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 Pentagon Early Bird for 10-25-2007 Please Scroll down to read the Headline then Scroll down to that Headline Number to read entire Article. Use of these news articles does not reflect official endorsement. Reproduction for private use or gain is subject to original copyright restrictions. Story numbers indicate order of appearance only. This is the single print version. Use the PRINT command in your browser to print the entire Early Bird as one document. (NOTE: This single file format is a long document and can use 50 or more pages of paper.) GATES TRIP
Washingtonpost.com October 24, 2007 Gates: Hold Off On Attacking Kurds By Robert Burns, Associated Press NOORDWIJK, the Netherlands -- Pentagon chief Robert Gates said Wednesday he saw little sense in air strikes or major ground assaults by U.S., Turkish or other forces against Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq until more is known about their locations along the border. His comments to reporters during a break in a NATO defense ministers meeting suggested U.S. concern that Turkey will open a large-scale offensive across the border into the Kurdish region of northern Iraq. That area has been one of the most prosperous and peaceful parts of Iraq in recent years. Turkish warplanes and helicopter gunships reportedly attacked positions of Kurdish rebels just inside Turkey earlier Wednesday, and Turkish leaders in Ankara discussed the scope and duration of a possible offensive. Turkey's leaders face demands at home to stage an offensive in northern Iraq. Rebels of the Kurdistan Workers' Party _ known as the PKK _ rest, train and get supplies in relative safety in the area before returning to Turkey to conduct attacks in support of their goal of autonomy in southeastern Turkey. At a news conference in this seaside village, where defense ministers of all 26 NATO member countries gathered to discuss their efforts in Afghanistan, Gates was asked to assess the prospects of the U.S. military launching air strikes in support of Turkey's efforts against the Kurdish rebels. "Without good intelligence, just sending large numbers of troops across the border (from Turkey) or dropping bombs doesn't seem to make much sense to me," Gates said. The defense secretary was questioned about whether his sense of the limitations on effective military action applied to U.S. as well as Turkish strikes. "For anybody," he replied. Adm. Michael Mullen, the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told soldiers at Fort Riley, Kan., that the border situation is complex and any incursions across it would be a difficult undertaking. Asked later whether the U.S. is considering air strikes, Mullen said he would not disclose any military options at this point. "It's a pretty tough area. It's a pretty mountainous area," he told reporters. "Nothing would be simple." In Washington, Pentagon officials said they could not confirm news reports of airstrikes. "I don't know of any Turkish airstrikes in that area today," Maj. Gen. Richard Sherlock, Joint Chiefs of Staff operational planning director, said at a Defense Department press conference. Separately, a senior defense official said there is increasing frustration at the highest reaches of the Bush administration with the Turkey-Iraq situation; that the Iraqis understand this; and that there is growing sympathy with the Turkish position that something has to be done. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, said the U.S. military believes the Turks would "like to avoid a cross-border military operation on the ground if they could." He suggested Turkey hopes "others will take ... tangible and concrete action to help preclude that." The official cited ways of curtailing the rebels' movement and making it more difficult to operate across the border." In congressional testimony Wednesday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the Iraqis are taking steps to crack down on Kurdish rebels. The U.S. has told Turkey that retaliatory attacks would have a "destabilizing effect," she said. Few of the U.S. military forces in Iraq are along the border with Turkey, but there is ample air power available. U.S. officials have said repeatedly in recent days that U.S. forces are tied up with the long-running fight against insurgents and the al-Qaida in Iraq group elsewhere in the country. At the outset of Wednesday's NATO meeting, the alliance's top diplomat, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer of the Netherlands, said Turkey is showing "remarkable restraint" in the Kurdish matter. He said the 26 allies expressed solidarity with Turkey in the face of the attacks by rebels. Associated Press writers Pauline Jelinek in Washington and Lolita C. Baldor from Fort Riley, Kan., contributed to this report. <A name=e20071025555793.html> USA Today October 25, 2007 Pg. 11 Dutch Push For NATO Help In Afghanistan The Dutch government said other NATO allies must send troops to support its 1,600 soldiers in Afghanistan's southern Uruzgan province or the parliament may not extend the Dutch mission beyond August. "There is no such thing as a free ride to peace and security," Defense Minister Eimert van Middelkoop said at a meeting of NATO nations' defense ministers in the Netherlands. U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates attended the event to press for more military support. Germany, Italy, France and Spain have refused to commit significant forces to southern and eastern Afghanistan, where most of the fighting has occurred. <A name=e20071025555902.html> Reuters.com October 24, 2007 Gates Expects Dutch To Stay In Afghanistan NOORDWIJK, Netherlands (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he expected the Netherlands next year to extend the mandate for a key 1,600-strong military presence in south Afghanistan despite domestic pressure to quit. "I can't speak for the Dutch. I certainly hope so and I guess I would say I expect them to do so," Gates told reporters after he met Defense Minister Eimert van Middelkoop at NATO talks in the Dutch coastal resort of Noordwijk on Wednesday. Dutch troops are based in the southern province of Uruzgan in the front-line of the battle between NATO's 40,000-strong peace force and Taliban insurgents. The Netherlands is due to decide next month whether to renew the mandate expiring in August 2008. <A name=e20071025555879.html> Boston Globe October 25, 2007 Optimism Voiced On Missile Shield MOSCOW - Proposals put forward by Washington to ease Russian concerns over the planned missile shield in Europe are "positive signs," a senior Kremlin aide said yesterday. US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said this week Washington had offered to delay the activation of parts of its European shield if Russia cooperated on the project. Earlier this month, US officials said they had invited Russia to inspect elements of the planned shield as a confidence-building measure. Sergei Yastrzhembsky, President Vladimir Putin's chief adviser on EU-Russia relations, said the proposals were "interesting finds." (Reuters) <A name=e20071025555766.html> Washington Post October 25, 2007 Pg. 18 Turkey Intensifies Border Operations Airstrikes Said to Target Sites Used by Rebels Based in Iraq By Joshua Partlow and Ellen Knickmeyer, Washington Post Foreign Service BAGHDAD, Oct. 24 -- Turkey has ramped up military operations along its southern border with Iraq, with aircraft reportedly bombarding the mountainous terrain on Wednesday, part of a growing confrontation that threatens to open a new northern front in the Iraq war. While intense diplomatic efforts continued to prevent large-scale violence, Turkish