Free Republic

Save the Apache, Lose the Gold Plating By David H. HackworthAs our magnificent warriors return from Iraq, they will tell the folks who sweated them out at home what really went down during their bold march to Baghdad and will catch them up on all the inside skinny concerning the war's winners and losers.              At first glance, one of the big equipment losers is the U.S. Army's crown jewel, the Longbow Apache helicopter gunship (AH-64D model). Especially since a Longbow squadron got ventilated March 24 over the city of Karbala when 34 of these $24 million birds –...

Guerrilla leader who became a legend emerges from hiding For 13 years he was a defiant symbol of Iraqi resistance. Hunted in vain by Saddam Hussein's militia, the legendary guerrilla fighter Abu Hattem fought an extraordinary campaign against the Iraqi regime from his secluded bases in the poisoned marshland of southern Iraq. Known as the Lord of the Marshes, his exploits earned him a reputation that is a cross between Robin Hood and Lawrence of Arabia, with tales of suicidal missions and narrow escapes. Western journalists tried for years to track him down during the guerrilla years, visiting Iranian border...

Hostages freed amid fighting TROOPS backed by helicopter gunships drove out Muslim separatist guerrillas from a highway they occupied in the southern Philippines after a day of intense fighting that left 18 people dead. As they fled, the rebels from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) released scores of villagers, bus commuters and several policemen they had held hostage, local military commander Colonel Ernesto Boac said. About 500 MILF fighters yesterday took the people hostage and attacked government installations, blocking the 400km highway linking Iligan city in south-western Mindanao and Zamboanga City, the regional trading capital. The government repulsed the...

  'I deserted Saddam's army' Iraq had a huge army, but only a fraction of its soldiers were killed or captured during the war. Hamed Nissam was one of those who took off his uniform and simply melted away. Hamed Nissam: "I held up a white flag and ran home" I was a tank driver defending Basra. It was a very old Russian tank, made in 1969.Because of the Americans' technological advantage, we were sure that we could not survive the war. We were horrified by the prospect of meeting them in battle. I was very afraid of being...

File photo of Arab volunteers flashing victory signs aboard a bus leaving from Baghdad   TUNISIA, April 19 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - After three tough weeks in Iraq, Tunisian volunteers who fought against the U.S.-led invasion forces returned home with haunting memories and bitter feeling of betrayal and hatred."We left for Iraq as volunteers to join the Iraqis who are die-set to defend their country, but returned victims to betrayal by some Iraqi army members and hatred - and even attacks - by some Iraqi civilians," recalled Al-Tayeb Bin Othman, a 27-year-old teacher."Upon reaching Baghdad, we stayed for...

ASHINGTON, April 17 — On the third day of the Iraq war, a mysterious American aircraft loitered high over Baghdad for hours on end, evading a withering barrage of missile and artillery fire.Even as Iraqi television showed gunmen shooting into the Tigris River's banks at a phantom plane, the real aircraft — a stripped-down, remotely piloted RQ-1 Predator drone — was landing in a lake 75 miles away, its secret 33-hour mission accomplished: to flush out Baghdad's vaunted air defenses so they could be pinpointed and attacked by waves of allied fighter-bombers.Remotely piloted aircraft like the Predator have played...

In late spring of 1990, this columnist wrote a small item about a group that was forming to defend then-Vice President Dan Quayle, who was under attack from the left-wing media. John Piper attended that first meeting and soon became president of "Friends of Dan Quayle," a bipartisan grass-roots group dedicated to a "fair and balanced" presentation of the tasks and talents of the vice president. "For over two years we had a number of accomplishments," Piper, a vice president of PaineWebber, recalled Wednesday. "We put together a media guide on Vice President Quayle (something that should have happened in...

Analysis: Iraqi forces are crumbling Matthew Gutman Apr. 5, 2003 Exiled Iraqi Army officers and Israeli experts barely raised an eyebrow at the relative ease with which coalition forces gained a choke hold on the Iraqi capital of Baghdad Saturday. Following a 3rd Infantry Patrol into the what was dubbed "the heart of Baghdad," air force Capt. Dani Burrows told reporters at central command in Qatar that Baghdad is "pretty much cut off in all directions." "Forget what they tell you, no one in Iraq is wiling to die for Saddam. The Iraqi people are tired," Salam A., an...

WASHINGTON, March 29 (Reuters) - U.S. Marines were in a fierce firefight with Iraqi fighters on Saturday in the southern city of Nassiriya, CNN reported. Marines on one side of the Euphrates River were blasting Hellfire missiles from Cobra helicopters and 25 mm cannons at Iraqis holed up in apartment buildings on the other side, according to a CNN correspondent traveling with a contingent of Marines from the 2nd Division. The network reported machine-gun fire coming from the Iraqi side of the river. The embattled city 235 miles (375 km) southeast of Baghdad has seen heavy fighting during the 10-day-old...

NEAR NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. helicopters attacked units of Iraq's elite Republican Guard on Saturday, killing at least 50 Iraqi soldiers and destroying some 25 vehicles, a senior officer said. "We fired 40 missiles and we had 40 hits. We had a confirmed kill of at least 25 vehicles including tanks, armored personnel carriers and trucks, and at least 50 dead," Major Hugh Cate told Reuters.

<p>In anticipation of a push on Baghdad, F/A-18s attacked a Republican Guard fuel depot and missile facility south of the Iraqi capital, officials said. Hornets dropped 500-pound satellite-guided bombs on the fuel facility, while other planes hit the missile site with four, 1000-pound bunker-penetrating bombs.</p>