DANGER AHEAD
STORY:
RICHARD CARLETON: It's the last post, and the last days for these Dutch soldiers, who are quitting Iraq. Holland is the 17th country to pull troops out. Australia is apparently the only country upping its commitment. This bleak outpost will soon be home to 450 fresh Australian soldiers. We're sending them almost half a world away. But what in heaven's name are we getting ourselves into here? From Al Samawah to Baghdad is just 250km — Sydney to Canberra. But nearly two years after the mission was accomplished and it's just too treacherous to drive to the capital. Instead, you must first go south to Kuwait, fly to Jordan and then fly again to Baghdad.
INTERCOM: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Baghdad International.
RICHARD CARLETON: This place is very dangerous. And the most dangerous road in the whole country is the three-kilometre run from the airport to the main highway.
SECURITY GUARD: If we come under contact and the cars get immobilised that way, we won't get out of here until...
RICHARD CARLETON: The hotel was little comfort. Room 1022 had just taken a rocket, and for a moment, I thought more would be on the way. Few foreigners ever step outside the fortified hotels now. But you must if you're to get inside the walled American compound — a number of car bombs right here at this entrance — and access the helicopters deep inside. I'm heading 150 kilometres north-west of Baghdad to Tikrit, Saddam's hometown. These gun-ships operate in pairs — each is giving cover to the other. No road is safe in Iraq now. The sky is where the Americans have the advantage.
COLONEL TODD WOOD: The safest form of travel right now is by air. But the fact that you can travel by air right now and not have to get shot down is a big step.
RICHARD CARLETON: Lieutenant Colonel Todd Wood's battalion is based here in Tikrit, a camp aptly named Camp Danger. He talks of a more secure Iraq. Look, just to get us here to your base, two helicopter gun-ships — 12 months ago it was a couple of hour's drive. Security improved?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: I will tell you the tactics of the insurgent have changed. He's a thinking enemy. He concentrates on the roads now and not the air.
RICHARD CARLETON: And he's winning?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: He's not winning.
RICHARD CARLETON: The Americans are here on a massive scale. Saddam's Tikrit compound, that they've taken over, just beggars belief. There are nearly 60 palaces here. Yes, 60, scattered around artificial lakes. But inside, grand marble spaces have been transformed to fit the new circumstances. Nevertheless, the new real world hits the Americans the moment they leave the compound.
SOLDIER: Some units have lost soldiers right outside the gate to IEDs.
RICHARD CARLETON: IED is jargon for Improvised Explosive Device. The exposed gunners on the top of the Humvees are invariably young men and understandably nervous.
SOLDIER: Move, motherf...er!
RICHARD CARLETON: Some still have a little to learn about winning hearts and minds of Muslims. Letting loose with his pistol didn't improve the circumstance. On patrol with your soldiers the other day, in my Humvee, the top gunner, directing the traffic, screamed out to Iraqis, "Move over, motherf...er!" You're not going to win carrying on like that.
COLONEL TODD WOOD: Absolutely. That is exactly the kind of attitude and exactly the kind of behaviour that as leaders we're fighting over here all the time.
RICHARD CARLETON: So you're failing?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: No, we're not failing. If I can win this fight by putting a bullet between a terrorist's eyes and that helps me win, that's great. If I can win this fight by building a hospital and defeating the terrorists that way, then that's great too.
I just wanted to stop by and say hi.
RICHARD CARLETON: In his own small way, Colonel Wood is doing his bit to repair the immense damage done by America's crimes at Abu Ghraib prison and elsewhere. America desperately wants to be liked again. So they hand out teddy bears, toss muffins from armoured cars and pay to rebuild a hospital. But what Iraqis remember is being told to F-off, being shot at and having their doors kicked in at night. Tonight the soldiers have intelligence that a suspect is hiding here. They cuffed and blindfolded the man of the house, corralled the women and turned the place upside down. But the intelligence was faulty.
CAPTAIN: Once we were about 10 minutes into it, I objected to it. I kind of realised we had a case of — on my part — either not developing the intelligence enough on my part or possibly on the source's part. There was some bad intel.