military helicopters and warplanes attacked hideouts thought to be used by Kurdish rebels as they travel between Iraq and Turkey, the Turkish state-run Anatolian news agency reported. The Turkish operations were taking place in four predominantly Kurdish provinces of eastern Turkey and "in the border area with Iraq," the news agency said. An Associated Press cameraman saw helicopters and several F-16 warplanes take off from a Turkish air base in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir, the AP reported. There were conflicting reports about exactly when and where the Turkish military carried out its attacks. Residents in northern Iraq described bombings Wednesday in the Mergasur area on the Turkish side of the border and said artillery shells had crashed down a day earlier near several villages inside Iraq. Much of the borderland is sparsely populated, accessible only by narrow dirt roads, making it difficult to confirm the extent of violence in the area. The reported bombing came as U.S. and Iraqi officials pleaded with Turkey to refrain from a major cross-border incursion to combat guerrillas from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), a Turkish separatist group operating from bases in Turkey and northern Iraq that is seeking a separate Kurdish state. "We are concerned about the continuing skirmishes that are happening up there and the terrorist attacks that are being lodged by the PKK against the Turks," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino, who added: "We continue to urge both sides to exercise restraint." A spokesman for the PKK, Abdul Rahman al-Chaderchi, said Turkish planes did fly into Iraq but denied that there was bombing in the Mergasur area. A senior official of the semiautonomous Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq also said the area was not attacked by Turkish planes. In Baghdad, U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the second-ranking American commander in Iraq, told reporters he could not verify the reports of Turkish aircraft crossing into Iraqi airspace. Turkey's parliament last week approved a resolution authorizing a military offensive into Iraq to pursue the guerrilla fighters who live along both sides of the border and are accused of killing dozens of Turkish citizens in recent weeks. The prospects for such an invasion appeared to gain momentum after PKK fighters killed at least 12 Turkish soldiers in an ambush Sunday. The PKK also claims to have captured eight Turkish soldiers, and video footage of captives was broadcast on Iraqi and Turkish television stations. Residents of northern Iraq say that both Turkey and Iran have shelled areas within northern Iraq sporadically for years. Turkey's military also has staged several raids into Iraq in the past under what it says is the right of "hot pursuit" against PKK rebels. On Wednesday, after an hours-long emergency meeting of Turkey's National Security Council, Turkish leaders moved closer to economic sanctions against the Kurdish region of northern Iraq, which Turkey accuses of harboring the rebels. The security council members recommended unspecified economic measures against those entities that "directly or indirectly support the separatist terrorist organization in the region," a council statement said. Turkey is a leading trade partner with northern Iraq, one of the few regions of the country that has enjoyed relative peace and prosperity since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. Turkish construction firms are responsible for 90 percent of rebuilding projects in Iraq's Kurdish north, officials there estimate, and Turkish companies are taking part in many private projects as well in a post-invasion building boom in the north. Wednesday's statement by the Turkish security council did not name northern Iraq. But Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan mentioned the possibility of sanctions against the Iraqi north on Tuesday. Officials of his governing party have said measures could include cutting electricity to northern Iraq and restricting traffic through border crossings. In Washington, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the United States intends to activate a trilateral commission, to involve Turkey, Iraq and the United States, to prevent future cross-border attacks. Rice acknowledged difficulties in containing the PKK in the rugged mountains but said, "That isn't an excuse." "The Iraqis have to deal seriously with this and so do we," Rice told members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. "And we've tried to reassure the Turks that we will do what we can to prevent that kind of attack again." Knickmeyer reported from Cairo. Special correspondents Dlovan Brwari in Dahuk, Iraq, and Naseer Nouri in Baghdad contributed to this report. <A name=e20071025555794.html> USA Today October 25, 2007 Pg. 13 Turkish Military Steps Up Anti-Rebel Measures By Associated Press CIZRE, Turkey — Turkish warplanes and helicopter gunships pounded Kurdish rebel positions along the Turkey-Iraq border Wednesday, Turkey's official news agency reported. The state-run Anatolia news agency said the aircraft bombed mountain paths used by the rebels to cross the porous border from Iraq and staged hit-and-run attacks against soldiers in southeastern Turkey. It was unclear whether the attacks hit targets inside Iraq or whether they were confined to Turkish areas near the border. "Along with Sikorsky and Cobra helicopters providing air support, warplanes that took off from (the city of) Diyarbakir are reported to have bombed and destroyed bases of the terrorists," the news agency reported. The attacks could escalate a confrontation between Turkey and Kurds who have staged an insurgency within Turkey since the 1980s. Turkey has threatened to launch a major offensive inside Iraq to root out the rebels, who frequently mount attacks in Turkey and then take refuge across the Iraqi border. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice plans to meet Turkish leaders next week in Ankara, Turkey's capital, to try to defuse the crisis, the State Department said. Pentagon officials declined to confirm reports of airstrikes. "I don't know of any Turkish airstrikes in that area today," Maj. Gen. Richard Sherlock, Joint Chiefs of Staff operational planning director, told a Defense Department news conference Wednesday. Residents in the Iraqi village of Derishkit told the Associated Press that two Turkish jet fighters struck a target on the banks of the Zey-Gowra River about 4 miles inside Iraq, but they were unable to offer further details. Meanwhile, Turkish Cabinet members and military generals held a six-hour meeting in Ankara to discuss a possible operation in northern Iraq. Afterward, the officials recommended that the government "first take necessary economic measures against those groups directly or indirectly supporting the separatist terrorist organization in the region," a statement said. The target of the economic measures was not made clear in the statement. However, the self-ruling Kurdish administration in Iraq's north has benefited from Turkish investment for construction works, including airports and housing projects. Ankara is also selling electricity to northern Iraq, and much of the imported food and other supplies come from Turkey. U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, at a NATO meeting in the Netherlands, said he saw little sense in airstrikes or major ground assaults by U.S., Turkish or other forces against rebels in northern Iraq until more is known about their locations along the border. "Without good intelligence, just sending large numbers of troops across the border (from Turkey) or