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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Secretary of Defense Makes Surprise Visit to Iraq

Aired December 24, 2004 - 22:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR, NEWSNIGHT: Good evening, again, much of the program tonight centers on last month's battle for Falluja, an important battle, the harshest taste of urban warfare to date, a fight that produced some of the most compelling war reporting ever and we'll look at a lot of it in this hour.
Before looking back, we look at today or right now. The secretary of defense a short time ago arrived in Mosul, a surprise and secretive Christmas visit with the troops there, his first visit to Iraq since the Abu Ghraib scandal last May and of course it comes in the wake of a tough couple of weeks for Mr. Rumsfeld, accused of insensitivity in answering questions about a lack of armor for troops and for not personally signing letters to the families of service people who died in the war, leaving the signatures to a machine. And most importantly, it comes just three days after the worst single attack on American forces, the attack in Mosul.

The secretary went immediately to the hospital where those who are wounded, they are the least of the wounded, those who have not been evacuated, are still being cared for. There will be pictures coming out on this. We expect them early tomorrow morning, perhaps 6:00, maybe a little earlier. But again, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld has made a surprise visit to Iraq. He is in Mosul now meeting with American soldiers there.

We learn more about that deadly attack in Mosul today and none of it causes us any comfort, quite the opposite. Not only was the base infiltrated, it was it seems infiltrated by someone wearing an Iraqi army uniform. So how many other insurgents out there dress the same? We begin with CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The top U.S. general in the Mosul region made a surprising revelation about what the suicide bomber at Camp Marez was likely wearing.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: What we think is likely, but certainly not certain, is that an individual in an Iraqi military uniform, possibly with a vest worn-explosive device, was inside the facility.

KOCH: A spokesman for the multinational forces says after the explosion, investigators discovered the remains of a torso wearing the uniform in the mess hall and believe it to be the bomber. But Lieutenant Colonel Steven Boylan (ph) insists they don't know if the bomber was actually a member of the Iraqi military or someone who stole the uniform, got it from a deserter or bought it on the black market. The military also believe the bomber had help.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: It is very difficult to conceive that this would be the act of a lone individual. It would seem to me reasonable to assume that this was a mission perhaps some time in the planning, days perhaps.

KOCH: There is no word yet on whether any Iraqi National Guardsmen are missing. One military official explaining there's no reliable tracking system to keep count of Iraqi soldiers. And the U.S. military can't yet say how many Iraqi civilians work at Camp Marez or whether any of them are unaccounted for. Senior Pentagon officials defend the increasing practice of hiring foreign nationals like Iraqis to do nonmilitary chores on bases. They say it improves not just the economic status of average Iraqis, but their attitude toward Americans and the push for democracy. Most also agreed introduces risk.

KEN ROBINSON, MILITARY INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: If you outsource to the host country in this case Iraq, and you bring in local Iraqis, you bring in to your security environment those who may threaten it.

KOCH: But one expert cautions against further distancing Iraqi civilians and soldiers in order to protect Americans.

THOMAS HAMMAS, NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY: The problem is, if you crack down too much and shut out the Iraqis too much, create the distrust, that obviously is what the insurgent is trying to do. They're trying to separate us from the Iraqis who can help us.

KOCH: For now, the Pentagon is re-evaluating security at U.S. military installations in Iraq, top brass concerned that the effectiveness of Tuesday's attack could prompt suicide copycats. Kathleen Koch, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: That's the Mosul part of the story today. Now, Falluja where three Marines died fighting there today and several hundred civilians were able to return home. On that score, it is slow going in Falluja, part of the challenge, telling the good guys from the bad without creating more bad guys in the process. Reporting this story out of Baghdad tonight, CNN's Karl Penhaul.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is one of just five U.S. checkpoints open for refugees returning to Falluja.

TRANSLATOR: We've been waiting here from 6:)0 a.m. until now and no one can enter. They gave us these instructions to get into the city.

PENHAUL: It's not exactly a warm welcome home. This sign warns any person that attempts to enter Falluja with a weapon is liable to be killed. An estimated 250,000 civilians fled Falluja before the assault. Marines say about 500 returned Thursday. Men of fighting age must show IDs and undergo fingerprint and eye scans, like immigrants arriving at U.S. airports. Residents have been waiting six and a half weeks to go back. Their patience is near breaking point.

TRANSLATOR: They took about five cars near the bridge and then they did not allow us to enter the city. I think this is a kind of propaganda, only because no one entered the city of Falluja until now.

PENHAUL: U.S. Marines and Iraqi soldiers, who stormed the city in November, say they're trying to stop insurgents filtering back disguised as civilians. Despite the November assault with massive U.S. fire power and thousands of troops, some of the insurgents never left. As refugees were returning Thursday, guerrilla fighters holed up in houses battled on. A Marines spokesman said U.S. Marines pulled back and called in air strikes to level the building. Witnesses say one-third of Falluja may have been flattened by fighting since November. Some of those who returned Thursday found they had little to go back to.

TRANSLATOR: This is a disaster, not a district. No one can walk here, let alone live. There is no water, no electricity, nothing.

TRANSLATOR: I just came to find the house as you see it, a wreck. Where will my family and children stay? What do we do?

PENHAUL: To date, U.S. and Iraqi officials have given no accurate assessment of how many homes were destroyed and how many civilians were killed. For now, returning residents will pick up what pieces are left while the rattle of distant gunfire reminds them the insurgency has not been defeated.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PENHAUL: The return is going to be neighborhood by neighborhood to Falluja. And with some 250,000 residents estimated waiting to return, that's likely to be a slow process. Aaron?

BROWN: Do we have any sense of how much reconstruction is going on in Falluja or are they -- has that not even begun?

PENHAUL: Well, Iraqi and U.S. authorities have talked about reconstruction, but they also say at the same time that even in some areas, the power and the water isn't returned yet to service. In terms of reconstruction, they also do though, talk about restoring the civilian authorities there. So all part and parcel of that. With 30 percent estimated of the city damaged, it is going to take a long time. Aaron.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: You have a long day ahead with Secretary Rumsfeld in the country. We'll let you get to work on that. We appreciate you getting up this morning. Thank you, Karl Penhaul who is in Baghdad.

With that as a backdrop, we thought it worthwhile to retrace the steps that got us here. Falluja, it turns out, is like that. It lends itself to a back story, as we call it. There was plenty of it when the Marines and Iraqi forces began their push on the city last month when we first aired this story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): As the American military swept toward Baghdad 18 months ago, the city of Falluja was a tactical afterthought. It is no more.

GEN. DAVID GRANGE (RET), MILITARY ANALYST: It's one of those situations where you can't have a locale like that with such resentment, such independence, that they don't go along with the unity efforts of the rest of the country.

BROWN: Only a month after the fall of Saddam, 19 Iraqis died when American soldiers fired into a street demonstration in Falluja. Someone in the crowd, the military says, fired first. Insurgents began to take control of the city, establishing a Taliban-like rule inside its boundaries.

GRANGE: It fell apart because immediately the jihadists took control, pushed extremists law into that particular enclave of the country and totally rejected any influence from the Iraqi interim government.

BROWN: Among those extremists, the Jordanian Abu al-Zarqawi, a terrorist the U.S. military says was behind the slaughter in early March of four civilian contractors which led to a Marine attack on the city.

GEN. MARK KIMMIT, U.S. ARMY: They are coming back. They are going to hunt down the people responsible for this bestial act.

BROWN: But for all of the tough talk at that time, the Marines never finished the job. They were pulled back.

CPL. CHRIS RODRIGUEZ, U.S. ARMY: It's upsetting. We don't want to do it. We've been here for a while. We don't want to lose the ground that we fought so hard for and that we've been here sweating blood.

BROWN: Security was handed over to what was called the Falluja brigade, Iraqi soldiers led by former Iraqi Army officers, soldiers who didn't fight, leaders who didn't lead and in some cases, aided the insurgents they were supposed to control. So now, again, Marines are preparing to take the city. Iraqi soldiers will back them up. Whether they will fight is not known.