CAPTAIN: Sorry to inconvenience you tonight.
RICHARD CARLETON: The exit is as graceful as the circumstances permitted.
CAPTAIN: We had some information. We thought some folks out here might be involved in some attacks on coalition forces. So we're sorry for the inconvenience here to your family tonight.
RICHARD CARLETON: The captain left around $20 "conscience money" and ordered the woman's husband released.
CAPTAIN: We didn't mistreat anybody. We closed out with the family. We paid 'em a little bit just for any sloppiness in the house and didn't break anything. So I feel like we didn't create any extra enemies or anything there either, so...
RICHARD CARLETON: If when you eventually leave here, the people are hating you more, then what's been your achievement?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: I know how I would feel to have a foreign power on my soil. But I feel like they do understand what we're trying to do for 'em, and they do appreciate the new-found freedoms that they've got.
RICHARD CARLETON: Colonel Wood says the insurgents are now going for softer targets, like locals cooperating with the coalition. Iraqi police are especially vulnerable. What happened here? One attack was particularly sadistic.
CAPTAIN: Insurgents came in, killed the gate guard, came to the location where you're standing right now, put all the police on their knees and slit their throats.
RICHARD CARLETON: How many?
CAPTAIN: Twelve altogether. One at the front gate, and 11 right here.
RICHARD CARLETON: The colonel says these guerilla tactics are counterproductive.
COLONEL TODD WOOD: This location right here is where the second bomb was placed.
RICHARD CARLETON: Well, maybe they are, but, on the street, opinion is profoundly opposed to the coalition forces. Do you want the Americans to stay or go?
MAN 1: I want all the foreigners out of Iraq.
RICHARD CARLETON: Australian troops are about to come here.
MAN 2: We don't need them.
RICHARD CARLETON: Is it good or bad that Australians come?
MAN 2: We don't need them here.
MAN 3: Of course it's bad for the Australian people and the Australian soldiers. They're going to be killed. It's hell here.
RICHARD CARLETON: The hell where the extra Australian troops are going is not as hot as the American sectors. At the Dutch base back in Samawah, it was party time. Who wouldn't be happy to be getting out of here?
DUTCH SOLDIER: All my friends at home, see you soon.
RICHARD CARLETON: The area that had been assigned to the Dutch force is about half the size of Tasmania, with the main focus on Samawah, where the Australians will be based. If John Howard's gamble with Australian lives pays off, then when Australian troops start patrolling in this town in a few weeks' time, their experience will be as benign as has been this British patrol's today.
Because the Dutch pulled out of here, as you know, just a little while ago, and these British troops are filling in as a stop-gap until the Australian troops arrive. Now these patrols do get stoned every now and again. It is a little dangerous, but the orders to these troops is that they are to wave and smile unless they are fired upon. These are the people we're told we're coming to protect — the Japanese self-defence force that's winning hearts and minds by building schools, hospitals and a decent water supply.
COLONEL OTA: I understand the Australian people's feelings that the Prime Minister's speech has turned over 180 degrees.
RICHARD CARLETON: The commanding officer is Colonel Ota.
COLONEL OTA: It is very lucky for me to Australian Army post come here and to work together.
RICHARD CARLETON: Here we discovered that what is expected of the Australian troops is not exactly as we've been told. The Japanese say they can and do look after themselves. What they want from us is a much bigger ask — they want a safe environment to work in. Now that means Australians doing the dangerous work, like these Brits, patrolling the streets and maintaining law and order — the stuff that cost the Dutch the lives of two of their soldiers. The British commander here is Lieutenant Colonel Tim Wilson.
LIEUTENANT COLONEL TIM WILSON: Yes, this is a more secure environment than perhaps Baghdad. But it still has some way to go to make sure it is as secure as NSW, for instance. It's got a considerable distance to go.