dropping bombs doesn't seem to make much sense to me," he said. <A name=e20071025555852.html> Los Angeles Times October 25, 2007 Turkey, Iraq Discuss Kurdish Attacks Ankara keeps up its shelling of PKK rebels amid talks to defuse tensions over the guerrillas' cross-border strikes. By Asso Ahmed and Yesim Borg, Special to The Times DAHUK, IRAQ —Turkish forces continued to lob artillery rounds at the remote mountain hide-outs of Kurdish guerrillas Wednesday as diplomats from Baghdad and Ankara met to discuss ways to avert an incursion into Iraqi Kurdistan. A Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, leader said that his fighters had repelled a small Turkish attack on one of their enclaves in the steep terrain of northern Iraq. The PKK official, Rustum Joodi, said five Turkish soldiers were killed in the skirmish. Border villages where the PKK has created bases for launching strikes against Turkey have been shelled daily since the Turkish parliament last week granted Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan the right to mount ground offensives in neighboring Iraq against the PKK. Turkey's goal to crush PKK strongholds in Iraq has cast a pall on the semiautonomous Kurdish provinces of Irbil, Dahuk and Sulaymaniya, which have provided a haven for a Kurdish renaissance and an oasis of peace in war-torn Iraq. The Iraqi government has pledged to crack down on the PKK for its cross-border attacks in Turkey. And on Wednesday, the White House demanded that Iraqi officials make good on a year-old commitment to close down offices of the PKK. Prime Minister Nouri Maliki promised on a visit to Turkey in November that he would shut down the PKK offices. However, they were never formally closed, and Maliki renewed the pledge this week, as Turkey threatened to send its military across the border to attack PKK sites in northern Iraq. White House Press Secretary Dana Perino in a briefing noted Maliki's restatement of his 2006 pledge, which has been questioned by Turkish officials. "We can understand why the Turks would be skeptical, because that pledge was made. It does need to be fulfilled," Perino said. "We'll be talking to the Iraqis about that as well." A senior Pentagon official involved in talks with the Turks said the U.S. also was pressing the Kurdish regional government to take concrete action against the PKK, including severing logistics lines and curtailing the movement of Iraq-based cells of the separatist group. "There are a variety of different things that might be done to make it, if not impossible, much more difficult for the PKK to operate across the border, that will also be visible to the government of Turkey and the Turkish people," the official said. Asked whether the U.S. military would conduct airstrikes on known PKK sites if the Iraqi Kurdish government failed to act, the Pentagon official said he could not comment on operational planning, but added, "I think throughout the senior reaches of the U.S. government, there is increasing sympathy for the Turkish position that something has to be done." Kurdistan regional officials have said that although they do not back the PKK, they believe the attacks are Turkey's problem. "We have emphasized many times that Kurdistan Workers Party does not exist in the Iraqi Kurdish cities," said a statement from Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd. "They are positioned [in] . . . in rocky terrain. For that it is impossible to arrest them, not to mention handing them over to Turkey." Iraqi Kurds have vowed to defend their land in the wake of a large-scale incursion by Turkey. An Iraqi delegation is to travel to Turkey soon in hopes of defusing the crisis. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will meet Turkish leaders in Ankara, the capital, on Nov. 2, the day Istanbul begins a two-day conference on Iraq. As many as 100,000 Turkish troops have been positioned on the Iraqi border, and Turkey already operates three small bases in Iraq, which were granted to it during Saddam Hussein's rule. Special correspondents Ahmed reported from Dahuk and Borg from Istanbul. Times staff writer Peter Spiegel in Washington contributed to this report. <A name=e20071025555862.html> Seattle Post-Intelligencer October 25, 2007 Iraqi Kurds Say They're Ready To Fight Turkey By Douglas Birch, Associated Press DERISHKIT, Iraq -- Two Turkish jet fighters streaked across the mountain peaks near this border village Wednesday as part of an expanding military force gathered to pressure Kurdish rebels to abandon their hideouts in northern Iraq. Residents claimed the planes were on a bombing run to hit a site about four miles inside Iraq but could offer no details to back up their assertion. If true, however, the airstrike would mark a notable escalation of Turkish tactics against the Kurdish rebels. The overflight came after three days of artillery shelling from inside Turkey at this area along the Zey-Gowra River, said Jalal Salman, 45, the principal of the local school, and five other villagers. Turkey's government has warned it will launch an offensive into northern Iraq if Iraqi authorities don't move against bases used by the Kurdish Workers' Party, or PKK, which has waged a more than two-decade fight for autonomy in predominantly Kurdish southeastern Turkey. Officials in Iraq's Kurdish region say there are no PKK bases, at least in populated areas under government control. Local officials said the Turkish artillery fire had mostly hit orchards, roads, mountainsides and, in one case, a tourist restaurant in a cave. So far there were no casualties in this area, they said. Five other Derishkit residents joined Salman and gestured toward a Turkish military post on a hilltop in the neighboring town of Khani-Mase. An armored vehicle stood on the heights, its gun pointing down the slope. The post is one of five bases established inside this part of Iraq in the mid-1990s with Iraqi Kurd agreement as part of Turkey's war against PKK separatists. Salman said villagers were not intimidated by the base's soldiers, who they said sometimes fired machine guns at people gathering firewood on the slopes below. They also said they won't hesitate to wage war on Turkish troops if an invasion comes. "There will be a guerrilla war, and we will take up arms," Salman said as the other men nodded in agreement. "What else can we do? They are bombing us. They are committing aggression." Popular anger at Turkey seems to be growing in northern Iraq, along with quiet preparations for conflict. There have been large demonstrations in the region's major cities, and television reports on a Kurdish protest in Turkey's capital riveted viewers here. According to a report in one Kurdish newspaper, people living near one of the largest Turkish bases in northern Iraq threatened to attack the post if the Turkish army continued to fire artillery at the area. Meanwhile, the Kurdish regional government has moved in units of its Peshmerga Defense Forces from the region's south. More than 100 of the fighters arrived aboard white buses Tuesday morning in Dohuk, capital of the region. <A name=e20071025555880.html> Miami Herald October 25, 2007 Maliki May Be Helpless As Turks Target Rebels As Turkey bombed suspected locations of Kurdish rebels in Iraq, officials said Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki had little power to stop the rebels. By Bobby Caina Calvan and Yaseen Taha, McClatchy News Service SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq -- Turkish warplanes bombed targets in northern Iraq on Wednesday as tensions remain high between the two countries over Turkey's allegations that Kurdish rebels have taken refuge in Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region. In