JACKIE SPINNER, THE WASHINGTON POST: This is going to be a big test for them and I think that we'll all be watching to see how well they perform, if they stay in the fight and how long they stay in the fight.

BROWN: The heavy lifting, so to speak, will be done by the Americans. So far in Iraq, about 20 percent of the American casualties have been as a result of fighting in or near Falluja.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: So that's how we set the stage a month or more ago. We'll let the story play out next. First, as seen during the battle itself and later from the men who fought and were wounded in it.

We'll take a break first. This is a special edition of NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Every one of the casualties tonight and for a while now has been from the battle of Falluja. Robert Cappa (ph) who photographed the troops coming ashore at Omaha Beach during the Second World War had a very simple motto. If your pictures aren't good enough, you weren't close enough. In that war, in this, photographers and reporters have gotten very close indeed. One of them, Lindsey Hilsum of Britain's ITN, filed this report one November day from Falluja.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LINDSEY HILSUM, ITN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The last cigarette before heading out. Search and attack, they call it. The Marines moved through the ruins of Falluja, looking for any gunmen who had not fled or been killed, the most desperate and determined. Tanks rumble in. The Americans were in this neighborhood the day before, but maybe the insurgents crept back overnight.

The Marines have been told to comb the mosque for weapons. And as they do, the firing starts. It turns into a firefight. The armored vehicle arrives with more ammunition, because the houses around the mosques are full of fighters. A group of Marines is pinned down on a flat (ph) rooftop. We're filming from an armored vehicle on the street below.

The heavier weapons fire a barrage at the insurgents. They call it suppressive fire. A Marine has been injured and his colleagues need to administer first aid and get him out. A stretcher is brought. This is a serious casualty and it may already be too late.

But the rest of the group now needs to get out, too, under intense fire. This is the most dangerous engagement India (ph) company has had in Falluja. We weren't allowed to film the casualties. This one was loaded into the Amtrak (ph) and taken away. The fire team crosses the street. They're going to hit the insurgents with an anti- tank missile.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: What's going to happen, M-16s 240. We're going to pop up, going to do five seconds of suppression, all right? Slow M-16s, like two bursts. That way (INAUDIBLE) is going to show me where the fire's coming from and I can look at the building, all right? You and you. Ready? Set, go!

HILSUM: The heavy fire keeps the insurgents' heads down. The tracer has shown the man with the missile, the target. The back blasts of the missile engulfed everyone in dust. They call in an air strike and the troops must quickly leave the danger area.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: All right. Start with the guns. Guns are going first. Go, guns!

HILSUM: They rush down the stairs to find a new position. Fearing the insurgents may still be active, they run down the street. The debris of the day's battle lies in their path, a rocket launcher, a flattened Kaleshnikov (ph). From a safer rooftop, we film tanks moving along the street, ready to fire a round into each house where there might still be resistance.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: There's probably a good 20 or 30 down in that last corner. And they're pinched right now. The whole division's got them surrounded and this is where they wree. They've been using this mosque over here to treat their wounded. Inside that mosque it's all dirty and this last strip of houses down to our front, about 30 meters, just full of gunshot wounds and stuff, trying to get them treated and they don't want to give up. Tried talking to them, their interpreter, getting them to surrender, walk out on the street. They're telling us they'd rather die than come out and surrender, so they're going to die.

HILSUM: The Marines begin to relax. The clash is nearing its end.

(on-camera): They've made a tactical withdrawal to this rooftop here, waiting for air power to come in and bomb the remaining insurgents. They think that there's at least another half dozen still in there.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: Five seconds.

HILSUM: Night is falling. As the Marines go on foot to see whether the combined power of all their weaponry has destroyed their enemies.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: Check out the body, sir.

HILSUM: In the wreckage of the houses along the street near the mosque, they find the bodies of 21 fighters. According to their documents, these five came from the neighboring town of Ramadi, terrorists to the Americans, martyrs to those who support their cause. The end of the Muslim fast of Ramadan is marked by the sickle moon. Americans control Falluja, the ruined city of mosques. Lindsey Hilsum, Channel 4 news, Falluja.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: That's just an extraordinary piece of reporting.

Of all the people we speak to on a regular basis, fair to say we are especially happy when we get to sit down with "Time" magazine's Michael Ware for the simple reason that he's home and that's he's safe. Mr. Ware spends a lot of time in dangerous places dealing often with shady characters, not that he does it with his eyes wide shut, just the opposite which is the other reason he's always welcome. When we last spoke with Michael, he had just returned from the fighting in Falluja.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: In a sentence or two, describe the unit you were with.

MICHAEL WARE, TIME MAGAZINE: During the battle for Falluja, I was with an army unit, a smaller element within the broader attack but very important. It boiled down to the 3rd platoon of Alpha company from what's known as the 2nd battalion, the 2nd infantry regiment. These are essentially mechanized infantry, young guys who jump out of the back of the Bradley armored vehicles.

BROWN: 19 to 25, 26?

WARE: Yeah. I mean, the leaders of these men if you call them, they're more like fresh-faced boys. The oldest among them was 26; perhaps one was 29. The bulk of them were in their late teens or just out of their teens. These really are the youth of America.

BROWN: The day before they went in, were you with them?

WARE: Yes I was.

BROWN: What was it like?

WARE: Pensive. I mean, these men had it drilled into them over and over what it was that they were to expect. They were going into the dark heart of the Iraqi insurgency. This was the nest or this was the base, not only of the home-grown Iraqi nationalists, but this was the central node of the foreign jihadis, the real hard core.

BROWN: Were they scared?

WARE: Yeah. I mean, there's always that fear I mean that anticipation of battle. I mean, you become so cognizant of your own mortality. And these boys aren't immune from that, but they do not shy away from it. They swallow it down and press on.

BROWN: There's a difference between being afraid and cowardice. Those are very different things. You're nuts not to be afraid.

WARE: Absolutely.

BROWN: Guys going in there, they're shooting at you and they're throwing RPGs at you and there's bombs everywhere.

WARE: Absolutely. I have seen combat in Iraq where you'll be with five or six men and you're engaged with the enemy and there's a fierce firefight and suddenly you'll look down from them and there's one man curled up into a ball who simply can't pick up his weapon. Yet the funny thing is the next day you may be in another firefight and he's the fiercest amongst them. That's the thing about combat. There's nowhere to hide from yourself. There's no room for pretense whatsoever and in Falluja, this really was such a place.

BROWN: They go in, they make their way in, they have all of the power of the U.S. military behind them, airpower, big tanks, artillery, the whole deal. And they are facing guys hiding in windows.

WARE: Absolutely. There's guys hiding in what you call rat holes and it's an apt description. There are men who were laying in wait and these were men who stayed behind when all the other insurgents left, when their leadership left, when their comrades departed to move on and fight for another day.

BROWN: They stayed to die?

WARE: They stayed to die. They stayed to kill American boys and to die themselves. Now, there's no greater enemy than that. It's one of the most powerful weapons in combat, that is a man prepared to die.

BROWN: People talked about that you go around a corner and you didn't know what you'd find. Was it like that?

WARE: Absolutely. I mean, the enemy, death, great harm lurked in every nook, in every cranny. There was one particular moment in the battle of Falluja with 3rd platoon where insurgents were hiding in a series of houses. We didn't know which one. After searching nine, we entered the tenth and it was quarter to 2:00 in the morning. The insurgents weren't in the front room. They were hiding in the kitchen. They allowed these boys to enter the house and they waited for one of them and then another to step around into the hallway and then they opened fire. We're talking six to eight feet away, in pitch black. Danger can't lurk any more sinister than that.

BROWN: We'll pick it up there. We'll take a break. We'll continue with Michael in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Continuing for a few more minutes with Michael Ware of "Time" magazine and the battle of Falluja. Was it as they thought it would be?

WARE: No. In the end, I wouldn't call it an anticlimax but it wasn't -- it wasn't the Armageddon-style showdown that many were expecting.

