Uprising in Iraq [Archive] - Marine Corps

wrbones

03-25-03, 05:55 PM

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,82098,00.html

U.S. Troops Come Under Attack, Kill 150-500 Iraqis; Anti-Saddam Revolt Reported in Basra

Tuesday, March 25, 2003

Between 150 and 500 Iraqi troops were killed Tuesday by U.S. Army forces during a ferocious battle near An Najaf, in central Iraq, a senior Defense official said.

• Map: The War in Iraq

The official said the American troops had come under attack. No U.S. casualties were immediately reported.

Elements of the 7th Cavalry Regiment were east of An Najaf when they suddenly came under fire from rocket-propelled grenades, the official said. The Iraqis were on foot; it wasn’t clear whether they were from regular army units, paramilitary forces or the Republican Guard.

Some of the 7th Cavalry's equipment was damaged in the attack, according to the Defense official. Early estimates of the number of Iraqis killed in the fight varied widely, from 150 to 500. It was not immediately clear what weaponry the Americans used.

The 7th Cavalry is part of the Army force driving toward Baghdad. Some elements of the force are farther north, near Karbala, with only the Medina armored division of the Republican Guard between them and Baghdad.

Earlier Tuesday, in what appeared to be a critical moment for coalition forces, thousands of Shiites in Basra began a popular uprising against Saddam Hussein's forces, according to a British pool journalist embedded with coalition troops.

Iraqi Fedayeen were reportedly firing at the Shiite protesters, who had the support of British troops in the area. Coalition forces, in turn, were reportedly firing missiles at the pro-Saddam forces.

Meanwhile, senior Defense officials told Fox News that intelligence reports indicated Iraqi forces — either special Republican Guard forces or Fedayeen Saddam terrorists — in and around Basra were dressing up as U.S. soldiers, then accepting the surrender of other Iraqi forces and executing them.

Britain's ITN news network reported that thousands of people were rampaging through the Basra streets. Dozens of buildings were on fire, according to ITN, as the predominantly Shiite population was in revolt against Saddam's minority Sunni rulers.

But there were few reliable details of the chaotic situation inside the southern city of Basra, Iraq's second-largest with 1.3 million residents.

"We've had reports we can't substantiate as of yet of an uprising in Basra. We are closely monitoring the situation," said U.S. Marine Maj. David C. Andersen.

A British spokesman said a top Baath Party official was captured outside the southern Iraqi city.

Coalition forces wanted the people of Basra to attack soldiers loyal to Saddam. British troops backed by tanks and armored vehicles were massing on the outskirts of Basra and planning to enter the city.

"We'll help them every which way we can," British spokesman Chris Vernon told a news conference in Kuwait. "We are helping them when we took out probably the most senior Baath party guy in Basra this morning. That will have sent a shock wave through them."

Anyone staging an uprising has "a lot of courage" since Saddam's supporters are terrorizing his people in Basra, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Tuesday.

The British contingent at U.S. Central Command late Tuesday afternoon announced the deaths of two soldiers of the Queens Royal Lancers, part of the First Royal Regiment of the Fusiliers Battle Group. The soldiers were killed in the friendly fire incident when two British Challenger tanks shot at each other while engaging enemy forces outside Basra.

Meanwhile, sandstorms slowed coalition forces to a crawl and thwarted air missions as U.S.-led forces edged within 50 miles of Baghdad.

"It's a little bit ugly out there today," with wind, sandstorms and rain, Air Force Major Gen. Victor E. Renuart Jr. said in a press briefing at U.S. Central Command in Qatar. "However, that hasn't stopped us."

Americans said that thus far, they had taken more than 3,500 Iraqi prisoners. There was no accurate death toll among Iraqi troops or civilians, though officials reported that about 500 Iraqi fighters had been killed in the last two days by the 3rd Infantry Division.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said it has counted 14 dead and 110 injured since Sunday in airstrikes on Baghdad. It had no figures for other parts of the country. The Iraqi government reported 194 civilian deaths.

American losses ran to 20 dead and 14 captured or missing. The remains of the first two to die were flown overnight to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.