Baghdad, politicians acknowledged that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki lacked the political and military muscle needed to fulfill his pledge to crack down on rebels from the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, who last week killed 12 Turkish soldiers and captured eight in an ambush in Turkey. Iraqi Kurdish officials indicated that they were unlikely to help in any crackdown, with the regional government's spokesman denying that there are PKK bases in northern Iraq. ''We believe that the statements of Mr. Maliki about closing the centers of the PKK don't apply to us, because we do not have any centers,'' said the spokesman, Jamal Abdullah. ``If Mr. Maliki knows about any centers of the PKK in areas under the control of the central government, let him close these centers and we will encourage and support him. But in areas under our control, there is not a single center.'' A PKK spokesman said that the Turkish planes attacked several targets near the town of Mergsur, about 90 miles north of Irbil, Iraqi Kurdistan's capital. No PKK forces were in the area at the time, said the spokesman, Abdul Rahman al Chadrachi. Chadrachi, who was reached by phone at an undisclosed location in Iraq's Kandil Mountains, also said that PKK rebels had clashed with Turkish forces in Turkey, but provided no details except to say that there were no PKK casualties. Wednesday's raids were the first time Turkey has sent planes into Iraqi airspace since its parliament last week authorized an invasion of Iraq to stop PKK attacks, which have claimed hundreds of lives in Turkey. The raids came a day after Maliki sought to defuse tensions by publicly calling the PKK a terrorist organization and banning it from operating in Iraq. But politicians said that Maliki has no means to enforce the ban in Iraq's Kurdish region, which operates virtually as an independent country, flying its own flag and signing its own deals with foreign investors. In recent interviews with McClatchy News Service, regional officials have said that they have little interest in tangling with the PKK. ''[Maliki] really can't do anything about it,'' said Mahmud Ali Othman, a Kurdish member of the Iraqi parliament. ``I think it's just words he's using to satisfy the Turks. He hasn't thought about how he's going to implement it.'' Othman said he believed that Maliki's ban on the PKK will only create tension between Iraq's central government and the Kurdish region. ``It was a mistake to give promises when, really, he can't do anything.'' The spokesman for the Kurdish region's security force, the peshmerga militia, emphasized that local officials, not the government in Baghdad, would decide whether to go after the PKK. ''The peshmerga gets its orders from the presidency of the Kurdistan region, not the Iraqi minister of defense,'' Maj. Gen. Jabbar Yawir said. He rejected placing the regional army under the direct command of the central government. He said peshmerga troops have massed near the Turkish border to repulse any Turkish incursion, but that Kurdish officials believe a full-scale invasion was unlikely. Calvan, a reporter for The Sacramento Bee, reported from Baghdad; McClatchy special correspondent Taha reported from Sulaimaniyah. McClatchy special correspondent Laith Hammoudi contributed to this report from Baghdad. <A name=e20071025555772.html> New York Times October 25, 2007 Pg. 1 Under Siege, Blackwater Takes On Air Of Bunker By Paul von Zielbauer and James Glanz BAGHDAD, Oct. 24 — The Blackwater USA compound here is a fortress within a fortress. Surrounded by a 25-foot-high wall of concrete topped by a chain-link fence and razor wire, the compound sits deep inside the heavily defended Green Zone, its two points of entry guarded by Colombian Army veterans carrying shotguns and automatic rifles. In the mazelike interior, Blackwater employees live in trailers stacked one on top of the other in surroundings that one employee likens to a “minimum-security prison.” Since Sept. 16, when Blackwater guards opened fire in a crowded Baghdad square, the compound has begun to feel more like a prison, too. On that day, employees of Blackwater, a private security firm hired to protect American diplomats, responded to what they called a threat and killed as many as 17 people and wounded 24. Richard J. Griffin, the State Department official who oversaw Blackwater USA and other private security contractors in Iraq, resigned Wednesday. For weeks, not a word has emerged publicly from the compound, as the F.B.I., the American military and the Iraqi government investigate the Sept. 16 and earlier Blackwater shootings in Iraq. But in recent days, that secretive Blackwater world has begun to fray under so much scrutiny, said four current and two former Blackwater employees. They described a grating sense among many of Blackwater guards, especially those with years of experience, that the killings on Sept. 16 were unjustified. “Some guys are thinking that it was not a good shoot, that it was not warranted,” said one Blackwater contractor, using military jargon for an episode that results in a wrongful death. “I don’t think there was criminal intent involved. I just think it was the application of the use of deadly force gone horribly wrong.” He added, “To mitigate one threat, 17 people had to die?” Blackwater employees are aware of the conclusions of Iraqi investigators: that Blackwater never received fire and that any threat was illusory. Like the company in its official statements, the guards appear to believe that three armored Blackwater vehicles received several rounds of gunfire somewhere in the city that day, and that this might help explain why the guards fired into Nisour Square. Still, a growing number of Blackwater guards here believe that the federal investigation may result in criminal charges against some of the four to six members of the team believed to have fired weapons on Sept. 16. Most of the men who fired are former Marine infantrymen still in their 20s, said one Blackwater contractor with a military background. In a series of detailed interviews, given despite a company policy that forbids contractors to speak openly, the Blackwater employees provided the first glimpse into how the deaths on Sept. 16 and in prior episodes were being recounted and understood by the armed men who protect American officials on Baghdad’s streets each day. Reporters for The New York Times spoke directly with four of the current and former employees; two others communicated with The Times in discussions and e-mail messages passed through intermediaries. In the weeks since the shootings, Blackwater has been flooded with federal agents and investigators. A new group of State Department security agents have flown in to help supervise each Blackwater convoy. F.B.I. agents are interviewing guards involved in the Sept. 16 episode. Blackwater lawyers also arrived at the camp about two weeks ago, contractors here said, to monitor those interviews. “I’m just trying to hold on,” said one member of the Blackwater convoy that was involved in the Sept. 16 killings, in an e-mail message. “They’ve been trying to bring in so many State agents, it’s getting full over here.” Inside the Blackwater camp, a crisp American flag is carefully raised and lowered each day in Baghdad’s dusty heat. In the closely stacked gray metal trailers that serve as living quarters, employees have 8-by-12-foot rooms and shared bathrooms. Recreation time is limited, and the employees eat among themselves. Many of the younger guards sunbathe on their trailer roofs — a few regularly did so in the nude, until female helicopter pilots flew overhead, saw them