RICHARD CARLETON: Nowhere in occupied Iraq is really safe, as the Australian troops that guarded the Baghdad embassy know only too well. The Australian troop presence here in Baghdad has always been just a little difficult to fathom. There used to be 120 Australian troops holed up in that partly finished high-rise over there guarding just four or five diplomats in the embassy, which is the little building to the rear. But then a car bomb went off out the front. You can still see the rubble from the explosion. And then the diplomats retreated to the big American base out at the airport. The 120 soldiers, now with apparently nothing to do, they took refuge in the other big American base, the so-called green zone over there. The body of the first Australian serviceman to die in this war was brought home on Thursday. Paul Pardoel was a navigator with the RAF. As of this weekend, the American war dead number 1534. Back in Iraq, the war grinds on. No weapons of mass destruction, but daily discoveries of hidden ordinance must be dealt with. This youngster, the suspect in this case, will be taken here. The Tikrit version of Abu Ghraib prison, where, it's said, with dignity and respect he will be interrogated in these purpose-built rooms. Colonel, "dignity and respect", but you must be expecting this question — do you bash here?
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: No. Do I what?
RICHARD CARLETON: Bash.
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: As in beat a prisoner?
RICHARD CARLETON: Yes.
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: No, negative. We don't do that here.
RICHARD CARLETON: But given America's disgraceful treatment of prisoners of war, what would Colonel Martinez be saying that was different if they are still bashing?
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: I would think that if something were happening at this facility that it would get out. Nowadays — this is what happened at Abu Ghraib — with the digital cameras that we have now, people do dumb things. They make dumb mistakes, and there's always someone watching, taking pictures, and somehow, some way — in a democratic society — it makes its way out. But at the end of the day, that's not done here.
RICHARD CARLETON: America says it will get out of Iraq as soon as these troops are ready to take their place. But has America the stomach to wait that long?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: If you take a look at our history, we've been in Korea for a long time. We're still there. We had occupational forces in Japan for more than 20 years. So we have, as a nation, we've got the kind of fortitude to see it through.
RICHARD CARLETON: Maybe, and, at the same time, drag Australia deeper and deeper into this quagmire? How in hell are we ever going to get out of here?
STORY:
RICHARD CARLETON: It's the last post, and the last days for these Dutch soldiers, who are quitting Iraq. Holland is the 17th country to pull troops out. Australia is apparently the only country upping its commitment. This bleak outpost will soon be home to 450 fresh Australian soldiers. We're sending them almost half a world away. But what in heaven's name are we getting ourselves into here? From Al Samawah to Baghdad is just 250km — Sydney to Canberra. But nearly two years after the mission was accomplished and it's just too treacherous to drive to the capital. Instead, you must first go south to Kuwait, fly to Jordan and then fly again to Baghdad.
INTERCOM: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Baghdad International.
RICHARD CARLETON: This place is very dangerous. And the most dangerous road in the whole country is the three-kilometre run from the airport to the main highway.
SECURITY GUARD: If we come under contact and the cars get immobilised that way, we won't get out of here until...
RICHARD CARLETON: The hotel was little comfort. Room 1022 had just taken a rocket, and for a moment, I thought more would be on the way. Few foreigners ever step outside the fortified hotels now. But you must if you're to get inside the walled American compound — a number of car bombs right here at this entrance — and access the helicopters deep inside. I'm heading 150 kilometres north-west of Baghdad to Tikrit, Saddam's hometown. These gun-ships operate in pairs — each is giving cover to the other. No road is safe in Iraq now. The sky is where the Americans have the advantage.
COLONEL TODD WOOD: The safest form of travel right now is by air. But the fact that you can travel by air right now and not have to get shot down is a big step.
RICHARD CARLETON: Lieutenant Colonel Todd Wood's battalion is based here in Tikrit, a camp aptly named Camp Danger. He talks of a more secure Iraq. Look, just to get us here to your base, two helicopter gun-ships — 12 months ago it was a couple of hour's drive. Security improved?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: I will tell you the tactics of the insurgent have changed. He's a thinking enemy. He concentrates on the roads now and not the air.
RICHARD CARLETON: And he's winning?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: He's not winning.
