Shaffer
04-09-03, 07:20 AM
The Marines, meanwhile, finished moving their 1st Division across the Diyala River into the eastern side of Baghdad, with some of them heading north to link up with the 3rd Infantry Division. Top Marine officers reported sporadic resistance -- fierce in some sections, nonexistent in others.
Other Marine units asserted control over the Rasheed air base, a secondary facility east of the city that could be used to bring in reinforcements and supplies, much as the 3rd Infantry Division is using Saddam International Airport to the west.
Mattis, the Marine commander, seemed generally untroubled by signs of looting in Baghdad. On the highway heading out of town to the southeast, gleeful Iraqis were riding a parade of large farm combines apparently taken from a business. In a onetime Republican Guard compound, buildings were ransacked and hundreds of pieces of old furniture had been dumped in the yard outside.
"You're in that kind of never-never land right now," Mattis said. Hussein's government is no longer in charge and "we're not in full control right now, so you're in that transition period."
Perkins, the 2nd Brigade commander whose troops fought off the counterattack this morning, said he planned to tighten the vise on remaining Iraqi fighters.
"We prefer that they just realize this thing is over and go home," he said. But he said that so far, "not many have surrendered; they fought to the death." The fighting in the capital since Monday "shows a difference in the level of commitment" here compared with that encountered by U.S. and British invasion forces in other cities, he said.
By consolidating its positions through southern Baghdad to the city center after pushing north Monday, the brigade now has "fairly secure" supply lines and can bring up ammunition, fuel, food and water, said Perkins, 44, of Keene, N.H.
Other Marine units asserted control over the Rasheed air base, a secondary facility east of the city that could be used to bring in reinforcements and supplies, much as the 3rd Infantry Division is using Saddam International Airport to the west.
Mattis, the Marine commander, seemed generally untroubled by signs of looting in Baghdad. On the highway heading out of town to the southeast, gleeful Iraqis were riding a parade of large farm combines apparently taken from a business. In a onetime Republican Guard compound, buildings were ransacked and hundreds of pieces of old furniture had been dumped in the yard outside.
"You're in that kind of never-never land right now," Mattis said. Hussein's government is no longer in charge and "we're not in full control right now, so you're in that transition period."
Perkins, the 2nd Brigade commander whose troops fought off the counterattack this morning, said he planned to tighten the vise on remaining Iraqi fighters.
"We prefer that they just realize this thing is over and go home," he said. But he said that so far, "not many have surrendered; they fought to the death." The fighting in the capital since Monday "shows a difference in the level of commitment" here compared with that encountered by U.S. and British invasion forces in other cities, he said.
By consolidating its positions through southern Baghdad to the city center after pushing north Monday, the brigade now has "fairly secure" supply lines and can bring up ammunition, fuel, food and water, said Perkins, 44, of Keene, N.H.