and complained. According to Blackwater employees, the leader of the convoy on Nisour Square was a man known as Hoss. He and two or three other members of the team have returned to the United States because their tours of duty were up or their contracts with the company had ended, one employee here said. In Hoss’s case, the trip home was to remove shrapnel from a wound he received before the Sept. 16 shootings. Blackwater workers rarely interact with Iraqis in Baghdad, and regulations forbid them to travel outside the Green Zone when they are not on well-armed missions to protect State Department officials. Most convoys through the city do not carry Iraqi translators, leaving the young guards, former military men, to judge whether a gesture, a foreign phrase or a glance suggests a threat strong enough to justify a violent response. Even in the Blackwater compound, no definitive account has emerged of how and why the Sept. 16 shootings occurred, company employees said. For its part, Blackwater has said that its guards were responding to an insurgent attack. But in furtive discussions over recent weeks, certain details about the episode, they said, have gained currency among many Blackwater workers, many of whom would like to believe that their colleagues acted appropriately. Those workers said, for example, that Blackwater guards who fired at Iraqis in Nisour Square described how an Iraqi driver had pulled up his car well after the Blackwater convoy had arrived and warned traffic to stay back. The encroaching car, the workers said, caused their colleagues to feel threatened and initiate machine-gun fire. They also said that friction between Blackwater convoys and groups of armed Iraqi police in the days before the shooting had created a mutual distrust, and that the police officers, perhaps as a result of earlier disputes, fired at the Blackwater convoy. “The Iraqi police were testing these guys at various intersections,” said one former Blackwater guard who has spoken with men on the convoy at Nisour Square. Iraqi police at the intersection have said they were not armed that day, and none of the dozens of Iraqi witnesses interviewed by Iraqi investigators and reporters for The New York Times said they saw anyone firing at the Blackwater convoy or even brandishing a weapon. But in a measure of the gulf between the narratives that have taken hold in the Blackwater compound and on the streets of Baghdad, the former guard and a current employee said that a consistent view had developed within the compound: that Blackwater was fired upon by Iraqis with AK-47s who fled the scene after Blackwater returned an overwhelming amount of fire. “How long does it take for a dead terrorist to become a dead civilian?” a Blackwater employee said. “As long as it takes to remove an AK-47 from the body,” suggesting that accomplices might have removed weapons as they fled. The Blackwater employees said that talk about the Sept. 16 shootings had also focused on a heated dispute between members of the team in the square, pitting the men pouring gunfire into Iraqi vehicles against other Blackwater guards who were imploring them to stop. “There was turmoil in the team, where half the guys were saying, ‘Don’t shoot,’” said a military veteran who spoke to a member of the Blackwater team on the convoy. But that dispute, the guards said, like the uncertainty in the compound, is likely to remain unresolved until federal investigators finally report their conclusions on what really happened that day on Nisour Square. <A name=e20071025555893.html> New York Times October 25, 2007 State Dept. Official Resigns; Oversaw Blackwater And Other Private Guards By John M. Broder WASHINGTON, Oct. 24 — The State Department official responsible for overseeing Blackwater USA and other private security contractors in Iraq resigned abruptly on Wednesday. Richard J. Griffin, who has been the director of the department’s diplomatic security bureau since June 2005, faced stiff criticism from Congress over his handling of a Sept. 16 shooting episode involving Blackwater gunmen that Iraqi investigators say killed 17 Iraqis and other acts of violence by the State Department’s security guards. A special panel appointed to investigate the handling of diplomatic security in Iraq found a glaring lack of oversight and accountability that was hindering the American diplomatic and military mission there. The F.B.I. and a joint American-Iraqi board are also investigating the Sept. 16 shooting and the operations of armed private guards in Iraq. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice quickly accepted Mr. Griffin’s resignation, which is effective Nov. 1. “Secretary Rice is grateful to Ambassador Griffin for his record of long exemplary service to the nation,” said Sean McCormack, the State Department spokesman. Mr. Griffin directed a little-known State Department bureau responsible for protection of American facilities and diplomats overseas. It employs 1,450 special agents who serve as bodyguards for ambassadors and other dignitaries abroad, but found itself unable to handle the security demands brought on by the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It turned to private American security companies like Blackwater and DynCorp International, which handle the bulk of guard work for American civilians in those two countries. The contracts, worth billions of dollars, presented management challenges that the bureau found itself struggling to handle. Military officials in Iraq and some diplomats there complained that Blackwater guards, in particular, were undermining the American effort by being quick to use their weapons and running Iraqi civilians off the roads. The State Department review panel, headed by the veteran diplomat Patrick F. Kennedy, found an urgent need to address those problems and to write new laws, if necessary, to make private security contractors subject to American law if they used excessive force. Ms. Rice is scheduled to appear Thursday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which has been investigating problems with Blackwater and other security contractors in Iraq. The committee’s chairman, Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California, said Wednesday, “Mr. Griffin’s resignation is another indication that the State Department’s efforts in Iraq are in disarray.” In his two-paragraph letter of resignation to President Bush, Mr. Griffin cited his 36 years in government service, which has included senior posts in the Secret Service and the Department of Veterans Affairs. He did not mention Blackwater or Iraq, nor cite a specific reason for leaving. He wrote only that he was moving on to “new challenges.” Mr. Griffin did not respond to requests for comment. Mr. McCormack said he would not elaborate on the reasons for or the timing of Mr. Griffin’s departure. Gregory Starr, a deputy in the diplomatic security bureau, will take over as acting director, Mr. McCormack said. The shootings involving Blackwater continue to stir popular outrage in Iraq, where the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has begun a legal effort to scrap a law giving immunity to private security contractors, known as Order 17, dating from the administration of L. Paul Bremer III. That would be a first step toward taking it off the books, though the process would probably be plodding in Iraq’s typically sluggish government and Parliament, with no immediate effect on the operations of private security contractors. In a sign of the importance of the issue for the Iraqis, the national security committee in Iraq’s Parliament is considering similar legislation, though no bill has yet been passed to the full chamber