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Forces to target 4 'hotspots' in Baghdad

Aug-12-2006 » Filed Under: 172nd SBCT

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By ROBERT BURNS AP Military Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq — The new push by U.S. and Iraqi forces to reverse a rising tide of violence in Baghdad will target four violent "hotspots" in the city, the American general in charge of the plan said Saturday.

Those parts of the city have experienced frequent kidnappings, suicide bombings and revenge killings by Shiites and Sunnis.

Maj. Gen. James Thurman, commander of the Army's 4th Infantry Division, said the renewed push for stability began Aug. 7 in the Dora area of southwestern Baghdad, a notoriously violent part of the city. He said sweeps of Dora neighborhoods had captured 179 people thus far and killed 25 "terrorists."

The other three targeted districts are Mansour and the Ghazaliyah-Shula areas of western Baghdad and the Azamiyah area in the northeast, he said, adding that the goal is to quell the violence and restore ordinary Iraqis' confidence in their government's ability to provide security and basic services. [...]

Pace, who arrived Saturday from Washington, met with Thurman and other senior American commanders and addressed the troops at Camp Liberty to thank them for their service.

A few of the soldiers in his audience were with the Alaska-based 172nd Stryker Brigade, whose one-year tour of duty in Iraq was extended by four months recently in order to add another 3,500 soldiers to Thurman's force in the capital. Thurman said he has received another 2,000 extra troops from other units.

Thurman said he now has 32,444 U.S. troops in Baghdad and areas south of the capital, as well as 32,554 Iraqi forces. Of the U.S. total, about 13,500 are in Baghdad proper, he said.

As recently as a month ago, U.S. officials thought they were going to be able to reduce U.S. troop levels this fall, but Thurman said the rise in strife between different religious groups "had us worried" and prompted him to ask his superiors for more combat power "so we could quell this and once and for all get rid of the people that are causing the problems here." Thus, the 172nd Stryker Brigade was moved into Baghdad from northern Iraq.

In his remarks to troops at Thurman's headquarters, Pace disclosed that the plan earlier this summer was to reduce the total number of U.S. combat brigades this fall to 12 from the 14 that were operating at the time. Instead a brigade that had been held in reserve in Kuwait was brought into Iraq and the 172nd was retained even as its replacement _ a brigade of the 2nd Infantry Division _ arrived.


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