BROWN: ... in some sense to end it all?

WARE: I'm sure the planners weren't deluding themselves to the degree that this would be the final crunch in the insurgent war in Iraq. But there certainly was a sense that this would be the great showdown and it wasn't and there was some surprise at that. And that struck me, because I don't understand why they were surprised. I mean we have seen this, not only from the Iraqi insurgents, but from the al Qaeda-inspired insurgents and the jidahis. We saw it in the battle of INAUDIBLE) in Afghanistan, in the battle against unsuer al islam (ph) in Halubja (ph) in northern Iraq during the invasion. We even saw it in Samara four or five weeks before Falluja. This is a guerrilla war. They're never going to confront you head on. They're always just going to wither away and come back to fight you another day from the flank, from behind, from above, from below. That's the nature of this war.

BROWN: Let me come back to that point. One or two more things about Falluja. You shot some as people are seeing, some incredible pictures and when you look at it, it seems totally chaotic. When you're in it, is there a sense of order or is it as chaotic as it appears to be?

WARE: I mean, combat is a very confusing place. It's -- it's -- there is a chaos to it. You don't know where the enemy is sometimes. You don't know how you can react, how you can rally yourselves. You don't know what support you've got. You're acting like you're out there on your own. Sometimes you don't even know where your friends are, particularly if it's dark or it's a close urban environment. It's hard to know where the next man is.

It is hard to know where the next man is.

I mean, it's almost impossible to describe. And what it takes, what it invariably demands is for one man in the group to stand up.

BROWN: Who was the guy in your group?

WARE: In 3rd Platoon, there was too men, both staff sergeants. One was Staff Sergeant David Bellavia. And the other one was Staff Sergeant Colin Fitts.

BROWN: So late 20s?

WARE: Yes, 26, 27, 28, I mean, young men themselves, yet with a maturity so far exceeding their years.

And, invariably, it was them that the younger men turned to. And these men, I spoke to them after some of these engagements. Internally, they're as terrified as the boys, yet they can never show this. And I know on one occasion when Bellavia stood up, I know from afterwards what was going through his mind, that he didn't want to do what he was about to do, to enter this house where he knew insurgents were laying in wait for him. Yet, from what he was saying, you got no hint of that.

BROWN: Just one final big-picture question. You've been in and out of there for two years. You'll be back in there probably sooner than you want. Do you have a sense that, on the military side, progress is being made?

WARE: To put it simply, no. No, I don't. I mean, I don't have any sense of victory or a sense that the coalition, that the West is winning right now.

I mean, it seems to me we're losing ground, figuratively and literally. Just from my own example, six -- nine months ago, I could travel the breadth of Iraq. Sure, it was dangerous, it was risky, but it was calculated. Then that ceased. And I was restricted to Baghdad itself. And the only way I could leave Baghdad was if the insurgents took me and guaranteed my safety.

Now I can't leave my compound. Kidnap teams circle my house. And even in my compound, they mortar, drop bombs on our house. And in parts of Baghdad itself, the U.S. military has lost control. The terrorists of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi control entire quarters of suburbs. One of them, Haifa Street, the most famous, is within mortar range of the U.S. Embassy itself. And every day, we're creating more recruits for the insurgents, and every day more young men from outside Iraq, from the Muslim world agree, the disenfranchised, they're rising up and coming to join the fight, to blood themselves.

Right now, we are the midwives of the next generation of jihad, of the next al Qaeda. So the very thing that the administration says it went there to prevent, it is creating. And despite the honor and the bravery and the uncommon valor that I see among the American boys there in uniform who are fighting this grinding war day to day, when I see them dying in front of me, I can't help but think that perhaps they're dying in vain, because we're making the nightmare that we're trying to prevent.

BROWN: It's good to see you. Have a good holiday.

WARE: Thank you very much. It's my pleasure.

BROWN: One of the truly wonderful things about you, I think, is that you understand that you get a holiday and they don't.

WARE: That's very true.

BROWN: They don't.

WARE: There's no let-up. There's no let-up. And it's very hard when you're leaving these guys and you have to say goodbye, because, yes, they don't get this.

BROWN: Good to see you.

WARE: Thank you. It's my pleasure.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Michael Ware reports for "TIME" magazine.

Still to come, more on what Michael was so vividly describing, the complicated nature of guerrilla warfare as seen from street level, American soldiers going door to door, dangerous work in Falluja, as reported by CNN's Jane Arraf.

Also, a view of the fighting through the lens of still photographer Rick Loomis, who shoots for "The L.A. Times."

We'll take a break first. Around the world, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BROWN: As we reported at the top, a number of developments today in Iraq. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld arrived a short time ago for a surprise visit to Mosul. We'll have more. We'll see the pictures on that, we think, early this morning, early tomorrow morning, about 6:00.

We also learned more about the suicide bombing there. That suicide bomber was likely wearing an Iraqi military uniform.

And three Marines died today in Falluja, a reminder that fighting a counterinsurgency is, by its very nature, open-ended. The troops know this, even as they can't always escape the consequences. At a minimum, it makes a difficult job even tougher at times, as CNN's Jane Arraf found out last month on the mean streets of Falluja.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): In the abandoned industrial heart of Falluja, streets and streets of locked doors. After a week of intense fighting, the Army's 1st Infantry Division is going through these streets a second time to make sure they've been cleared of gunmen and weapons.

CAPT. KIRK MAYFIELD, U.S. ARMY: When we sweep through we miss something then the insurgents are able to come back in, have a cache of arms or ammunition that they're able to use against coalition forces or the Iraqi provincial forces later.

ARRAF: With no people left here there's almost no intelligence on where weapons might be hidden. The soldiers spend hours forcing open doors to hundreds of buildings. The more resistant doors get pulled apart by armored vehicles. When they can't shoot off the locks they use a power saw.

Task Force 22's brigade combat troop has to go through this sector street by street checking literally every building that isn't a mosque. Those they leave for Iraqi security forces.

It's tedious and terrifying work. They don't know what could be hiding behind these locked shutters. After a week of high intensity combat one of the biggest dangers in this silent neighborhood is complacency.

MARGARITO RAMIREZ, U.S. ARMY: You just don't ever know what could happen, you know, and you got to stay vigilant and stay alert out here.

ARRAF: In this field they find unexploded white phosphorus mortars designed to break apart in a rain of caustic fire. The soldiers wrap them with plastic explosives and take cover when they're detonated.

(on camera): It's a scene of devastation as we walk through this industrial section of Falluja. There are fires burning from ammunitions blown up, destruction almost everywhere. Bombs have been dropped here on what appear to be fighting positions, on bunkers, where insurgents were dug in. These are people's livelihoods, these shops, these auto repair stores. It's going to take a long, long time to get the city back to normal.

(voice-over): On this day, they find no live gunmen and for hours few weapons. But at the end of the day in this ordinary looking building, they discover a treasure trove of weapons and ammunition.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I probably got about 2,500 rounds of 14.5 millimeter.

ARRAF: Inside are aging anti-aircraft guns, artillery and mortars, cases of usable ammunition and bags of armor-piercing heavy machine gun rounds. The Army believes it might be a bomb making factory. In this neighborhood, in this city, it's certainly a reason for checking behind every door.

Jane Arraf, CNN, Falluja.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Ahead on the program, the battle that came before, when American forces went into Falluja in the spring. The anatomy of a firefight told by soldiers who fought it.

A break first. From New York, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Falluja, as we said at the top, is a story with a backstory, the assault in November, a return visit for Marines who fought there last spring who were pulled out, then sent in once again.

Back in April, NEWSNIGHT's Beth Nissen chronicled the moment in time in the earlier battle of Falluja. She did it, as she does so well, by listening to the young men who fought and fell, the men of Echo Company.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): April 26, Falluja, among the units deployed here, Echo Company 2nd Battalion 1st Marines. With them, a network pool camera crew and a "Los Angeles Times" photographer documenting the day's mission, to secure two houses near a Marine perimeter to keep close watch for armed insurgents, snipers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't see any targets.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't either.

