Iraq Notebook
Review finds troops lacked ammunition

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WASHINGTON — The Army's 3rd Infantry Division charged into Iraq in April short of the ammunition their commanders had said was necessary to invade, according to the division's postwar evaluation.

It was one of a number of supply problems encountered by the 3rd Infantry before and during its 21-day dash to Baghdad from Kuwait, according to the internal review.

"Every attempt to gain the ammunition assets resulted in some agency or another denying requests, short-loading trucks or turning away soldiers," the report said. "The entire situation became utter chaos. ... The division crossed (into Iraq) short the ammunition it had declared necessary to commit to combat."

The report cataloged serious problems with supply, security and handling of prisoners of war.

A spokesman for the division, Maj. Darryl Wright, characterized the report as a candid effort to pinpoint problems and refine tactics so the division fights better next time.

He said the report had not yet been finalized. It blamed many problems on higher headquarters or other parts of the military, although it did point out some places where the division could train its own soldiers better.

U.N. stamp of legitimacy needed, 2 Democrats say

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Democratic Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Jack Reed of Rhode Island, in a visit yesterday, said the expense and political burden in administering Iraq would be made easier with the U.N.'s stamp of legitimacy and help in transferring power to Iraqis.

"I'm a big believer that we ought to internationalize this, but it will take a big change in our administration's thinking," Clinton said. "I don't see that it's forthcoming."

Both senators cautioned that the Bush administration's new plans to speed up the transfer of power to an Iraqi government are risky.

"We're caught in a dilemma, possibly of our own making," Reed said. "A quick, hasty election might bring to power a person who doesn't share the values we're trying to encourage. But the more we wait, the more it looks like an occupation."

3 arrested in network to recruit, train extremists

PARIS — Italian and German police yesterday arrested three suspected members of a network that allegedly recruited Islamic extremists in Europe to train in terror camps in Iraq.

Italian officials said they think five of the recruits have died in suicide attacks in Iraq in recent months.

Abderrazak Mahdjoub, an Algerian arrested in Hamburg, Germany, also was an alleged associate of Hamburg-based al-Qaida cell that plotted the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.

Authorities think that Mahdjoub, 29, and at least two other former associates of the Sept. 11 hijackers were deployed in Europe and the Middle East by the network of Abu Musab Zarqawi, a senior figure in al-Qaida.

His trail leads from postwar Iraq to this month's suicide bombings in Turkey and foiled plots around Europe.

Mahdjoub faces Italian charges of terrorist association, providing fraudulent documents, and involvement in illegal immigration.

Tunisians Bouyahia Maher ben Abdelaziz and Housni Jama, who were arrested in Milan, are accused of providing money and fraudulent documents to suspected terrorists in Turkey and Singapore.

Also ...

A German court sentenced a U.S. businessman to nearly five years in prison yesterday for organizing a 1999 shipment to Iraq of drills that could be used to make a long-range cannon. Iraqi-born Sahib Abd al-Amir al-Haddad, 60, who holds a U.S. passport but lived in Amman, Jordan, was convicted of breaking German export laws. ... South Korea President Roh Moo Hyun said yesterday that he decided to send up to 3,000 combat troops to Iraq in hopes it would encourage the United States to continue to work to resolve the North Korean nuclear crisis.

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