G.I.'s Kill 11 Who Ambushed Patrol in Iraq; No U.S. Casualties
By AMY WALDMAN - NEW YORK TIMES
BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 4 - A day after attacks against the United States-led coalition in Iraq escalated, American forces killed 11 attackers who ambushed them near the town of Balad today, the military said.
Officials said no American soldiers were harmed in the failed ambush, in which the attackers used small-arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades against an American patrol.
The incident today came less than 24 hours after an American soldier was killed in Baghdad and 18 were injured, also near Balad, on Thursday night. Those attacks, and the ambush today, seemed to affirm the comments of the commander of allied forces in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez of the Army, who said on Thursday, "We're still at war."
A military spokesman said a soldier was shot to death at 8:30 p.m. Thursday as he sat inside a Bradley fighting vehicle protecting the Baghdad Museum. About two hours later, a support base near Balad, about 60 miles north of Baghdad, came under mortar attack, wounding the 18 soldiers, two seriously.
Those two attacks followed a day of violence in which 10 soldiers were wounded in three other separate incidents, including a rocket-propelled grenade attack on a busy Baghdad Street at 10 in the morning.
In Dubai, , the Arab television satellite network Al Jazeera broadcast an audiotape today of a voice purporting to be that of Saddam Hussein claiming he is still in Iraq and urging Iraqis to aid the escalating resistance attacks against allied forces.
There was no way of determing whether the tape was authentic, but the mere perception that it might be could strengthen the influence of Mr. Hussein on Iraqis loyal to him at a time when the United States is intent on ending any effect he might be having on the growing resistance. On Thursday, the State Department said it was offering a reward of up to $25 million for information leading to the capture of Mr. Hussein or confirmation of his death.
With the violence seemingly escalating daily, the offer of a bounty for Mr. Hussein seemed to reflect the renewed urgency allied officials and military commanders attach to finding the deposed leader and his two sons, whose specter they believe is fueling the growing resistance to the American occupation.
"Until we know for sure, their names will continue to cast a shadow of fear over this country," L. Paul Bremer III, the American civilian administrator of Iraq, said on Thursday in his weekly address to the Iraqi people.
In Washington, a group of senators just back from a three-day visit to Iraq were even more emphatic on Thursday about the need to capture or kill Mr. Hussein.
"There's a pervasive climate of fear that is impeding the recovery, particularly in central and southern Iraq," said Senator Susan Collins, a Maine Republican. "There is a fear that he will return, that he will come back. And that fear prevents us from making progress as rapidly as we otherwise would, and that fear emboldens those who would attack our troops."
The $25 million reward for Mr. Hussein is the same amount offered for Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda. Mr. Bremer said up to $15 million apiece would be offered for similar information on Mr. Hussein's sons, Uday and Qusay.
Mr. Bremer said in an interview on Sunday that the "general assessment" of people he talked to was that Mr. Hussein was still in Iraq.
While Mr. Bremer maintained that the threats and violence against American soldiers and civilians, as well as the Iraqis working with them, would not deter reconstruction, General Sanchez made clear at a news conference Thursday that rebuilding the country and fighting the enemy would have to take place side by side.
While saying the daily attacks on American forces did not appear to be centrally coordinated, the general acknowledged that there had been an "increase in sophistication of the explosive devices." He said 25 soldiers had been killed in action and 177 wounded since May 1, when Mr. Bush declared the official cessation of major hostilities.
The multiple attacks came a day after Mr. Bush seemingly invited confrontation with militant Iraqis, saying, "Bring 'em on." The American-led alliance, he said, has adequate force to deal with the security situation. Thursday's attacks seemed to defy that assertion. They also suggested that sapping the resistance might not be as simple as capturing or killing Mr. Hussein. The attacks occurred in diverse locations: a Sunni area west of Baghdad that staunchly supported the former government, a Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad that did not and the center of the city.
In the Baghdad neighborhood of Kadhimiya on Thursday, a gunman opened fire on a group of soldiers from the First Armored Division on foot patrol at 2:30 a.m., wounding one of them. The soldiers returned fire, killing the gunman and wounding a 6-year-old boy with him, according to an American military spokesman.
In the city of Ramadi, about 65 miles west of Baghdad, six soldiers were wounded when their two-vehicle convoy drove over an improvised explosive device at 6:30 a.m. Thursday.
Ramadi has become a center of resistance to the American-led occupation. It is about 30 miles west of Falluja, where an explosion at a Sunni mosque killed at least six people on Monday night. An allied investigation blamed a bombmaking class being held in a building adjacent to the mosque, but many residents accused the Americans of firing a missile into the mosque and promised revenge against American troops.
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