NISSEN (on camera): What were you watching for especially?

CPL. JOSHUA CARPENTER, U.S. MARINES: Pretty much just bad guys with guns. NISSEN (voice-over): Insurgents had been on the offensive for days. But with U.S. military commanders trying to establish a cease- fire, Marines were under orders to leave themselves to defensive operations. The Marines were frustrated, edgy.

LANCE CPL. BRYON CURNUTT, U.S. MARINES: You never know what to expect. But you know every day you're going to get mortared. Somebody is going to be taking potshots at you or sniper fire.

NISSEN: Marines took incoming fire almost as soon as they occupied the two houses, fire that appeared to be coming from a minaret nearby. Marine units were ordered on to the rooftops.

CARPENTER: We were on the roof and we started getting hit pretty hard with mortars and RPGs and small-arms fire.

CURNUTT: The next thing I know, some of the guys in the building said they were throwing rocks at us. I turned to look and that's when the explosion went off.

NISSEN: The rocks were grenades.

CARPENTER: A grenade landed on top of the roof that I was on. A piece ricocheted I guess off the top of the roof and hit me in the eye.

CURNUTT: I just heard screaming, looked around, had blood squirting out my neck. I put my hand on that. I saw a lot of smoke. I could see RPGs coming out from other buildings. I saw another Marine looking at his arm screaming really loud.

NISSEN: That Marine was Lance Corporal Zach Fincannon.

LANCE CPL. ZACH FINCANNON, U.S. MARINES: I a heard a loud pop. And I looked over to my left and I see that my arm was dangling.

NISSEN: The blast took off his left hand, shredded his forearm.

FINCANNON: It's like a nightmare kind of thing. It was like, man, this can't really happen to me.

NISSEN: The Marines did buddy aid on each other, put pressure bandages, tourniquets on the wounded. Several were hurt. Someone radioed for the Navy combat medics.

CURNUTT: We were under heavy fire. RPGs are slamming into both buildings. Navy Corpsman did an excellent job. They drove right into the fight from our defensive positions and pulled us out of there. We owe our lives to those guys.

NISSEN: Within minutes, the wounded were at a nearby battalion aid station. Within hours, they were medevaced to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, the big Army hospital in Germany.

CURNUTT: When me and my friend were on the medevac out of there, he grabbed me with his good hand and said somebody is praying for us. FINCANNON: I feel very lucky to be alive. And I'm very glad that a lot of my fellow Marines are alive.

NISSEN: A lot, but not all. One of the Marines sent to the rooftop to replace the wounded was hit with machine gunfire. Lance Corporal Aaron C. Austin, age 21, died in a stairwell.

Hours later, after tanks fired rounds at the minaret, after the firefight ended, Echo Company had time finally to collect itself, to mourn the fallen, to pray for the wounded, pray for Lance Corporal Curnutt.

CURNUTT: I have I think three four pieces of shrapnel in my face, a piece in each of my legs and some scrapes and bruises.

NISSEN: Pray for Corporal Carpenter.

CARPENTER: The worst case is, I won't be able to see. So...

NISSEN (on camera): What have you thought about that?

CARPENTER: I still got my left eye.

NISSEN (voice-over): Pray for Lance Corporal Fincannon.

FINCANNON: My left arm was blown off. They are going to have a prosthetic hand on there. And I got huge shrapnel wounds in my left side. Other than that, I'm fine.

NISSEN: Like most of the war wounded, these Marines have no regrets, except that they are unable to go back to their units back to Iraq.

CURNUTT: That's where my brothers are. The rest of my team is still there. That's where the fight is. Until every Marine and soldier is out of there, the fight is not over.

NISSEN: The war goes on one firefight after another.

Beth Nissen, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Some of the photos in Nissen's piece are the work of Rick Loomis of "The Los Angeles Times," who day in and day out, did what all combat photographers do, which takes nothing away from Mr. Loomis. Instead, we think it says something, something wonderful about his line of work and about the brave men and, yes, the brave women, who do it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICK LOOMIS, PHOTOGRAPHER, "THE L.A. TIMES": My name is Rick Loomis. And I'm a photographer with "The Los Angeles Times." I'm embedded with the 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment out of Camp Pendleton, California. It definitely feels like they are playing defense and they do not like playing defense at all. They are very agitated. They feel like sitting ducks. That's not a position that they like to find themselves in. They would prefer to go on the offensive.

This was a mission that took place on Monday. The Marines wanted to go out and take two houses that were just a few hundred yards from the perimeter that they have set up. At one point, there was a report of eight insurgents that were near a mosque and minaret. And the Marines sent a team out from one of these houses to go see if they could catch up to these insurgents that were there.

They were completely under fire in these two houses. And they said there was a sniper in this minaret, and ended up sending one or two tank rounds, took down the minaret. And then the tanks came in to get us as well.

The plume of smoke is from later on in the day when everybody got out of the house. And they basically tried to attack positions where they thought the insurgents had come from. Following that gun battle, they sent a chaplain over. And the chaplain held a couple of services inside this compound where the Marines are staying. And during one of the services, a lot of the Marines held one candle and they placed it into this little mound of dirt.

And at the very end of the service, one Marine came out alone and did a prayer kneeling down and put his candle in with the rest of them. Today was a bright, blue, sunny day. It's just amazing to think of what is going on here in the context of seeing a nice day out, but also knowing that you can't walk outside of your little perimeter zone, for fear of being attacked or killed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is your desire here, to be baptized here today?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, it is.

LOOMIS: There was four Marines that were baptized today in the service. It was held in a little courtyard of a place where they're staying. The baptism was held in the same place that a friendly-fire mortar round had come into and killed two Marines. And then another Marine was killed a couple of days ago, so the memorial for those three there.

These gentlemen wanted to be baptized there today. They made a baptismal pool out of a piece of plastic sheeting some MRE boxes. So they basically stacked those boxes up and put the plastic tarp in there and filled it full of what water they could find.

I don't know if you'll ever get Marines to admit that they were ever -fearful for their lives. But some of these guys have seen their friends disappear and get wounded. And I think reality is certainly striking them pretty hard.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(ROOSTER CROWING)

BROWN: OK, time to check morning papers around the country and around the world. More potpourri than theme tonight, OK? We're sort of do for a potpourri, aren't we?

"The Christian Science Monitor," this will -- frankly, this will depress you. "Hard Week in a Long Iraq Mission. Increasingly, U.S. Military Expert Say Americans Need to Prepare for a Decades-Long Counterinsurgency Campaign."

OK, here's the question. Did anybody really think about this is going to go on for decades when the war was being talked about before it began? I mean, would you have signed on for that? I don't know.

"The Ottawa Sun." That would be in Canada, for those of you who don't know where Ottawa is. But, of course, I do. "The Nightmare Before Christmas." There's been terrible weather in the Midwest, including up there in Canada, a lot of snow, a lot cold, a lot rain, slush. "Flash Freeze, Paralyzed City." And that's in Canada, where they know how to actually drive in the stuff.

"Santa Rosa News." "Joy to the World," just like that. And I love this, "Toys For Tots Bring Toys and Smiles to Local Children." There is good news out there and it often shows up in small-town papers.

I want to get to this one other thing here, OK? Just be patient with me for a second. "Bitter Cold in Cincinnati." That's not what I wanted get to.

"The Miami Herald." This is what I want to get to. "The FDA to Review Studies of Pain Drugs." Now, I get the better-late-than-never thing, but come on.

The weather -- weather tomorrow in Chicago, "cruel yule," according to "The Chicago Sun-Times," which gave four stars, by the way, to "Aviator," the Howard Hughes movie.

We'll wrap it up in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We have an absolutely terrific Christmas Eve program for you, some of the great characters we met this year, if you've got some time tomorrow, 10:00 Eastern. I will see you again after the 1st of the year. Going to take a week off.

