wrbones
04-11-03, 07:33 AM
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,83845,00.html
Mosul Falls, Leaving Tikrit as Final Key City
Friday, April 11, 2003
BAGHDAD, Iraq — As opposition forces collapsed and U.S. and Kurdish troops seized the oil-rich city of Kirkuk in the north Thursday, the trend continued in Mosul as Iraqi forces abandoned the city early Friday.
Iraqi troops in Mosul -- the largest city northern Iraq -- showed little to no resistance as the allies moved in, and military leaders planned to meet with representatives to negotiate a surrender. U.S. Central Command announced Friday that the entire 5th Corps of the Iraqi army had surrendered at Mosul, and agreed to a cease-fire.
As in other cities abandoned by Saddam Hussein's forces, looting and celebrations spread quickly through Mosul; some people grabbed wads of bills from the Central Bank. The collapse of the faltering regime's defense lines left the north-central city of Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, as the one likely site for a last stand.
In Baghdad, where regime control collapsed on Wednesday, U.S. troops were trying to curb looting that continued unabated for a third straight day. In parts of the capital, Marines were starting to enforce a dusk-to-dawn curfew.
• Maps: Iraq | Baghdad
"Tell the Americans to stop the killing and the looting," pleaded one Baghdad woman, Jabryah Aziz, 41. "We can't live like this much longer, with Muslims looting other Muslims."
Striking anew at the regime leadership, coalition warplanes dropped six satellite-guided bombs on a building where Saddam's half brother, Barzan Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti, a close adviser, was believed to be.
Al-Takriti, a former head of the secret police, was a close adviser to Saddam and allegedly helped hide millions of dollars abroad while serving as ambassador to Switzerland.
U.S. commanders said they were still assessing damage and casualties from the strike.
In a tragic incident, Reuters reported on Friday that Marines had mistakenly killed two children at a Nasiriyah checkpoint.
In northern Iraq, small numbers of American and Kurdish soldiers entered Mosul, encountering no resistance and a warm welcome from civilians. Lt. Col. Robert Waltemeyer, commander of a U.S. special forces unit north of Mosul, said American officers would meet with municipal leaders to establish secure zones.
A commander of the Americans' Kurdish allies, Gen. Babakir Zibari, said Iraqi army officers and remnants of Saddam's Baath Party in Mosul had offered to surrender on condition that bombing stops and they be granted amnesty.
The advance on Mosul came a day after the fall of Kirkuk, the other major city in the north. Both cities have economic links to nearby oil fields that have been secured virtually intact.
Nearly 100 miles to the north of Baghdad lies Tikrit, where Iraqi defenders were believed to have regrouped from other parts of the country. U.S. commandos were in the region, and warplanes were attacking, softening the battlefield for what may be the finale of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
U.S.-led fighters and bombers also hit Iraqi positions near the border with Syria, where special forces were trying to prevent regime loyalists from slipping out of Iraq and to keep foreign fighters from entering.
Possible Evidence of Weapons of Mass Destruction
Fox News' Rick Leventhal reported that the Marines he is embedded with -- the 2nd Battalion, 23rd Marines -- may have found a mobile biological weapons lab around Baghdad.
The Marines ordered a vehicle that appeared to be a refrigerator truck to stop at a construction site. When the truck did not stop, troops opened fire on it, and the driver jumped out and fled.
Investigators looked inside and saw what looked like a surface-to-air radar vehicle. But hidden inside fake side panels were an electronic pulley system, open jars and containers, a winch and hooks meant to move apparatus for rinsing and cooling substances without manual help.
Marines said the truck fit the description of a mobile bioweapons lab, and they planned to conduct further tests on the vehicle.
In addition, U.S. Marines may have found weapons-grade plutonium in a massive underground facility discovered beneath Iraq's Al Tuwaitha nuclear complex.
Coalition forces were investigating radioactive material found at the site, embedded reporter Carl Prine of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review told Fox News. The complex is operated by the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission and is located south of Baghdad's suburbs.
Two preliminary tests suggested the material may be weapons-grade plutonium, but officials said further testing is necessary before that can be confirmed.
Chaos After the Fall
There were signs of difficulties ahead in efforts at building a new society.
Two Islamic clerics were hacked to death by a mob in Najaf at one of Shiite Islam's holiest shrines, witnesses said.