RICHARD CARLETON: The Americans are here on a massive scale. Saddam's Tikrit compound, that they've taken over, just beggars belief. There are nearly 60 palaces here. Yes, 60, scattered around artificial lakes. But inside, grand marble spaces have been transformed to fit the new circumstances. Nevertheless, the new real world hits the Americans the moment they leave the compound.
SOLDIER: Some units have lost soldiers right outside the gate to IEDs.
RICHARD CARLETON: IED is jargon for Improvised Explosive Device. The exposed gunners on the top of the Humvees are invariably young men and understandably nervous.
SOLDIER: Move, motherf...er!
RICHARD CARLETON: Some still have a little to learn about winning hearts and minds of Muslims. Letting loose with his pistol didn't improve the circumstance. On patrol with your soldiers the other day, in my Humvee, the top gunner, directing the traffic, screamed out to Iraqis, "Move over, motherf...er!" You're not going to win carrying on like that.
COLONEL TODD WOOD: Absolutely. That is exactly the kind of attitude and exactly the kind of behaviour that as leaders we're fighting over here all the time.
RICHARD CARLETON: So you're failing?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: No, we're not failing. If I can win this fight by putting a bullet between a terrorist's eyes and that helps me win, that's great. If I can win this fight by building a hospital and defeating the terrorists that way, then that's great too.
I just wanted to stop by and say hi.
RICHARD CARLETON: In his own small way, Colonel Wood is doing his bit to repair the immense damage done by America's crimes at Abu Ghraib prison and elsewhere. America desperately wants to be liked again. So they hand out teddy bears, toss muffins from armoured cars and pay to rebuild a hospital. But what Iraqis remember is being told to F-off, being shot at and having their doors kicked in at night. Tonight the soldiers have intelligence that a suspect is hiding here. They cuffed and blindfolded the man of the house, corralled the women and turned the place upside down. But the intelligence was faulty.
CAPTAIN: Once we were about 10 minutes into it, I objected to it. I kind of realised we had a case of — on my part — either not developing the intelligence enough on my part or possibly on the source's part. There was some bad intel.
CAPTAIN: Sorry to inconvenience you tonight.
RICHARD CARLETON: The exit is as graceful as the circumstances permitted.
CAPTAIN: We had some information. We thought some folks out here might be involved in some attacks on coalition forces. So we're sorry for the inconvenience here to your family tonight.
RICHARD CARLETON: The captain left around $20 "conscience money" and ordered the woman's husband released.
CAPTAIN: We didn't mistreat anybody. We closed out with the family. We paid 'em a little bit just for any sloppiness in the house and didn't break anything. So I feel like we didn't create any extra enemies or anything there either, so...
RICHARD CARLETON: If when you eventually leave here, the people are hating you more, then what's been your achievement?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: I know how I would feel to have a foreign power on my soil. But I feel like they do understand what we're trying to do for 'em, and they do appreciate the new-found freedoms that they've got.
RICHARD CARLETON: Colonel Wood says the insurgents are now going for softer targets, like locals cooperating with the coalition. Iraqi police are especially vulnerable. What happened here? One attack was particularly sadistic.
CAPTAIN: Insurgents came in, killed the gate guard, came to the location where you're standing right now, put all the police on their knees and slit their throats.
RICHARD CARLETON: How many?
CAPTAIN: Twelve altogether. One at the front gate, and 11 right here.
RICHARD CARLETON: The colonel says these guerilla tactics are counterproductive.
COLONEL TODD WOOD: This location right here is where the second bomb was placed.
RICHARD CARLETON: Well, maybe they are, but, on the street, opinion is profoundly opposed to the coalition forces. Do you want the Americans to stay or go?
MAN 1: I want all the foreigners out of Iraq.
RICHARD CARLETON: Australian troops are about to come here.
MAN 2: We don't need them.
RICHARD CARLETON: Is it good or bad that Australians come?
MAN 2: We don't need them here.
MAN 3: Of course it's bad for the Australian people and the Australian soldiers. They're going to be killed. It's hell here.
