4th Infantry Scours Region for Hussein

Slicing through the Tigris River in a flat steel boat, 2nd Lt. Sharon Edens is officially searching for arms smugglers in the murky green waters around Saddam Hussein’s former palace compound here. But as she passes a series of sandstone mansions built by the deposed dictator, it’s hard not to think about catching the man himself.

Edens knows that if any military unit is going to nab Hussein, it’s likely to be hers, the Army’s 4th Infantry Division. Its 16,000 soldiers are spread throughout a large region north of Baghdad, including Hussein’s native Tikrit, where U.S. intelligence officials believe loyalists are helping him evade capture.

“You think about it, but you try to focus on the mission,” said Edens, 29, who has been leading some of the daily river patrols.

Although she knows it’s unlikely that she’ll find Hussein hiding in the high grass along the Tigris, Edens believes that her patrols -- along with scores of raids and searches in recent weeks -- are helping to tighten the noose around the former Iraqi leader.

U.S. officials believe that capturing or killing Hussein will cut the number of attacks directed at U.S. forces and those working with them.

The violence continued Tuesday afternoon, when a civilian contractor with Kellogg Brown & Root was killed as his vehicle ran over an explosive device north of Tikrit, a spokesman for the U.S. military said.

The man was in a convoy on a routine mail run from central to northern Iraq when his truck hit an antitank mine, according to his firm, a subsidiary of Halliburton, a Houston-based oilfield-services and construction company. The man’s name was withheld pending notification of his family.

A short time later, the 4th Infantry base in Tikrit was struck by mortar fire.

In the Fallouja area west of Baghdad, one soldier from the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment was wounded in a rocket-propelled-grenade attack, a military spokesman said.

Edens, 1st Platoon leader of the 502nd Engineers Battalion, is well aware that hostilities are on the rise.

Reports of drive-by shootings at the Tikrit base are growing, although most assailants miss their target, according to Master Sgt. Dave Johnson. Soldiers recently moved out of one riverfront palace after it was struck by a homemade bomb.

As Edens’ green patrol boat glided past several of Hussein’s former residences Tuesday, dozens of Iraqis splashed near the banks, seeking relief from the 118-degree heat.

Occasionally, Edens gave a tentative wave. Sometimes a small child waved back, but most of the people just stared. One boy threw a rock.

“When we first started, there were more waves,” Edens said. “Now there are less. I understand.”

Most of the division arrived in April, and the soldiers are eager to go home. Some hope that if Hussein is captured, the U.S. military presence can be scaled back.

Others express frustration with the focus on the search for Hussein and say that even if he is captured or killed, U.S. soldiers will be required to stay in Iraq to assist in the rebuilding.

“The search is a wild goose chase,” said one soldier, who asked not to be named. “Even if they do catch him in a raid, with Bush screaming about all these rebuilding projects, it won’t mean anyone’s going home.”

Maj. Josslyn Aberle, spokeswoman for the 4th Infantry, said Tuesday that recent intelligence reports suggested that U.S. forces have come within 24 hours of catching Hussein, although she added that a near-miss reported last week concerned Hussein’s new security advisor, not the former leader.

The division has been dispatching 3,000 to 4,000 soldiers every 24 hours on about 300 patrols and an average of 10 raids, some aimed at catching Hussein or his lieutenants and many based on tips from Iraqis.

On Monday night, the 4th Infantry detained nine suspects believed to have been mid-level officials in the former regime, including four with ties to the Fedayeen Saddam militia, Aberle said.

“Every time we pick up one of these mid-level managers, we are attacking the remnants of Saddam’s regime and denying him one more place to hide,” she said.

Prompted by a tip from an Iraqi who approached a soldier in Baqubah south of here, another raid this week netted five 60-millimeter mortar rounds, three AK-47s and a crate of ammunition, coalition officials said Tuesday. Five people were detained.

Some of the tips -- perhaps motivated by the $25-million reward for Hussein -- have turned out to be dead ends, leading one Army officer to characterize them as “Elvis sightings.”

Still, media organizations are optimistic that capture is close. Fifty-three journalists from around the world are “embedded” with 4th Infantry troops, hoping to be part of the raid that catches Hussein. That’s the largest contingent of reporters traveling with the division since the start of the war.

“I don’t know who wants to catch Saddam more, us or the media,” Aberle said. “I’m betting on the media.”