Have a wonderful holiday, a great new year. Good night for all of us at NEWSNIGHT.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com


Aired December 24, 2004 - 22:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR, NEWSNIGHT: Good evening, again, much of the program tonight centers on last month's battle for Falluja, an important battle, the harshest taste of urban warfare to date, a fight that produced some of the most compelling war reporting ever and we'll look at a lot of it in this hour.
Before looking back, we look at today or right now. The secretary of defense a short time ago arrived in Mosul, a surprise and secretive Christmas visit with the troops there, his first visit to Iraq since the Abu Ghraib scandal last May and of course it comes in the wake of a tough couple of weeks for Mr. Rumsfeld, accused of insensitivity in answering questions about a lack of armor for troops and for not personally signing letters to the families of service people who died in the war, leaving the signatures to a machine. And most importantly, it comes just three days after the worst single attack on American forces, the attack in Mosul.

The secretary went immediately to the hospital where those who are wounded, they are the least of the wounded, those who have not been evacuated, are still being cared for. There will be pictures coming out on this. We expect them early tomorrow morning, perhaps 6:00, maybe a little earlier. But again, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld has made a surprise visit to Iraq. He is in Mosul now meeting with American soldiers there.

We learn more about that deadly attack in Mosul today and none of it causes us any comfort, quite the opposite. Not only was the base infiltrated, it was it seems infiltrated by someone wearing an Iraqi army uniform. So how many other insurgents out there dress the same? We begin with CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The top U.S. general in the Mosul region made a surprising revelation about what the suicide bomber at Camp Marez was likely wearing.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: What we think is likely, but certainly not certain, is that an individual in an Iraqi military uniform, possibly with a vest worn-explosive device, was inside the facility.

KOCH: A spokesman for the multinational forces says after the explosion, investigators discovered the remains of a torso wearing the uniform in the mess hall and believe it to be the bomber. But Lieutenant Colonel Steven Boylan (ph) insists they don't know if the bomber was actually a member of the Iraqi military or someone who stole the uniform, got it from a deserter or bought it on the black market. The military also believe the bomber had help.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: It is very difficult to conceive that this would be the act of a lone individual. It would seem to me reasonable to assume that this was a mission perhaps some time in the planning, days perhaps.

KOCH: There is no word yet on whether any Iraqi National Guardsmen are missing. One military official explaining there's no reliable tracking system to keep count of Iraqi soldiers. And the U.S. military can't yet say how many Iraqi civilians work at Camp Marez or whether any of them are unaccounted for. Senior Pentagon officials defend the increasing practice of hiring foreign nationals like Iraqis to do nonmilitary chores on bases. They say it improves not just the economic status of average Iraqis, but their attitude toward Americans and the push for democracy. Most also agreed introduces risk.

KEN ROBINSON, MILITARY INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: If you outsource to the host country in this case Iraq, and you bring in local Iraqis, you bring in to your security environment those who may threaten it.

KOCH: But one expert cautions against further distancing Iraqi civilians and soldiers in order to protect Americans.

THOMAS HAMMAS, NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY: The problem is, if you crack down too much and shut out the Iraqis too much, create the distrust, that obviously is what the insurgent is trying to do. They're trying to separate us from the Iraqis who can help us.

KOCH: For now, the Pentagon is re-evaluating security at U.S. military installations in Iraq, top brass concerned that the effectiveness of Tuesday's attack could prompt suicide copycats. Kathleen Koch, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: That's the Mosul part of the story today. Now, Falluja where three Marines died fighting there today and several hundred civilians were able to return home. On that score, it is slow going in Falluja, part of the challenge, telling the good guys from the bad without creating more bad guys in the process. Reporting this story out of Baghdad tonight, CNN's Karl Penhaul.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is one of just five U.S. checkpoints open for refugees returning to Falluja.

TRANSLATOR: We've been waiting here from 6:)0 a.m. until now and no one can enter. They gave us these instructions to get into the city.

PENHAUL: It's not exactly a warm welcome home. This sign warns any person that attempts to enter Falluja with a weapon is liable to be killed. An estimated 250,000 civilians fled Falluja before the assault. Marines say about 500 returned Thursday. Men of fighting age must show IDs and undergo fingerprint and eye scans, like immigrants arriving at U.S. airports. Residents have been waiting six and a half weeks to go back. Their patience is near breaking point.

TRANSLATOR: They took about five cars near the bridge and then they did not allow us to enter the city. I think this is a kind of propaganda, only because no one entered the city of Falluja until now.

PENHAUL: U.S. Marines and Iraqi soldiers, who stormed the city in November, say they're trying to stop insurgents filtering back disguised as civilians. Despite the November assault with massive U.S. fire power and thousands of troops, some of the insurgents never left. As refugees were returning Thursday, guerrilla fighters holed up in houses battled on. A Marines spokesman said U.S. Marines pulled back and called in air strikes to level the building. Witnesses say one-third of Falluja may have been flattened by fighting since November. Some of those who returned Thursday found they had little to go back to.

TRANSLATOR: This is a disaster, not a district. No one can walk here, let alone live. There is no water, no electricity, nothing.

TRANSLATOR: I just came to find the house as you see it, a wreck. Where will my family and children stay? What do we do?

PENHAUL: To date, U.S. and Iraqi officials have given no accurate assessment of how many homes were destroyed and how many civilians were killed. For now, returning residents will pick up what pieces are left while the rattle of distant gunfire reminds them the insurgency has not been defeated.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PENHAUL: The return is going to be neighborhood by neighborhood to Falluja. And with some 250,000 residents estimated waiting to return, that's likely to be a slow process. Aaron?

BROWN: Do we have any sense of how much reconstruction is going on in Falluja or are they -- has that not even begun?

PENHAUL: Well, Iraqi and U.S. authorities have talked about reconstruction, but they also say at the same time that even in some areas, the power and the water isn't returned yet to service. In terms of reconstruction, they also do though, talk about restoring the civilian authorities there. So all part and parcel of that. With 30 percent estimated of the city damaged, it is going to take a long time. Aaron.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: You have a long day ahead with Secretary Rumsfeld in the country. We'll let you get to work on that. We appreciate you getting up this morning. Thank you, Karl Penhaul who is in Baghdad.

With that as a backdrop, we thought it worthwhile to retrace the steps that got us here. Falluja, it turns out, is like that. It lends itself to a back story, as we call it. There was plenty of it when the Marines and Iraqi forces began their push on the city last month when we first aired this story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): As the American military swept toward Baghdad 18 months ago, the city of Falluja was a tactical afterthought. It is no more.

GEN. DAVID GRANGE (RET), MILITARY ANALYST: It's one of those situations where you can't have a locale like that with such resentment, such independence, that they don't go along with the unity efforts of the rest of the country.

BROWN: Only a month after the fall of Saddam, 19 Iraqis died when American soldiers fired into a street demonstration in Falluja. Someone in the crowd, the military says, fired first. Insurgents began to take control of the city, establishing a Taliban-like rule inside its boundaries.

GRANGE: It fell apart because immediately the jihadists took control, pushed extremists law into that particular enclave of the country and totally rejected any influence from the Iraqi interim government.

BROWN: Among those extremists, the Jordanian Abu al-Zarqawi, a terrorist the U.S. military says was behind the slaughter in early March of four civilian contractors which led to a Marine attack on the city.

GEN. MARK KIMMIT, U.S. ARMY: They are coming back. They are going to hunt down the people responsible for this bestial act.

BROWN: But for all of the tough talk at that time, the Marines never finished the job. They were pulled back.

CPL. CHRIS RODRIGUEZ, U.S. ARMY: It's upsetting. We don't want to do it. We've been here for a while. We don't want to lose the ground that we fought so hard for and that we've been here sweating blood.

BROWN: Security was handed over to what was called the Falluja brigade, Iraqi soldiers led by former Iraqi Army officers, soldiers who didn't fight, leaders who didn't lead and in some cases, aided the insurgents they were supposed to control. So now, again, Marines are preparing to take the city. Iraqi soldiers will back them up. Whether they will fight is not known.

