Chasing the Ghosts

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Nestled close to Syria, Tall 'Afar is at the center of a vast border region rife with smuggling and anti-American sentiment. After the U.S. invasion, it became a gateway for foreign fighters entering Iraq. In time, homegrown insurgent cells came under the control of al-Zarqawi's al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia organization, which transformed the city into a training and command base for foreign jihadis and a hideout for al-Zarqawi and his deputies. After the fall of Fallujah, the town became a propaganda tool for the resistance, with attacks on U.S. forces in the city featured heavily in the "top 10 attacks" videos circulated among insurgent groups. For civilians, especially the Shi'ite minority, the city became a prison under insurgent rule. Al-Zarqawi's shock troops commandeered buses, schools and businesses for military purposes, evicting uncooperative families and selling their furniture. Insurgent videos and residents' accounts detail how anyone deemed to be collaborating with U.S. forces was executed, often publicly. "The enemy has taken good people who have worked with us out into the street and cut their heads off," armored reconnaissance troop commander Captain Jesse Sellars told his replacements coming into western Tall 'Afar.

Although U.S. officers had known for months about the atrocities taking place in Tall 'Afar, they were powerless to do anything about them. Stretched thin fighting rebels in places like al-Qaim and Mosul, the military dedicated just a single infantry battalion to an area twice the size of Connecticut. In May, however, more than 4,000 troops of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, a unit with a unique combination of tanks, Bradleys and helicopters that is back for its second tour in Iraq, were hastily rerouted from the south to the Tall 'Afar region, where they began disrupting the insurgents' supply lines and safe havens. They paid a price: two platoons alone saw a third of their 50-odd soldiers killed or wounded in less than four months, and hardy Abrams tanks and Bradley vehicles burned in the streets. "A day can go from good to bad in a heartbeat in there," says reconnaissance helicopter pilot Captain Matthew Junko. And so last month the regiment's commander, Colonel H.R. McMaster, told his troops what he had been itching to say all along: it was time to take back Tall 'Afar.