One of the slain clerics, Haider al-Kadar, was a widely hated loyalist of Saddam who served in the Ministry of Religion. The other was Abdul Majid al-Khoei, whose father was a prominent Shiite spiritual leader persecuted by Saddam. They were killed at a meeting meant to serve as a model for reconciliation in post-Saddam Iraq.
Reconciliation will be one of many challenges for the interim government which the coalition plans to establish over the coming weeks.
Until that government is formed, the Pentagon envisions parallel ministries led by Americans and Iraqis, according to Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. He told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the oversight of public services such as health care and electricity would gradually shift from the U.S.-led ministries to the Iraqi ones.
Wolfowitz said the Bush administration will launch a "rolling dialogue" next week with Iraqi leaders. But he offered no details about how long it would take to form the interim government, or how many U.S. troops and civilians might stay in Iraq after the war.
A British official, Foreign Office Minister Mike O'Brien, suggested in a BBC television interview that an interim administration could be in place in 90 days, but added, "don't hold me to that."
Iraq's U.N. Ambassador Mohammed Al-Douri, the first Iraqi official to concede defeat, said Friday he was quitting his job and leaving New York. In an interview with Al-Arabiya, a Dubai-based satellite channel, he complained that U.S. forces in Iraq are "destroying, ravaging, killing."
Asked earlier if he intended to defect, Al-Douri replied, "There is no more Iraqi government to be defected from."
U.S. forces in Baghdad battled holdout fighters for hours Thursday near the al-Azimyah Palace and a nearby mosque and Baath party official's house.
U.S. officials said they had been tipped off that senior Baath party leaders were meeting in the area, and the Iraqis opened fire first.
Hours later, a suicide blast injured four Marines shortly after dark in downtown Baghdad. No further details were available.
Half a world away, the victim of an earlier suicide bombing was laid to rest in Arlington National Cemetery outside Washington. Capt. Russell B. Rippetoe, an Army ranger from Arvada, Colo., became the first soldier from the Iraqi conflict to be buried on the historic grounds.
Fox News' Bret Baier, Major Garrett, David Lee Miller, Teri Schultz, Eric Shawn and Liza Porteus and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Mosul Falls, Leaving Tikrit as Final Key City
Friday, April 11, 2003
BAGHDAD, Iraq — As opposition forces collapsed and U.S. and Kurdish troops seized the oil-rich city of Kirkuk in the north Thursday, the trend continued in Mosul as Iraqi forces abandoned the city early Friday.
Iraqi troops in Mosul -- the largest city northern Iraq -- showed little to no resistance as the allies moved in, and military leaders planned to meet with representatives to negotiate a surrender. U.S. Central Command announced Friday that the entire 5th Corps of the Iraqi army had surrendered at Mosul, and agreed to a cease-fire.
As in other cities abandoned by Saddam Hussein's forces, looting and celebrations spread quickly through Mosul; some people grabbed wads of bills from the Central Bank. The collapse of the faltering regime's defense lines left the north-central city of Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, as the one likely site for a last stand.
In Baghdad, where regime control collapsed on Wednesday, U.S. troops were trying to curb looting that continued unabated for a third straight day. In parts of the capital, Marines were starting to enforce a dusk-to-dawn curfew.
• Maps: Iraq | Baghdad
"Tell the Americans to stop the killing and the looting," pleaded one Baghdad woman, Jabryah Aziz, 41. "We can't live like this much longer, with Muslims looting other Muslims."
Striking anew at the regime leadership, coalition warplanes dropped six satellite-guided bombs on a building where Saddam's half brother, Barzan Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti, a close adviser, was believed to be.
Al-Takriti, a former head of the secret police, was a close adviser to Saddam and allegedly helped hide millions of dollars abroad while serving as ambassador to Switzerland.
U.S. commanders said they were still assessing damage and casualties from the strike.
In a tragic incident, Reuters reported on Friday that Marines had mistakenly killed two children at a Nasiriyah checkpoint.
In northern Iraq, small numbers of American and Kurdish soldiers entered Mosul, encountering no resistance and a warm welcome from civilians. Lt. Col. Robert Waltemeyer, commander of a U.S. special forces unit north of Mosul, said American officers would meet with municipal leaders to establish secure zones.
