May 3 issue - The inaugural mission of the 1st
Cavalry's 2d Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment was, in its humble way, a bid for
hearts and minds. It was to safely dispose of Iraqi sewage. Having arrived in
Iraq in late March, a 19-man patrol from the battalion, traveling in four
Humvees, had just finished escorting three Iraqi "honey wagons" on
their rounds in the grim slum of Sadr City, where vendors stash eggs and
chickens in bamboo crates next to puddles of viscous black mud. ("You're
lucky if it's mud," joked one U.S. officer.) Suddenly the street became
"a 300-meter-long kill zone," recalls platoon leader Sgt. Shane
Aguero, courtesy of gunmen from the Mahdi militia of Shiite rebel Moqtada al-Sadr.
The Humvees swerved and ran onto sidewalks, rolling on the rims of flat tires,
as gunmen kept up the barrage of bullets. Sgt. Yihjyh (Eddie) Chen, gunner in
the lead vehicle, was shot dead. Another soldier was hit and began bleeding
from the mouth. As they'd been drilled to do, the soldiers set out to strip
the disabled vehicles of sensitive items and to "zee off the
radio"—to see that codes and equipment don't fall into enemy hands.
When another group got ambushed nearby, an enemy round came through the
Humvee's right rear door—through retrofitted panels that the soldiers had
been told would repel AK-47 rounds. Miraculously, none of the three people
inside were hit. Then a third Humvee sputtered to a halt: debris had pierced
the fuel tank. "It just wouldn't start; we coasted the last 50 yards out
of the kill zone," said its driver, Spc. Dee Foster. At last an armored
Bradley fighting vehicle arrived, and its steel ramp opened to scoop him and
his buddies to safety.

In continuing adherence to the Army's "light is
better" doctrine, even units recently rotated to Iraq have left most of
their armor behind. These include the I Marine Expeditionary Force, which has
paid dearly for that decision with an astonishing 30 percent-plus casualties
(45 killed, more than 300 wounded) in Fallujah and Ar Ramadi. The Army's 1st
Cavalry Division—which includes the unit in Sadr City—left five of every
six of its tanks at home, and five of every six Bradleys.

A breakdown of the casualty figures suggests that
many U.S. deaths and wounds in Iraq simply did not need to occur. According to
an unofficial study by a defense consultant that is now circulating through
the Army, of a total of 789 Coalition deaths as of April 15 (686 of them
Americans), 142 were killed by land mines or improvised explosive devices,
while 48 others died in rocket-propelled-grenade attacks. Almost all those
soldiers were killed while in unprotected vehicles, which means that perhaps
one in four of those killed in combat in Iraq might be alive if they had had
stronger armor around them, the study suggested. Thousands more who were
unprotected have suffered grievous wounds, such as the loss of limbs.

Maurizio Gambarini / EPA In harm's way: A U.S. Marine driving a bullet-riddled Humvee in Iraq in early April

Other quick fixes are being rushed in. In Ohio,
O'Gara-Hess and Eisenhardt Armoring Co. says it is flush with new orders to
crank out 300 "up-armored" Humvees per month. And Rumsfeld has just
approved a quiet plan to fly 28 M1A1 tanks from Germany into Iraq by April 27,
NEWSWEEK has learned. The move comes as the military is planning for a final
assault on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah. Meanwhile, soldiers are
rushing to jury-rig their Humvees with anything hard they can find: bolt-on
armor, sandbags, even plywood panels, creating what one senior officer calls
"Mad Max-mobiles." But Pentagon sources say many of the retrofitted
Humvees cannot take the extra weight, and their suspension or transmission
systems fail. Another method is to spray shock-absorbing polyurethane
foam—one popular brand name is called Rhino—to the inside or outside of
unarmored vehicles.

The need for more armor—and possibly
troops—erupted as an issue on Capitol Hill last week in combative hearings
of the Senate and House Armed Services committees. "We are not structured
for the security environment we're in," Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen.
Richard Myers told senators and congressmen, including some angry Republicans.
As part of his 2005 budget request, Rumsfeld had originally cut the Army
budget by 6 percent. But the Army has identified nearly $6 billion in unfunded
requests—and more are on the way. "The costs are going to be
staggering," says Sen. Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat who has
pestered the Pentagon for months for better estimates. Deputy Defense
Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told the House committee that military operations in
Iraq are now costing about $4.7 billion a month—a sum that approaches the $5
billion a month (on average) that the Vietnam War cost, adjusted for
inflation.

Sen. John McCain says the Pentagon needs an
additional division beyond the 20,000 men it is leaving in Iraq for 90-day
extensions. Another senator and Vietnam vet, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, even
suggested the nation might have to take a long-term look at reviving the
draft. Few others went that far, but one knowledgeable Army officer points out
that Rumsfeld's standing "stop-loss" order—basically a freeze on
retirements—is a "silent draft." It is not expected to be lifted
"for the foreseeable future," the officer said. On Capitol Hill,
Myers spoke of transforming old field-artillery and air-defense battalions
into new units. But the Pentagon has yet to come to grips with its armor
crisis—or its human cost.

With Babak Dehghanpisheh in Baghdad, Mark
Hosenball and Tamara Lipper in Washington and T. Trent Gegax in New York