JACKIE SPINNER, THE WASHINGTON POST: This is going to be a big test for them and I think that we'll all be watching to see how well they perform, if they stay in the fight and how long they stay in the fight.

BROWN: The heavy lifting, so to speak, will be done by the Americans. So far in Iraq, about 20 percent of the American casualties have been as a result of fighting in or near Falluja.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: So that's how we set the stage a month or more ago. We'll let the story play out next. First, as seen during the battle itself and later from the men who fought and were wounded in it.

We'll take a break first. This is a special edition of NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Every one of the casualties tonight and for a while now has been from the battle of Falluja. Robert Cappa (ph) who photographed the troops coming ashore at Omaha Beach during the Second World War had a very simple motto. If your pictures aren't good enough, you weren't close enough. In that war, in this, photographers and reporters have gotten very close indeed. One of them, Lindsey Hilsum of Britain's ITN, filed this report one November day from Falluja.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LINDSEY HILSUM, ITN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The last cigarette before heading out. Search and attack, they call it. The Marines moved through the ruins of Falluja, looking for any gunmen who had not fled or been killed, the most desperate and determined. Tanks rumble in. The Americans were in this neighborhood the day before, but maybe the insurgents crept back overnight.

The Marines have been told to comb the mosque for weapons. And as they do, the firing starts. It turns into a firefight. The armored vehicle arrives with more ammunition, because the houses around the mosques are full of fighters. A group of Marines is pinned down on a flat (ph) rooftop. We're filming from an armored vehicle on the street below.

The heavier weapons fire a barrage at the insurgents. They call it suppressive fire. A Marine has been injured and his colleagues need to administer first aid and get him out. A stretcher is brought. This is a serious casualty and it may already be too late.

But the rest of the group now needs to get out, too, under intense fire. This is the most dangerous engagement India (ph) company has had in Falluja. We weren't allowed to film the casualties. This one was loaded into the Amtrak (ph) and taken away. The fire team crosses the street. They're going to hit the insurgents with an anti- tank missile.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: What's going to happen, M-16s 240. We're going to pop up, going to do five seconds of suppression, all right? Slow M-16s, like two bursts. That way (INAUDIBLE) is going to show me where the fire's coming from and I can look at the building, all right? You and you. Ready? Set, go!

HILSUM: The heavy fire keeps the insurgents' heads down. The tracer has shown the man with the missile, the target. The back blasts of the missile engulfed everyone in dust. They call in an air strike and the troops must quickly leave the danger area.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: All right. Start with the guns. Guns are going first. Go, guns!

HILSUM: They rush down the stairs to find a new position. Fearing the insurgents may still be active, they run down the street. The debris of the day's battle lies in their path, a rocket launcher, a flattened Kaleshnikov (ph). From a safer rooftop, we film tanks moving along the street, ready to fire a round into each house where there might still be resistance.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: There's probably a good 20 or 30 down in that last corner. And they're pinched right now. The whole division's got them surrounded and this is where they wree. They've been using this mosque over here to treat their wounded. Inside that mosque it's all dirty and this last strip of houses down to our front, about 30 meters, just full of gunshot wounds and stuff, trying to get them treated and they don't want to give up. Tried talking to them, their interpreter, getting them to surrender, walk out on the street. They're telling us they'd rather die than come out and surrender, so they're going to die.

HILSUM: The Marines begin to relax. The clash is nearing its end.

(on-camera): They've made a tactical withdrawal to this rooftop here, waiting for air power to come in and bomb the remaining insurgents. They think that there's at least another half dozen still in there.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: Five seconds.

HILSUM: Night is falling. As the Marines go on foot to see whether the combined power of all their weaponry has destroyed their enemies.

UNIDENTIFIED SOLDIER: Check out the body, sir.

HILSUM: In the wreckage of the houses along the street near the mosque, they find the bodies of 21 fighters. According to their documents, these five came from the neighboring town of Ramadi, terrorists to the Americans, martyrs to those who support their cause. The end of the Muslim fast of Ramadan is marked by the sickle moon. Americans control Falluja, the ruined city of mosques. Lindsey Hilsum, Channel 4 news, Falluja.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: That's just an extraordinary piece of reporting.

Of all the people we speak to on a regular basis, fair to say we are especially happy when we get to sit down with "Time" magazine's Michael Ware for the simple reason that he's home and that's he's safe. Mr. Ware spends a lot of time in dangerous places dealing often with shady characters, not that he does it with his eyes wide shut, just the opposite which is the other reason he's always welcome. When we last spoke with Michael, he had just returned from the fighting in Falluja.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: In a sentence or two, describe the unit you were with.

MICHAEL WARE, TIME MAGAZINE: During the battle for Falluja, I was with an army unit, a smaller element within the broader attack but very important. It boiled down to the 3rd platoon of Alpha company from what's known as the 2nd battalion, the 2nd infantry regiment. These are essentially mechanized infantry, young guys who jump out of the back of the Bradley armored vehicles.

BROWN: 19 to 25, 26?

WARE: Yeah. I mean, the leaders of these men if you call them, they're more like fresh-faced boys. The oldest among them was 26; perhaps one was 29. The bulk of them were in their late teens or just out of their teens. These really are the youth of America.

BROWN: The day before they went in, were you with them?

WARE: Yes I was.

BROWN: What was it like?

WARE: Pensive. I mean, these men had it drilled into them over and over what it was that they were to expect. They were going into the dark heart of the Iraqi insurgency. This was the nest or this was the base, not only of the home-grown Iraqi nationalists, but this was the central node of the foreign jihadis, the real hard core.

BROWN: Were they scared?

WARE: Yeah. I mean, there's always that fear I mean that anticipation of battle. I mean, you become so cognizant of your own mortality. And these boys aren't immune from that, but they do not shy away from it. They swallow it down and press on.

BROWN: There's a difference between being afraid and cowardice. Those are very different things. You're nuts not to be afraid.

WARE: Absolutely.

BROWN: Guys going in there, they're shooting at you and they're throwing RPGs at you and there's bombs everywhere.

WARE: Absolutely. I have seen combat in Iraq where you'll be with five or six men and you're engaged with the enemy and there's a fierce firefight and suddenly you'll look down from them and there's one man curled up into a ball who simply can't pick up his weapon. Yet the funny thing is the next day you may be in another firefight and he's the fiercest amongst them. That's the thing about combat. There's nowhere to hide from yourself. There's no room for pretense whatsoever and in Falluja, this really was such a place.

BROWN: They go in, they make their way in, they have all of the power of the U.S. military behind them, airpower, big tanks, artillery, the whole deal. And they are facing guys hiding in windows.

WARE: Absolutely. There's guys hiding in what you call rat holes and it's an apt description. There are men who were laying in wait and these were men who stayed behind when all the other insurgents left, when their leadership left, when their comrades departed to move on and fight for another day.

BROWN: They stayed to die?

WARE: They stayed to die. They stayed to kill American boys and to die themselves. Now, there's no greater enemy than that. It's one of the most powerful weapons in combat, that is a man prepared to die.

BROWN: People talked about that you go around a corner and you didn't know what you'd find. Was it like that?

WARE: Absolutely. I mean, the enemy, death, great harm lurked in every nook, in every cranny. There was one particular moment in the battle of Falluja with 3rd platoon where insurgents were hiding in a series of houses. We didn't know which one. After searching nine, we entered the tenth and it was quarter to 2:00 in the morning. The insurgents weren't in the front room. They were hiding in the kitchen. They allowed these boys to enter the house and they waited for one of them and then another to step around into the hallway and then they opened fire. We're talking six to eight feet away, in pitch black. Danger can't lurk any more sinister than that.

BROWN: We'll pick it up there. We'll take a break. We'll continue with Michael in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Continuing for a few more minutes with Michael Ware of "Time" magazine and the battle of Falluja. Was it as they thought it would be?

WARE: No. In the end, I wouldn't call it an anticlimax but it wasn't -- it wasn't the Armageddon-style showdown that many were expecting.