The tally of British troops killed in the war was 22.Two were killed by "friendly fire" from another British tank near Basra, officials said Tuesday. Two died when a U.S. Patriot missile shot their plane down earlier this week; two died in combat; and 14 died in a pair of helicopter accidents.

But the invasion of Baghdad was still on track, said Renuart Jr.

Despite adverse weather in some parts of Iraq, U.S.-led warplanes bombed targets in the northern part of the country and briefly knocked government television off the air in the capital. And U.S. troops in control of a vast Iraqi air base sealed 36 bunkers, earmarked as possible sites of Saddam's elusive weapons of mass destruction.

President Bush, speaking to military personnel at the Pentagon, said: "We cannot know the duration of this war, yet we know its outcome. We will prevail."

"The Iraq regime will be disarmed. The Iraq regime will be ended. The Iraq people will be free and our world will be more secure and peaceful," Bush said.

Rumsfeld said Iraqi resistance "has not affected coalition progress."

"The Iraqi regime is losing control of more of the country," Rumsfeld said at the Pentagon. The coalition "will not stop until that regime is driven from power … their fate is certain. All that's unclear is whether it will take days or weeks."

"Iraqi authorities know their days are numbered."

Not surprisingly, Saddam saw it differently. State television carried what it described as a message from him to tribal and clan leaders, saying, "Consider this to be the command of faith and jihad and fight them."

About 1,400 air sorties were expected to focus on Republican Guard units blocking the path to Baghdad on Tuesday. He added that coalition troops destroyed six GPS jammers — used to throw U.S. aircraft and bombs off course electronically — over the past two nights.

U.S. officials say Russian companies helped supply Iraq with these jammers.

The overall mission of Navy air power was changing to focus more on support for U.S. ground troops advancing on Baghdad, said Capt. Patrick Driscoll aboard the USS Kitty Hawk.

Combat missions from two aircraft carriers were called back because of bad weather, and at least a dozen planes returned without reaching Iraq. Two Army divisions were virtually stalled in a sandstorm.

Thousands of Marines took back roads toward Baghdad to avoid civilians, but traveled only about 20 miles in five hours.

Still, the Army's 3rd Infantry Division advanced toward Baghdad early Tuesday and pounded military installations.

U.S. air power, helicopters and artillery to "beat down those Republican Guard positions" before ground troops move ahead in the battle for Baghdad, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

"We've never said it's going to be quick, we've never said it's going to be easy, you've never heard those words come out of officials here at the Pentagon," Air Force Gen. Richard Myers said on ABC's Good Morning America Tuesday. "War is tough and it's going to be a tough fight. But it's a worthy fight."

But United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan and others have warned of a possible humanitarian crisis in the Baghdad. The International Red Cross said during the day that it had begun repairs at a war-damaged water-pumping station serving the city.

There was also growing worry at the Pentagon that Iraqi Republican Guard units will start using chemical weapons as coalition land forces approach Baghdad.

U.S. officials cited intelligence reports that Iraqi units may have been ordered to unleash chemical weapons, but they cautioned that reports of specific geographic tripwires, or "red lines" drawn up by Iraqi leadership, are premature.

The Iraqi Republican Guard controls the bulk of Iraq's chemical weaponry, most of which can be fired from artillery guns or short-range rocket launchers.

"I have no doubt that he would do such a thing," Secretary of State Colin Powell told Fox News on Monday. "We will follow this matter carefully."

Central Command said Tuesday that a U.S. F-16 fighter engaged a U.S. Patriot missile battery during combat air operations approximately 30 miles south of An-Najaf in Iraq on Monday. No soldiers were injured or killed. The incident was under review.

People in Baghdad dug more and bigger defensive trenches around the city, including the courtyard of the Iraq museum, home to priceless antiquities. Many more stores were open for business, and people were milling about.

Command Sgt. Maj. Kenneth Preston of V Corps said Tuesday that coalition forces ran into "a lot" of Iraqi tanks and anti-aircraft weaponry and "thousands and thousands" of weapons around the city of Najaf.