for a vote. The United States administration in Iraq wrote the provision into Iraqi law soon after the invasion in 2003. Since then, the number of security contractors has mushroomed and the question of their impunity has grown more pressing. After a drunken employee of Blackwater shot a man to death, for example, the employee was flown out of Iraq, docked pay and fired. Mr. Maliki’s spokesman, Ali al-Dabbagh, issued a statement saying the government would draft the law revoking immunity before the next cabinet meeting. The statement did not say when the next cabinet meeting was scheduled. Andrew E. Kramer contributed reporting from Baghdad. <A name=e20071025555857.html> Washington Post October 25, 2007 Pg. 19 U.S. Offers Cash To Victims In Blackwater Incident Family Members Of Some View Amount as Paltry By Sudarsan Raghavan, Washington Post Foreign Service BAGHDAD, Oct. 24 -- The U.S. Embassy on Wednesday began offering tens of thousands of dollars in payments to victims and families of victims of the Sept. 16 shootings in Baghdad involving security guards from the firm Blackwater Worldwide, according to relatives and U.S. officials. Family members of several victims turned down the compensation, out of concern that accepting the funds would limit their future claims against the North Carolina-based security contractor and its chief executive, Erik Prince. Others said that the money being offered -- in some cases $12,500 for a death -- was paltry and that they wanted to sue Blackwater in an American court. "This is an insult," said Firoz Fadhil Abbas, whose brother Osama was killed in a barrage of bullets. "The funeral and the wake cost more than what they offered. My brother who got killed was responsible for four families." The offers of compensation, while a standard practice in the U.S. military, are unusual for the U.S. Embassy, reflecting the diplomatic and political sensitivities raised by the shootings, which sparked outrage in Iraq and the United States. U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Mirembe Nantongo described the offers as "condolence payments" to support the relatives of the victims and said the money was not intended to be a final settlement of their claims. Relatives could still bring suits against Blackwater, she said. "It's not an admission of culpability," Nantongo said. "And this is in no way a waiver of future claims." The offers came two days before the 40-day anniversary of the shootings, a traditional day of mourning in many Islamic societies. They also came a day after a panel, appointed by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, found shortcomings in the embassy's compensation system for incidents involving private security contractors. "The Embassy process for provision of payments, as is expected by Iraqi legal practice and custom, to the families of innocent civilians killed or seriously injured . . . or for damage to property, is not as responsive or timely as that of the U.S. military," the report found. Blackwater guards contend that they were ambushed by Iraqi civilians and policemen. But eyewitnesses, police investigators and U.S. soldiers who later arrived at the scene say the guards opened fire on Iraqi civilians without provocation. The Iraqi government has concluded that Blackwater is solely to blame for the shootings, which left 17 people dead in Nisoor Square near the affluent western Baghdad neighborhood of Mansour. Blackwater's legal status is unclear. Foreign security firms are immune from Iraqi questioning and legislation under Order 17, a law created by Iraq's post-invasion U.S. authority. But the Iraqi government is mounting a determined effort to overturn the decree and clear the way for private security companies to be tried in Iraqi courts and for Iraqi citizens to file suit against them. On Wednesday, Iraq's cabinet decided to create a committee to explore ways to repeal Order 17, according to Iraqi television reports citing anonymous Iraqi officials. An official in the office of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said he could neither confirm nor deny the action. Iraq's Interior Ministry has been trying to repeal Order 17 since January and has referred its findings from an internal probe of the Sept. 16 incident for possible criminal prosecution. Iraqi investigators from the Defense Ministry have concluded that Blackwater should be expelled from Iraq and that $8 million should be paid as compensation for each victim. U.S. officials have said that any action against Blackwater must wait until the findings of an ongoing FBI probe are released. Some victims have sued Blackwater and Prince in a U.S. federal court, seeking unspecified damages to compensate for alleged war crimes, illegal killings, wrongful death and emotional distress. Haitham Ahmed, whose wife, Mehasin Muhsin Kadhum, and son, Ahmed Haitham, were killed in Nisoor Square, said justice has been elusive. He has written to Maliki seeking help, but as of Wednesday he had not been contacted by Iraqi officials, he said. On Saturday, Ahmed met with a State Department official who asked him what he thought was fair compensation for his wife and son. "They are priceless," Ahmed replied. The official pressed him on an amount. "Like Lockerbie," Ahmed replied, referring to the Pan American airline bombing over Scotland in which victims' families each reportedly received $8 million in compensation from the Libyan government. "And you would have to deliver the criminals to an Iraqi court just like Libya delivered the criminals to the British," Ahmed told the U.S. official. On Wednesday, Ahmed refused to go to the Green Zone to receive the payment from a team led by Patricia Butenis, deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy. Later, Ahmed learned from Mohammad Hafud Abdul Razaq that $12,500 had been offered for the death of Abdul Razaq's 10-year-old son, Ali, who was seated in the back seat of a car near Nisoor Square when a bullet struck his head. "A humiliating figure," said Ahmed, who added that he was considering joining the U.S. lawsuit. Abdul Razaq, a 37-year-old car dealer, refused to accept the money. Butenis, he said, expressed her condolences, but he wanted Blackwater to acknowledge what it did. "The manager of Blackwater didn't apologize, and he didn't admit the crime. He didn't apologize for his crime," Abdul Razaq said. Then he said that he told Butenis that the amount was far too little to compensate for his son's death. "I told the ambassador, 'You are fighting terrorist groups who are offering $100,000 for people who blow themselves up.' " Others were desperate. Baraa Sadoun, 29, a taxi driver, was shot in the abdomen. He took $7,500 in crisp $100 bills. He had already had two surgeries in a private hospital. "I paid double this amount for the treatment and surgery," Sadoun said. "For more than a month now, I'm jobless and disabled. And my car is completely damaged. This incident totally ruined my life." Special correspondent Zaid Sabah contributed to this report. <A name=e20071025555848.html> Los Angeles Times October 25, 2007 Iraqis Want Contractors Liable Cabinet presses to end the immunity given to foreign security firms. By Doug Smith, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer BAGHDAD —The Cabinet of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has decided to press for repeal of the law that gives foreign security contractors immunity from legal action in Iraq, a government spokesman said Wednesday. A new measure being drafted by government officials would hold private contractors accountable to Iraqi courts for their actions. Maliki spokesman Ali Dabbagh said the Cabinet would send the proposal to parliament next week. The announcement came a day after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice unveiled tougher restrictions on the contractors, whose run-ins with Iraqi citizens have become an increasing source of resentment. Under a rule imposed by American authorities after the U.S.