Iraqi Pottery Barn

Tonight we, and most of the world waits for the begining of our assault on Fallujah. The soldiers are preparing for losses not seen since Vietnam, and all the plans have been drawn up and shared with those in charge. And maybe those on the other side, too:

A company commander of the Iraqi security forces who received a full briefing on the expected Falluja assault is missing from a military base where U.S. and Iraqi troops are preparing for the possible operation.

The captain, a Kurd with no known ties to the Sunni city of Falluja, is thought to have taken notes from the battle briefing late Thursday. U.S. Marines and his fellow Iraqi officers found no sign of him Friday morning, except for his uniform and a weapon on his cot.

Marines are concerned that the information he knows could be passed along to insurgents. U.S. military sources believe insurgents have friends in the military and government.

Meanwhile...

Insurgents set off at least two car bombs and attacked a police station Saturday in the central Iraqi town of Samarra, killing at least 29 people and wounding 40 in what could be an effort to take pressure off Fallujah, where U.S. forces are gearing up for an assault.

Elsewhere, 20 American soldiers were wounded in the Sunni Triangle city of Ramadi, the U.S. command said without elaborating. Residents of that insurgent stronghold, located 70 miles west of Baghdad, reported clashes and explosions throughout the day.

U.S. warplanes pounded Fallujah, the insurgents' strongest bastion, with their strongest bombardment in months Friday night and Saturday, residents said.

But as U.S. forces tried to soften up guerrillas in Fallujah, heavy fighting erupted in Samarra, a city 60 miles to the northeast that U.S. and Iraqi forces reclaimed from insurgents in September and had sought to use as a model for pacifying restive Sunni Muslim areas of the country.