RICHARD CARLETON: The hell where the extra Australian troops are going is not as hot as the American sectors. At the Dutch base back in Samawah, it was party time. Who wouldn't be happy to be getting out of here?
DUTCH SOLDIER: All my friends at home, see you soon.
RICHARD CARLETON: The area that had been assigned to the Dutch force is about half the size of Tasmania, with the main focus on Samawah, where the Australians will be based. If John Howard's gamble with Australian lives pays off, then when Australian troops start patrolling in this town in a few weeks' time, their experience will be as benign as has been this British patrol's today.
Because the Dutch pulled out of here, as you know, just a little while ago, and these British troops are filling in as a stop-gap until the Australian troops arrive. Now these patrols do get stoned every now and again. It is a little dangerous, but the orders to these troops is that they are to wave and smile unless they are fired upon. These are the people we're told we're coming to protect — the Japanese self-defence force that's winning hearts and minds by building schools, hospitals and a decent water supply.
COLONEL OTA: I understand the Australian people's feelings that the Prime Minister's speech has turned over 180 degrees.
RICHARD CARLETON: The commanding officer is Colonel Ota.
COLONEL OTA: It is very lucky for me to Australian Army post come here and to work together.
RICHARD CARLETON: Here we discovered that what is expected of the Australian troops is not exactly as we've been told. The Japanese say they can and do look after themselves. What they want from us is a much bigger ask — they want a safe environment to work in. Now that means Australians doing the dangerous work, like these Brits, patrolling the streets and maintaining law and order — the stuff that cost the Dutch the lives of two of their soldiers. The British commander here is Lieutenant Colonel Tim Wilson.
LIEUTENANT COLONEL TIM WILSON: Yes, this is a more secure environment than perhaps Baghdad. But it still has some way to go to make sure it is as secure as NSW, for instance. It's got a considerable distance to go.
RICHARD CARLETON: Nowhere in occupied Iraq is really safe, as the Australian troops that guarded the Baghdad embassy know only too well. The Australian troop presence here in Baghdad has always been just a little difficult to fathom. There used to be 120 Australian troops holed up in that partly finished high-rise over there guarding just four or five diplomats in the embassy, which is the little building to the rear. But then a car bomb went off out the front. You can still see the rubble from the explosion. And then the diplomats retreated to the big American base out at the airport. The 120 soldiers, now with apparently nothing to do, they took refuge in the other big American base, the so-called green zone over there. The body of the first Australian serviceman to die in this war was brought home on Thursday. Paul Pardoel was a navigator with the RAF. As of this weekend, the American war dead number 1534. Back in Iraq, the war grinds on. No weapons of mass destruction, but daily discoveries of hidden ordinance must be dealt with. This youngster, the suspect in this case, will be taken here. The Tikrit version of Abu Ghraib prison, where, it's said, with dignity and respect he will be interrogated in these purpose-built rooms. Colonel, "dignity and respect", but you must be expecting this question — do you bash here?
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: No. Do I what?
RICHARD CARLETON: Bash.
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: As in beat a prisoner?
RICHARD CARLETON: Yes.
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: No, negative. We don't do that here.
RICHARD CARLETON: But given America's disgraceful treatment of prisoners of war, what would Colonel Martinez be saying that was different if they are still bashing?
COLONEL DAVID MARTINEZ: I would think that if something were happening at this facility that it would get out. Nowadays — this is what happened at Abu Ghraib — with the digital cameras that we have now, people do dumb things. They make dumb mistakes, and there's always someone watching, taking pictures, and somehow, some way — in a democratic society — it makes its way out. But at the end of the day, that's not done here.
RICHARD CARLETON: America says it will get out of Iraq as soon as these troops are ready to take their place. But has America the stomach to wait that long?
COLONEL TODD WOOD: If you take a look at our history, we've been in Korea for a long time. We're still there. We had occupational forces in Japan for more than 20 years. So we have, as a nation, we've got the kind of fortitude to see it through.
RICHARD CARLETON: Maybe, and, at the same time, drag Australia deeper and deeper into this quagmire? How in hell are we ever going to get out of here?