-led invasion, contractors working for multinational forces cannot be prosecuted under Iraqi law. The impunity has fostered reckless disregard for Iraqi lives, critics contend. Pressure for a change mounted last month after guards from Blackwater USA employed by the State Department were involved in a shooting that left 17 Iraqis dead. Also Wednesday, Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, commander of the multinational force in Iraq, said at a news conference that he expected improving Iraqi forces to resume command over at least half of Baghdad's security within a year. U.S. forces have taken the lead across much of the capital in recent weeks under a troop buildup launched by the military this year. Odierno and his Iraqi counterpart credited the so-called surge with reducing terrorist and criminal acts in the capital to their lowest levels in eight months. In violence Wednesday, a double bombing near a gathering spot for laborers in the Jissir Diyala neighborhood of southeast Baghdad left 11 dead, Iraqi police said. Three of the victims were police officers, police said. Also, the bodies of six gunshot victims were found in the capital, police said. The U.S. military said an American soldier died of injuries suffered in a mine explosion during operations in Salahuddin province north of Baghdad. Three other soldiers were injured. Elsewhere in the province, another U.S. soldier was killed and five wounded during combat operations near the town of Baiji. At least 3,835 American military personnel have been killed in Iraq since the invasion in March 2003, according to the website icasualties.org. <A name=e20071025555824.html> Washington Times October 25, 2007 Pg. 1 Guards Held To Military Rules Asked to sign documents By Sharon Behn, Washington Times Even before the State Department's announcement that rules for contractors would be tightened, private security guards hired by the Pentagon for Iraq were being asked to sign documents subjecting them to the Uniform Code of Military Justice and other rules. "Everyone is jumping through their [expletive] since the Blackwater stuff came out," said one private contractor working for the Pentagon in Iraq's Anbar province. "The [contracting officers] turned a blind eye on a lot of this required government paperwork for armed contractors. Now everyone is scrambling to get things at least looking correct," he said, on the condition that his name not be used. One document employees of at least one company working for the Pentagon had to sign stipulated that contractors and their employees must abide by U.S. laws and host nation laws. "The Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) is one such body of U.S. law applicable to contractors accompanying the force during contingency operations," says the document drafted by Maj. Gen. Darryl A. Scott, commanding general and head of contracting activity. "Under the UCMJ, U.S. commanders may discipline contractor employees for offenses ranging from fraud and theft to assault and other crimes against persons," it says. Finally, the document dictates that contractors must not allow an employee "suspected of a serious offense or of violating the Rules for the Use of Force" to depart Iraq or Afghanistan without approval from the senior commander in the country. In one widely reported incident, Blackwater, the State Department's main security company, whisked a Blackwater contractor out of the country after he got drunk and fatally shot a guard to Iraq's prime minister. That contractor is under investigation by the U.S. Justice Department. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who is expected to meet with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates on his return from Europe, is likely to resist attempts to bring State Department contractors under Pentagon oversight. Miss Rice's independent review panel — created after the Blackwater Sept. 16 incident in which as many as 17 Iraqi civilians were killed — has recommended that contractors be held accountable under U.S. law. State Department officials have indicated their reluctance for the department's civilian contractors to be subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Doug Brooks of the International Peace Operations Association, which counts more than 100 security companies as members, said the document signed by Pentagon contractors did not appear to be anything new. "It sounds like [Pentagon officials] are re-emphasizing" the rules, he said. "They don't want to happen to them what happened to the State Department contractors." One British security company, which has 9,000 employees worldwide, said it had not seen a lot of changes in Iraq following the Blackwater incident. "We as a company have not seen a huge change in the way we operate," said Patrick Toyne Sewell, director of communications for ArmorGroup International, speaking on the phone from London. "As far as I am aware, we have not experienced any further layers of regulation from our clients," said Mr. Toyne Sewell. He said his company already followed a stringent code of conduct that respected local national law and international human rights laws. Erik Prince, the head of Blackwater, recently told editors and reporters at The Washington Times that strict new regulations were pushing the Pentagon to hire more non-American companies. In the past six to nine months, said Mr. Prince, the Pentagon had been awarding "a lot more work to non-U.S. companies [because of] less oversight, less accountability and less visibility." An additional document to be signed by contractors is a "memorandum for US Contracting Office," addressing the training, responsibilities and conditions for permission to carry weapons under Pentagon contracts. The memorandum makes a clear difference between Rules for the Use of Force by contracted security companies in Iraq and the Rules of Engagement (ROE) for military use only. "In particular, I understand that ROE is ONLY for military use and that under no circumstances will I use ROE for use of force decisions," the memorandum says. "I further acknowledge that the use of a firearm creates a potential for criminal and civil liability under US/host nation laws," it says. The contractor in Anbar said that as a result of all the paperwork, guards were rushing out to shooting ranges to get their "range cards" while others are applying for security jobs in other places, such as the United States and Africa. "People just see that change is coming, and none of it good," he said. <A name=e20071025555764.html> Washington Post October 25, 2007 Pg. 2 Military Training Units Seen As Career Detours Teams Are Called 'the Way Out' of Iraq By Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post Staff Writer FORT RILEY, Kan., Oct. 24 -- The United States' exit from Iraq and Afghanistan depends on stepping up U.S. advising of those nations' security forces, Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Wednesday as he visited military training teams preparing to deploy. "It's the way out, no question, in both countries," Mullen told Lt. Col. Geoffrey D. Ellerson, whose 11-man training team will leave in three weeks for a year-long tour in a volatile region of Iraq east of Baghdad. "I can't overstate the importance" of the teams, he said. The military is planning to expand the advisory teams and expects to have a decision by spring on the numbers and