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AFI RESEARCH INTELL.BRIEFING
The
Defence of Baghdad - Special Military Report
Richard M. Bennett
3rd
April 2003:
The forward
units of the 101st Airborne/3rd Infantry Division advance
towards the SW of the city through the Karbala Gap and the US
Marine Corps Division advance through Al Kut have met only
insignificant opposition. It seems highly unlikely that many of the
defenders have simply melted away into the civilian population here
or indeed elsewhere as significant quantities of heavy
equipment such as Tanks, APC, Artillery and the like have not been
found either abandoned or destroyed. Nor have large numbers of POW's
been taken. The Army, Republican Guard and Air Force(largely
fighting as Ground or Air Defence Troops)numbered some 410,000
two weeks ago. The best estimate we have so far received is that
some 10,000 have been taken prisoner of defected, with a similar
number killed or wounded. Iraq would therefore appear, at least on
paper to still have some 390,000 effectives. This does not include 45,000
well armed paramilitaries and perhaps as many as another 50,000
Fedayeen and al Quds Guerrilla-style forces(others give an even
higher figure).
~
US
claims to have largely destroyed the two main Republican Guard
Divisions defending the southern approaches to Baghdad must be
treated with caution. There is no evidence that catastrophic damage
has yet been inflicted on either unit and the noticeable lack of
destroyed and captured equipment, and dead or captured Iraqi
soldiers tends to confirm this. More importantly AFI Research
believes that there are in fact eight identifiable Republican Guard
Divisions, not six as is often reported and indeed the two Divisions
reported to have been opposing the US ground campaign are believed
to have only transferred south from the Northern Corps within
the last month or so. The 2nd Al
Medina Armoured Division with the 2nd, 10th and 17th
Armoured, and 14th Mechanized Brigades near Karbala and the 5th
Baghdad Mechanized Division with the 4th, 5th and 6th
Mechanized Brigades near Al Kut are both reinforcement units.
~
As these
two units appear to have been the only such Divisions involved
in any serious fighting so far it is of great interest to considered
the possible deployment of the original Southern Corps formations. The
1st Hammurabi Mechanized Division is
reportedly deployed in well protected positions to the West
of Baghdad with the 8th and
9th Mechanized and 18th
Armoured Brigades;
the 6th Nebuchadnezzar
Mechanized Division was based
in Al Kut area with the 19th,
22nd and 23rd Mechanized Brigades,
but now appears to have withdrawn into the outskirts of Baghdad;
the 8th Special Forces
Division based both in the
city and probably behind US lines with the 33rd, 65th,
66th and 68th Brigades. The 26th
Brigade is reportedly near the Airport and the Al
Nida Armoured Division which
was based in the
Qal'at Saleh-Amarah
area with the 41st,
42nd and 43rd Armoured Brigades. It
is believed that this unit was withdrawn north and is deployed
somewhere behind the Baghdad Division and on the right flank of the
US Marine advance. Inside
the city the Special Republican Guard which consists
of the First, Second and Third Mechanized Brigades guarding the
three main routes into the city, and the Fourth Mechanized
Brigade held
as a strategic reserve alongside the elite
1st Adnan Tank Regiment at Abu Gharib and 2nd Tank
Regiment at Al Makasib forms another overstrength Divisional
sized formation.
~ Northern Front. The
Republican Guard units still deployed north of Baghdad are
the 7th Adnan Mechanized Division based at Mosul
with the 11th and 12th Mechanized, and 21st Armoured Brigades
and the Al Abed Mechanized Division based at Kirkuk / Khalid
Camp with the 38th, 39th and
40th Mechanized Brigades defending
the Northern Front. In addition there are two largely intact Regular
Army Northern Corps; the First Corps at
Khalid Camp in Kirkuk
with the 2nd Infantry Division at
Al Rabee, the 5th
Mechanized Division at Kirkuk,
the 8th Infantry Division in
the Shuwan Area and the 38th Infantry Division at
Qader Karan, while the Fifth Corps is
centred on Mosul with
the 1st Mechanized Division at
Makhmur, the 4th Infantry Division near
Bashiqa, the 7th Infantry Division near
Al Mansour and the 16th
Infantry Division in Mosul. ~ Southern Front. The considerable remnants of the Third Corps with the 6th Armoured Division near Naserria and the 11th and 51st Divisions bottled up in the partial-siege of Basrah are still supported by a largely untouched Fourth Corps at Al-Amara (Amarah) with the 10th Armoured Division, the 14th Infantry Division and the 18th Infantry Division to the north east along Route-6. The Second Corps originally at Diwaniyah with the 3rd Armoured Division, the 15th Infantry Division and the 34th Infantry Division is not reported to have been heavily involved in combat nor yet militarily out of the picture. ~ Analysis. Iraqi sources, and of course uncorroborated or for that matter denied by independent sources, have claimed that their actual losses in equipment have been marginally less than expected; the effectiveness of the US bombing has also been less than expected though this may be just bravado. However the air campaign has certainly failed to destroy completely either the command and control structure or the moral of the ground units so far. These same sources claim that less than a third of the actual Iraqi front line fighting force has so far been fully committed to battle and that much of the fighting has been left to the Special Force Commando's, stay behind regular Army units and the Fedayeen. ~ Baghdad remains at the centre of a very large area still under its control, with perhaps 80% of the civilian population of Iraq. It remains largely unthreatened to the East, North and North West. If the forces listed above have not laid down their arms and returned home, and assuming they are still prepared to continue with the fight(and without large scale surrenders after some two weeks of heavy bombing and ground attack, that is likely to be the case) then somewhere or other are some 250,000 Republican Guard and regular Army strengthened by perhaps as many as 75,000 irregulars and all within easy reach of Baghdad, the forward US units and a goodly part of an exposed 350mile long supply line. In addition there may still be as many as 80,000 additional forces on the Northern Front and 60,000 in Central Iraq and the Basrah area. ~ Iraqi sources have suggested that a counter-attack, if one occurs of course, would be designed to quickly close with the Allied forces and mix the Iraqi and US units up into a ground 'dog-fight' to neutralize the US air superiority. The Iraqi's are apparently prepared to sacrifice a number of major units in order to inflict very severe casualties on the US 3rd Infantry division in particular. However the most likely scenario appears to be that the Iraqi command will leave a door open into the city and harass the advancing Allied troops at every opportunity. It may be significant that the Iraqi command forecast correctly the time of the US push on Baghdad to the day and indeed made little serious attempt to destroy strategically important bridges, lay mine fields at choke points or flood the low lying areas to impede the US advance. Strange tactics from a country that has had months if not years to prepare for this invasion. ~ Even when Baghdad is eventually taken, perhaps after many days or weeks of heavy fighting, the regime may still continue to use the cities as a 'trap' while making their final stand in the marshlands to the East, the mountains to the North East and Saddams own heartland to the North. Unless the US 'gets lucky' or springs a strategic surprise, Iraq may be able to prolong this war well into the heat of the summer months with potentially disastrous diplomatic and political consequences for the Allies internationally and particularly in the Middle East.
~~~ Richard Bennett Media. rbmedia@supanet.com Tel/Fax: +44 (0) 1626 33 50 40 ~~~ Check out the websites at Freelance and Richard Bennett Media or see our entries in the latest Guardian Media Guide and Artists & Writers Yearbook ~~~ Books
by Richard M Bennett include
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