BROWN: ... in some sense to end it all?

WARE: I'm sure the planners weren't deluding themselves to the degree that this would be the final crunch in the insurgent war in Iraq. But there certainly was a sense that this would be the great showdown and it wasn't and there was some surprise at that. And that struck me, because I don't understand why they were surprised. I mean we have seen this, not only from the Iraqi insurgents, but from the al Qaeda-inspired insurgents and the jidahis. We saw it in the battle of INAUDIBLE) in Afghanistan, in the battle against unsuer al islam (ph) in Halubja (ph) in northern Iraq during the invasion. We even saw it in Samara four or five weeks before Falluja. This is a guerrilla war. They're never going to confront you head on. They're always just going to wither away and come back to fight you another day from the flank, from behind, from above, from below. That's the nature of this war.

BROWN: Let me come back to that point. One or two more things about Falluja. You shot some as people are seeing, some incredible pictures and when you look at it, it seems totally chaotic. When you're in it, is there a sense of order or is it as chaotic as it appears to be?

WARE: I mean, combat is a very confusing place. It's -- it's -- there is a chaos to it. You don't know where the enemy is sometimes. You don't know how you can react, how you can rally yourselves. You don't know what support you've got. You're acting like you're out there on your own. Sometimes you don't even know where your friends are, particularly if it's dark or it's a close urban environment. It's hard to know where the next man is.

It is hard to know where the next man is.

I mean, it's almost impossible to describe. And what it takes, what it invariably demands is for one man in the group to stand up.

BROWN: Who was the guy in your group?

WARE: In 3rd Platoon, there was too men, both staff sergeants. One was Staff Sergeant David Bellavia. And the other one was Staff Sergeant Colin Fitts.

BROWN: So late 20s?

WARE: Yes, 26, 27, 28, I mean, young men themselves, yet with a maturity so far exceeding their years.

And, invariably, it was them that the younger men turned to. And these men, I spoke to them after some of these engagements. Internally, they're as terrified as the boys, yet they can never show this. And I know on one occasion when Bellavia stood up, I know from afterwards what was going through his mind, that he didn't want to do what he was about to do, to enter this house where he knew insurgents were laying in wait for him. Yet, from what he was saying, you got no hint of that.

BROWN: Just one final big-picture question. You've been in and out of there for two years. You'll be back in there probably sooner than you want. Do you have a sense that, on the military side, progress is being made?

WARE: To put it simply, no. No, I don't. I mean, I don't have any sense of victory or a sense that the coalition, that the West is winning right now.

I mean, it seems to me we're losing ground, figuratively and literally. Just from my own example, six -- nine months ago, I could travel the breadth of Iraq. Sure, it was dangerous, it was risky, but it was calculated. Then that ceased. And I was restricted to Baghdad itself. And the only way I could leave Baghdad was if the insurgents took me and guaranteed my safety.

Now I can't leave my compound. Kidnap teams circle my house. And even in my compound, they mortar, drop bombs on our house. And in parts of Baghdad itself, the U.S. military has lost control. The terrorists of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi control entire quarters of suburbs. One of them, Haifa Street, the most famous, is within mortar range of the U.S. Embassy itself. And every day, we're creating more recruits for the insurgents, and every day more young men from outside Iraq, from the Muslim world agree, the disenfranchised, they're rising up and coming to join the fight, to blood themselves.

Right now, we are the midwives of the next generation of jihad, of the next al Qaeda. So the very thing that the administration says it went there to prevent, it is creating. And despite the honor and the bravery and the uncommon valor that I see among the American boys there in uniform who are fighting this grinding war day to day, when I see them dying in front of me, I can't help but think that perhaps they're dying in vain, because we're making the nightmare that we're trying to prevent.

BROWN: It's good to see you. Have a good holiday.

WARE: Thank you very much. It's my pleasure.

BROWN: One of the truly wonderful things about you, I think, is that you understand that you get a holiday and they don't.

WARE: That's very true.

BROWN: They don't.

WARE: There's no let-up. There's no let-up. And it's very hard when you're leaving these guys and you have to say goodbye, because, yes, they don't get this.

BROWN: Good to see you.

WARE: Thank you. It's my pleasure.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Michael Ware reports for "TIME" magazine.

Still to come, more on what Michael was so vividly describing, the complicated nature of guerrilla warfare as seen from street level, American soldiers going door to door, dangerous work in Falluja, as reported by CNN's Jane Arraf.

Also, a view of the fighting through the lens of still photographer Rick Loomis, who shoots for "The L.A. Times."

We'll take a break first. Around the world, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BROWN: As we reported at the top, a number of developments today in Iraq. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld arrived a short time ago for a surprise visit to Mosul. We'll have more. We'll see the pictures on that, we think, early this morning, early tomorrow morning, about 6:00.

We also learned more about the suicide bombing there. That suicide bomber was likely wearing an Iraqi military uniform.

And three Marines died today in Falluja, a reminder that fighting a counterinsurgency is, by its very nature, open-ended. The troops know this, even as they can't always escape the consequences. At a minimum, it makes a difficult job even tougher at times, as CNN's Jane Arraf found out last month on the mean streets of Falluja.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): In the abandoned industrial heart of Falluja, streets and streets of locked doors. After a week of intense fighting, the Army's 1st Infantry Division is going through these streets a second time to make sure they've been cleared of gunmen and weapons.

CAPT. KIRK MAYFIELD, U.S. ARMY: When we sweep through we miss something then the insurgents are able to come back in, have a cache of arms or ammunition that they're able to use against coalition forces or the Iraqi provincial forces later.

ARRAF: With no people left here there's almost no intelligence on where weapons might be hidden. The soldiers spend hours forcing open doors to hundreds of buildings. The more resistant doors get pulled apart by armored vehicles. When they can't shoot off the locks they use a power saw.

Task Force 22's brigade combat troop has to go through this sector street by street checking literally every building that isn't a mosque. Those they leave for Iraqi security forces.

It's tedious and terrifying work. They don't know what could be hiding behind these locked shutters. After a week of high intensity combat one of the biggest dangers in this silent neighborhood is complacency.

MARGARITO RAMIREZ, U.S. ARMY: You just don't ever know what could happen, you know, and you got to stay vigilant and stay alert out here.

ARRAF: In this field they find unexploded white phosphorus mortars designed to break apart in a rain of caustic fire. The soldiers wrap them with plastic explosives and take cover when they're detonated.

(on camera): It's a scene of devastation as we walk through this industrial section of Falluja. There are fires burning from ammunitions blown up, destruction almost everywhere. Bombs have been dropped here on what appear to be fighting positions, on bunkers, where insurgents were dug in. These are people's livelihoods, these shops, these auto repair stores. It's going to take a long, long time to get the city back to normal.

(voice-over): On this day, they find no live gunmen and for hours few weapons. But at the end of the day in this ordinary looking building, they discover a treasure trove of weapons and ammunition.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I probably got about 2,500 rounds of 14.5 millimeter.

ARRAF: Inside are aging anti-aircraft guns, artillery and mortars, cases of usable ammunition and bags of armor-piercing heavy machine gun rounds. The Army believes it might be a bomb making factory. In this neighborhood, in this city, it's certainly a reason for checking behind every door.

Jane Arraf, CNN, Falluja.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Ahead on the program, the battle that came before, when American forces went into Falluja in the spring. The anatomy of a firefight told by soldiers who fought it.

A break first. From New York, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Falluja, as we said at the top, is a story with a backstory, the assault in November, a return visit for Marines who fought there last spring who were pulled out, then sent in once again.

Back in April, NEWSNIGHT's Beth Nissen chronicled the moment in time in the earlier battle of Falluja. She did it, as she does so well, by listening to the young men who fought and fell, the men of Echo Company.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): April 26, Falluja, among the units deployed here, Echo Company 2nd Battalion 1st Marines. With them, a network pool camera crew and a "Los Angeles Times" photographer documenting the day's mission, to secure two houses near a Marine perimeter to keep close watch for armed insurgents, snipers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't see any targets.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't either.

