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Insurgents Rule the Roads

Apr-19-2004 » Filed Under: 3/2 SBCT

This article from the LA Times indicates that 80 Stryker vehicles were sent from Mosul to secure key roads between Najaf and Baghdad.

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By Nicholas Riccardi and Edmund Sanders
Times Staff Writers

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- At a sprawling desert camp in southern Iraq, U.S. soldiers sleep in trucks and Humvees because Iraqi merchants are afraid to deliver tents to them.

On a key road west through the Sunni Triangle, masked men with Kalashnikov assault rifles have occupied the concrete-block checkpoints the U.S. military once used.

The new troops arrived at Forward Operating Base Duke, an empty swath of desert outside the holy city of Najaf, to find a logistical nightmare.

Military buyers had signed contracts with local vendors to supply everything from water to portable tents. But the contractors were balking at delivering the goods.

"When the security situation gets bad, they don't want to deliver, and that's what's happening now," said Capt. Ron Talarico, who is helping coordinate supplies.

A temporary water shortage was solved, but the camp still has only six portable toilets for the 2,500 troops. There are no showers or laundry facilities. A shortage of tents has forced troops to sleep in their vehicles in 100-degree temperatures and blistering sandstorms.

"It's a wasteland here," said 1st Lt. Matt Nethers, 24, from Los Alamitos, Calif. "The army logistical system isn't what it could be."

The military dispatched its Stryker Brigade, including 80 state-of-the-art combat vehicles, to try to secure the main roads.

Finally, on Saturday, military officials announced they would close the highway running from near Najaf past Baghdad and to the city of Balad to restore order. On Monday, they said closures would be irregular, depending on military and repair needs.


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