composition of additional U.S. forces needed for the effort, said Maj. Gen. Robert Durbin, who oversees the training. Durbin said he could easily double the number of troops going through the 72-day training program. In all, about 4,800 team members have been trained over the past year. The teams are critical to the U.S. military strategy in Iraq, where they include about 1,500 military personnel, and in Afghanistan, where they have about 600 members. In Iraq, the teams live and work alongside Iraqi army and police units, teaching them basic tactics and planning, providing them with intelligence, air power and other support, as well as monitoring their operations for signs of sectarian activity and other abuses. One challenge to expanding the advisory effort, however, is attracting highly qualified Army officers to leave traditional career paths to join the teams, which some see as hurting their chances for promotion, according to several officers interviewed this week. The teams are composed of mid-grade officers and enlisted personnel who are also in demand for combat duties. "It's not a dead end, but it slows down your career," said Capt. Richard Turvey, 35, of Muncie, Ind. About half of the captains such as Turvey who attend field artillery school at Fort Sill, Okla., are being assigned to the training teams. "I became an officer to be a commander; now I'm going to have to wait longer," agreed Capt. Mark Johnstone, 33, of Denver. "The teams are taking us from our traditional roles as artillerymen." Changing military promotion policies to reward officers to serve on the teams is vital, according to Mullen and other officers. "Individuals have to see this as meaningful in their career, and the services have to recognize this and start promoting" those who serve on the teams, said Mullen, adding that he plans to raise the issue with Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the Army chief of staff. So far, officers remain skeptical. "We have to have certain jobs to be competitive." said Maj. Jason Jones, one of a group of Army majors attending school at Fort Leavenworth who voiced reluctance to join the training teams. "That takes me out of the cycle. In essence, it sort of hurts you," Jones said. Promotion prospects for those who serve on the teams remain uncertain, said Maj. Kealii T. Morris. "The jury is still out" on how promotion boards will treat officers who serve on the teams, he said. Another way to expand the training effort is to create the U.S. teams out of entire units, rather than individuals, Durbin said. He said that in addition to training the small teams of about a dozen individual soldiers, he seeks to give the Army the option of training entire units such as battalions with several hundred soldiers. The advantages of training a battalion is that a battalion is already a cohesive unit and would fit smoothly into military rotational cycles, Durbin said. In the future, he anticipates training small teams and units, which would in turn be broken into small teams to partner with Iraqi and Afghan units. <A name=e20071025555914.html> Topeka Capital-Journal October 25, 2007 Ft. Riley Sergeants Command Admiral's Attention Joint Chiefs chairman hears concerns of troops By Tim Carpenter, The Capital-Journal FORT RILEY — Two hundred sergeants went one-on-one Wednesday with the nation's top military commander at a town-hall gathering that exposed troop anxiety about conflicts beyond Iraq and Afghanistan. Navy Adm. Michael Mullen, one month into a new assignment as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was asked to consider whether the U.S. military should reach inside Iran to interrupt the supply of insurgent forces in Iraq. President Bush also has denounced development of nuclear weapons by Iran. "I'm not one to take military options off the table," Mullen said. "However, I'm a firm believer they should be options of last resort. I'd worry a great deal about getting into a conflict with a third country in that part of the world right now." In response to another question, the admiral said diplomacy should be used to discourage an invasion by Turkey of northern Iraq. Turkey is an important ally of the United States in the region. "There is tremendous amount of diplomatic effort right now going on to not create a situation that spins out of control across that border," Mullen said. Questions from the Army and Air Force troops included personal concerns about the scarcity of military medical staff members at stateside U.S. bases, the inability of soldiers to enroll in advanced training schools and a problem with price gouging of service members in the Junction City housing market. The unifying theme was strain on troops and their families from repeated combat deployments. Most of the sergeants at the forum had been overseas two or three times, while some had deployed as many as five times. The first soldier to speak asked Mullen why the United States didn't impose a draft to better cope with troop demands in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mullen said he served in Vietnam when the country still relied on a draft to fill military personnel needs and wasn't enthusiastic about returning to that system. "This is the most combat-ready, combat-hardened military we've ever had in our history. I treasure that," he said. "I'd worry about moving to a draft and integrating all that into where we are right now, risking the professional level that we have risen to." Mullen said the current rotation of 15 months on battlefield deployment followed by 12 months at home should be phased out as the current missions allow. The goal is 12 months deployed and 15 months back home, he said, with the more permanent objective one year deployed for every three years at home. "We've got missions right now we've got to succeed in. That's what we get paid to do," he said. Mullen repeatedly praised the troops for their dedication and acknowledged the morale-draining stress borne by spouses and children. The goal over the next several years is to add 90,000 troops to the Army and Marines to bring relief from future deployments, he said. "There's not an overnight fix here," he said. "If I had one, I'd pull it off the shelf and do it." The admiral said he was in Iraq several weeks ago and was impressed by security improvements. "That said, the economics got to move and the politics have got to move," he said. "Those security forces can only do this for so long without the other two legs of that three-legged stool — security, politics and economics — kicking in. I'm a little more optimistic than I was before I went, but the next six, seven, eight months are critical." Mullen included Fort Riley in a tour of military installations in Oklahoma, Kansas and Colorado. He also spoke with Army captains at Fort Sill, Okla., with officers in the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, and with Army recruiters in Denver. "In all the services," Mullen said, "I'm not sure there's a tougher job right now than recruiting." Prior to speaking with the sergeants at Fort Riley, he presided at a ceremony where five soldiers re-enlisted. He said those troops said they were drawn to service to their country, but also monetary bonuses and choice of duty assignments. "Your service at this time in our nation's history is service I don't take for granted," the four-star admiral said. "That oath that I just gave is a very precious oath. Not a lot of people in this country raise their hands." While at Fort Riley, Mullen toured the Warrior Transition Unit for injured soldiers. He said programs for wounded service members must continue to improve. The goal is smooth transition from a U.S. military trea |