NISSEN (on camera): What were you watching for especially?

CPL. JOSHUA CARPENTER, U.S. MARINES: Pretty much just bad guys with guns. NISSEN (voice-over): Insurgents had been on the offensive for days. But with U.S. military commanders trying to establish a cease- fire, Marines were under orders to leave themselves to defensive operations. The Marines were frustrated, edgy.

LANCE CPL. BRYON CURNUTT, U.S. MARINES: You never know what to expect. But you know every day you're going to get mortared. Somebody is going to be taking potshots at you or sniper fire.

NISSEN: Marines took incoming fire almost as soon as they occupied the two houses, fire that appeared to be coming from a minaret nearby. Marine units were ordered on to the rooftops.

CARPENTER: We were on the roof and we started getting hit pretty hard with mortars and RPGs and small-arms fire.

CURNUTT: The next thing I know, some of the guys in the building said they were throwing rocks at us. I turned to look and that's when the explosion went off.

NISSEN: The rocks were grenades.

CARPENTER: A grenade landed on top of the roof that I was on. A piece ricocheted I guess off the top of the roof and hit me in the eye.

CURNUTT: I just heard screaming, looked around, had blood squirting out my neck. I put my hand on that. I saw a lot of smoke. I could see RPGs coming out from other buildings. I saw another Marine looking at his arm screaming really loud.

NISSEN: That Marine was Lance Corporal Zach Fincannon.

LANCE CPL. ZACH FINCANNON, U.S. MARINES: I a heard a loud pop. And I looked over to my left and I see that my arm was dangling.

NISSEN: The blast took off his left hand, shredded his forearm.

FINCANNON: It's like a nightmare kind of thing. It was like, man, this can't really happen to me.

NISSEN: The Marines did buddy aid on each other, put pressure bandages, tourniquets on the wounded. Several were hurt. Someone radioed for the Navy combat medics.

CURNUTT: We were under heavy fire. RPGs are slamming into both buildings. Navy Corpsman did an excellent job. They drove right into the fight from our defensive positions and pulled us out of there. We owe our lives to those guys.

NISSEN: Within minutes, the wounded were at a nearby battalion aid station. Within hours, they were medevaced to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, the big Army hospital in Germany.

CURNUTT: When me and my friend were on the medevac out of there, he grabbed me with his good hand and said somebody is praying for us. FINCANNON: I feel very lucky to be alive. And I'm very glad that a lot of my fellow Marines are alive.

NISSEN: A lot, but not all. One of the Marines sent to the rooftop to replace the wounded was hit with machine gunfire. Lance Corporal Aaron C. Austin, age 21, died in a stairwell.

Hours later, after tanks fired rounds at the minaret, after the firefight ended, Echo Company had time finally to collect itself, to mourn the fallen, to pray for the wounded, pray for Lance Corporal Curnutt.

CURNUTT: I have I think three four pieces of shrapnel in my face, a piece in each of my legs and some scrapes and bruises.

NISSEN: Pray for Corporal Carpenter.

CARPENTER: The worst case is, I won't be able to see. So...

NISSEN (on camera): What have you thought about that?

CARPENTER: I still got my left eye.

NISSEN (voice-over): Pray for Lance Corporal Fincannon.

FINCANNON: My left arm was blown off. They are going to have a prosthetic hand on there. And I got huge shrapnel wounds in my left side. Other than that, I'm fine.

NISSEN: Like most of the war wounded, these Marines have no regrets, except that they are unable to go back to their units back to Iraq.

CURNUTT: That's where my brothers are. The rest of my team is still there. That's where the fight is. Until every Marine and soldier is out of there, the fight is not over.

NISSEN: The war goes on one firefight after another.

Beth Nissen, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Some of the photos in Nissen's piece are the work of Rick Loomis of "The Los Angeles Times," who day in and day out, did what all combat photographers do, which takes nothing away from Mr. Loomis. Instead, we think it says something, something wonderful about his line of work and about the brave men and, yes, the brave women, who do it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICK LOOMIS, PHOTOGRAPHER, "THE L.A. TIMES": My name is Rick Loomis. And I'm a photographer with "The Los Angeles Times." I'm embedded with the 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment out of Camp Pendleton, California. It definitely feels like they are playing defense and they do not like playing defense at all. They are very agitated. They feel like sitting ducks. That's not a position that they like to find themselves in. They would prefer to go on the offensive.

This was a mission that took place on Monday. The Marines wanted to go out and take two houses that were just a few hundred yards from the perimeter that they have set up. At one point, there was a report of eight insurgents that were near a mosque and minaret. And the Marines sent a team out from one of these houses to go see if they could catch up to these insurgents that were there.

They were completely under fire in these two houses. And they said there was a sniper in this minaret, and ended up sending one or two tank rounds, took down the minaret. And then the tanks came in to get us as well.

The plume of smoke is from later on in the day when everybody got out of the house. And they basically tried to attack positions where they thought the insurgents had come from. Following that gun battle, they sent a chaplain over. And the chaplain held a couple of services inside this compound where the Marines are staying. And during one of the services, a lot of the Marines held one candle and they placed it into this little mound of dirt.

And at the very end of the service, one Marine came out alone and did a prayer kneeling down and put his candle in with the rest of them. Today was a bright, blue, sunny day. It's just amazing to think of what is going on here in the context of seeing a nice day out, but also knowing that you can't walk outside of your little perimeter zone, for fear of being attacked or killed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is your desire here, to be baptized here today?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, it is.

LOOMIS: There was four Marines that were baptized today in the service. It was held in a little courtyard of a place where they're staying. The baptism was held in the same place that a friendly-fire mortar round had come into and killed two Marines. And then another Marine was killed a couple of days ago, so the memorial for those three there.

These gentlemen wanted to be baptized there today. They made a baptismal pool out of a piece of plastic sheeting some MRE boxes. So they basically stacked those boxes up and put the plastic tarp in there and filled it full of what water they could find.

I don't know if you'll ever get Marines to admit that they were ever -fearful for their lives. But some of these guys have seen their friends disappear and get wounded. And I think reality is certainly striking them pretty hard.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(ROOSTER CROWING)

BROWN: OK, time to check morning papers around the country and around the world. More potpourri than theme tonight, OK? We're sort of do for a potpourri, aren't we?

"The Christian Science Monitor," this will -- frankly, this will depress you. "Hard Week in a Long Iraq Mission. Increasingly, U.S. Military Expert Say Americans Need to Prepare for a Decades-Long Counterinsurgency Campaign."

OK, here's the question. Did anybody really think about this is going to go on for decades when the war was being talked about before it began? I mean, would you have signed on for that? I don't know.

"The Ottawa Sun." That would be in Canada, for those of you who don't know where Ottawa is. But, of course, I do. "The Nightmare Before Christmas." There's been terrible weather in the Midwest, including up there in Canada, a lot of snow, a lot cold, a lot rain, slush. "Flash Freeze, Paralyzed City." And that's in Canada, where they know how to actually drive in the stuff.

"Santa Rosa News." "Joy to the World," just like that. And I love this, "Toys For Tots Bring Toys and Smiles to Local Children." There is good news out there and it often shows up in small-town papers.

I want to get to this one other thing here, OK? Just be patient with me for a second. "Bitter Cold in Cincinnati." That's not what I wanted get to.

"The Miami Herald." This is what I want to get to. "The FDA to Review Studies of Pain Drugs." Now, I get the better-late-than-never thing, but come on.

The weather -- weather tomorrow in Chicago, "cruel yule," according to "The Chicago Sun-Times," which gave four stars, by the way, to "Aviator," the Howard Hughes movie.

We'll wrap it up in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We have an absolutely terrific Christmas Eve program for you, some of the great characters we met this year, if you've got some time tomorrow, 10:00 Eastern. I will see you again after the 1st of the year. Going to take a week off.

Have a wonderful holiday, a great new year. Good night for all of us at NEWSNIGHT.

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