Iraqi 'warrior' tells of a resistance with 'no real organization
Ian Fisher/NYT

HAWIJA, Iraq The man was in the car for less than two minutes when he pulled out a hand grenade. He had been carrying it, like an apple, in a little red shopping bag. He smiled. The other passengers winced.

"If you don't pull the pin," he explained calmly, "it won't explode."

The grenade was not, apparently, a threat but the man's way of establishing that he was, as he claimed, a member of the "resistance." Little is known about these forces except that they keep killing anyone associated with the American-led occupation and are making the American mission in Iraq very dangerous and difficult.

It was unclear why this man, who said he was a former soldier, and appeared sturdy and fit, perhaps 35 years old, was willing to talk to a Western reporter. His account could not be verified. He readily agreed to an interview after being introduced by a man who identified himself to The New York Times as a local reporter. He offered to make contact with what he termed the local resistance in this city in the Sunni Muslim heartland, the center for violence against Americans in Iraq.

American commanders say that the people fighting them appear more brazen, and in recent weeks they have even circulated leaflets in Hawija asking all Iraqis to join them.

Grenade still in hand and with a nerve-racking politeness, the man steered the car's driver to a cemetery here where he said several of his comrades, killed by American soldiers, had been buried. There, in almost an hour of conversation behind a wall, keeping an unending vigil for American soldiers on patrol, the man described what he said were operations of his cell, which he said consisted of about 15 men, mostly former soldiers, who take no direct orders from anyone but are in contact with similar groups.

"People with more military experience than me set the targets and make the plans," he said. "It is like, 'I have a friend, who has another friend,'" he said. "We have contacts between the cells but there is no real organization."

Some of the details he gave dovetailed with comments from the American military. The man said, for example, that six insurgents were killed in an Aug. 30 firefight with the Americans, the same number given by Major Douglas Vincent, a spokesman for the 173rd Airborne Brigade, which has responsibility for Hawija.

Vincent dismissed as "very creative" the man's assertion that his cell had killed a total of 500 Americans. Six Americans have been killed in the area since late March, the major said.

The man's description squared largely with that of American military officials, who say they believe the attacks are carried out by loosely organized groups, composed of soldiers and others loyal to Saddam Hussein, as well as by Muslims from other countries who have come to Iraq to fight Americans. Bit the man said he had seen no foreigners in the ranks of the resistance. He said his group had mounted about 35 attacks locally, of which he participated in "more than five." His comments suggested a good knowledge of weapons, and he said his cell had used Katyusha rockets, rocket-propelled grenades, large machine guns, AK-47's, mines and homemade bombs detonated by remote control. He said they bought some arms with their own money and looted others from unguarded ammunition dumps left over from before the war.

Speaking insultingly of President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair, he said they would not be able "to control the Iraqis."

"We will not allow them to kill Iraqis," he said. "I am speaking before God, on my behalf and that of the other mujahedeen."

His choice of the word "mujahedeen" was perhaps one of the most telling details about what this insurgency would like to be. The word means "holy warrior," and for many Muslims it connotes brave struggles against occupiers over centuries, against the crusaders a millennium ago or against the Russians in Afghanistan a mere two decades ago.

But the Americans increasingly use a different word: "fedayeen."

In Iraq, the fedayeen were Saddam's dark-uniformed storm-troopers, who, unbroken after the U.S.-led alliance invaded Iraq last spring, appear to be among the most potent force behind the attacks on Americans and their allies here, American officials say.

Many Iraqis also consider the resisters fedayeen and worry that Saddam will return if the resisters win.

"If it were not for Saddam, I think more people would have joined already," said Kashid Ahmad Saleh, 48, a farmer here who is deeply angry at the American presence.

Vincent, the 173rd Airborne Brigade spokesman, cited the Aug. 30 attack, in which he said two American soldiers were wounded, as the "perfect" example of the resistance's weakness.

"If they were truly winning the struggle, they wouldn't be scared to operate in the day, they wouldn't attack innocent aid organizations and Iraqi citizens, but would have the courage to face the U.S. Army directly," he said in an e-mail message on Thursday.

The man said the insurgents' overall strategy was just what American commanders say it is: to kill so many soldiers that America has no political choice but to leave Iraq.

He said that the recent American decision to speed up civilian control to Iraqis was one indication their strategy is working - an assertion Vincent and other Americans strongly reject.

" We will stop killing Americans if they withdraw," the man said. "As we are precious to our families, American soldiers are precious to their families."

The New York Times

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