A commander of the Americans' Kurdish allies, Gen. Babakir Zibari, said Iraqi army officers and remnants of Saddam's Baath Party in Mosul had offered to surrender on condition that bombing stops and they be granted amnesty.
The advance on Mosul came a day after the fall of Kirkuk, the other major city in the north. Both cities have economic links to nearby oil fields that have been secured virtually intact.
Nearly 100 miles to the north of Baghdad lies Tikrit, where Iraqi defenders were believed to have regrouped from other parts of the country. U.S. commandos were in the region, and warplanes were attacking, softening the battlefield for what may be the finale of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
U.S.-led fighters and bombers also hit Iraqi positions near the border with Syria, where special forces were trying to prevent regime loyalists from slipping out of Iraq and to keep foreign fighters from entering.
Possible Evidence of Weapons of Mass Destruction
Fox News' Rick Leventhal reported that the Marines he is embedded with -- the 2nd Battalion, 23rd Marines -- may have found a mobile biological weapons lab around Baghdad.
The Marines ordered a vehicle that appeared to be a refrigerator truck to stop at a construction site. When the truck did not stop, troops opened fire on it, and the driver jumped out and fled.
Investigators looked inside and saw what looked like a surface-to-air radar vehicle. But hidden inside fake side panels were an electronic pulley system, open jars and containers, a winch and hooks meant to move apparatus for rinsing and cooling substances without manual help.
Marines said the truck fit the description of a mobile bioweapons lab, and they planned to conduct further tests on the vehicle.
In addition, U.S. Marines may have found weapons-grade plutonium in a massive underground facility discovered beneath Iraq's Al Tuwaitha nuclear complex.
Coalition forces were investigating radioactive material found at the site, embedded reporter Carl Prine of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review told Fox News. The complex is operated by the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission and is located south of Baghdad's suburbs.
Two preliminary tests suggested the material may be weapons-grade plutonium, but officials said further testing is necessary before that can be confirmed.
Chaos After the Fall
There were signs of difficulties ahead in efforts at building a new society.
Two Islamic clerics were hacked to death by a mob in Najaf at one of Shiite Islam's holiest shrines, witnesses said.
One of the slain clerics, Haider al-Kadar, was a widely hated loyalist of Saddam who served in the Ministry of Religion. The other was Abdul Majid al-Khoei, whose father was a prominent Shiite spiritual leader persecuted by Saddam. They were killed at a meeting meant to serve as a model for reconciliation in post-Saddam Iraq.
Reconciliation will be one of many challenges for the interim government which the coalition plans to establish over the coming weeks.
Until that government is formed, the Pentagon envisions parallel ministries led by Americans and Iraqis, according to Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. He told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the oversight of public services such as health care and electricity would gradually shift from the U.S.-led ministries to the Iraqi ones.
Wolfowitz said the Bush administration will launch a "rolling dialogue" next week with Iraqi leaders. But he offered no details about how long it would take to form the interim government, or how many U.S. troops and civilians might stay in Iraq after the war.
A British official, Foreign Office Minister Mike O'Brien, suggested in a BBC television interview that an interim administration could be in place in 90 days, but added, "don't hold me to that."
Iraq's U.N. Ambassador Mohammed Al-Douri, the first Iraqi official to concede defeat, said Friday he was quitting his job and leaving New York. In an interview with Al-Arabiya, a Dubai-based satellite channel, he complained that U.S. forces in Iraq are "destroying, ravaging, killing."
Asked earlier if he intended to defect, Al-Douri replied, "There is no more Iraqi government to be defected from."
U.S. forces in Baghdad battled holdout fighters for hours Thursday near the al-Azimyah Palace and a nearby mosque and Baath party official's house.
U.S. officials said they had been tipped off that senior Baath party leaders were meeting in the area, and the Iraqis opened fire first.
Hours later, a suicide blast injured four Marines shortly after dark in downtown Baghdad. No further details were available.
Half a world away, the victim of an earlier suicide bombing was laid to rest in Arlington National Cemetery outside Washington. Capt. Russell B. Rippetoe, an Army ranger from Arvada, Colo., became the first soldier from the Iraqi conflict to be buried on the historic grounds.
Fox News' Bret Baier, Major Garrett, David Lee Miller, Teri Schultz, Eric Shawn and Liza Porteus and The Associated Press contributed to this report.