set-piece battles, American military commanders said Thursday. American soldiers fought such units in a pitched battle last week in the village of Turki, 25 miles south of this Iraqi Army base in volatile Diyala Province, near the Iranian border. At least 72 insurgents and two American officers were killed in more than 40 hours of fighting. American commanders said they called in 12 hours of airstrikes while soldiers shot their way through a reed-strewn network of canals in extremely close combat. Officers said that in this battle, unlike the vast majority of engagements in Diyala, insurgents stood and fought, even deploying a platoon-sized unit that showed remarkable discipline and that one captain said was in “perfect military formation.” Insurgents throughout Iraq usually avoid direct confrontation with the Americans, preferring to use hit-and-run tactics and melting away at the sight of American armored vehicles. Lt. Col. Andrew Poppas, commander of the Fifth Squadron, 73rd Cavalry, a unit of the 82nd Airborne Division, said in an interview that the fighters at Turki “were disciplined and well-trained, with well-aimed shots.” “We hadn’t seen anything like this in years,” he said. The insurgents had built a labyrinthine network of trenches in the farmland, with sleeping areas and significant weapons caches. Two anti-aircraft guns had been hidden away. Insurgents were apparently able to establish a training camp after American combat forces moved out of the area in the fall of 2005, Colonel Poppas said. Sunni Arab militants there belong to the fundamentalist Wahabbi strain of Islam and are believed to be led, at least in part, by a man known as Abu Abdul Rahman, an Iraqi-Canadian who moved from Canada to Iraq in 1995 after marrying a woman from Turki, the colonel said. Abu Abdul Rahman was mentioned on some jihadist Web sites as a possible contender for the leadership of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia after the group’s founder, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was killed in an American airstrike in Diyala Province last summer, said Capt. Mike Few, commander of A Troop, Fifth Squadron. Senior commanders training Iraqi Army units here say other rural areas of eastern and central Diyala where American forces have had little oversight have been transformed into camps similar to the one at Turki. The “graduates,” many of whom belong to an umbrella group called the Sunni Council, then spread to urban areas such as Baquba, the provincial capital, said Maj. Tim Sheridan, an intelligence officer. Sectarian violence is rampant in Diyala, where Sunni Arab and Shiite militants are vying for control. The battle at Turki began after Colonel Poppas and other soldiers flew over the area on a reconnaissance mission on Nov. 12. From the helicopters, they spotted a white car covered by shrubbery and a hole in the ground that appeared to be a hiding place. The colonel dropped off an eight-man team and later sent other soldiers to sweep the area. Gunfire erupted on Nov. 15 when one unit ran into an ambush. The fighting eventually became so intense that the Americans called in Apache attack helicopters and F-16 fighters, which dropped bombs and strafed the area for hours. An American captain and a lieutenant, both West Point graduates, were shot dead by insurgents in separate firefights.