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Analysis: Republican Guard's last stand
UPI ^ | 4/1/03 | Martin Walker

Posted on 04/01/2003 9:40:01 AM PST by browardchad

KUWAIT CITY, April 1 (UPI) -- The war entered its decisive phase Tuesday as midday temperatures in central Iraq soared toward 100 degrees and U.S. forces advanced into Iraq's so-called Red Zone around Baghdad, where local commanders may have authority to use chemical weapons, coalition leaders say.

The best of Iraq's conventional forces, five Republican Guard divisions, have now been identified gathering south of Baghdad for what looks to be the decisive battle of the war. Coalition military intelligence sources add that a sixth RG Division, the al-Adnan, is also reported moving south from Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit to join them.

They are moving into a killing ground, the flood plain of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers south of Baghdad. It is a relatively confined battlefield where allied warplanes and combat helicopters now hover like predatory hawks to swoop on any target that shows itself. The clear weather conditions, and the coming of the heat of a desert summer, suggest that coalition commanders are pressing on to Baghdad without waiting for the expected reinforcement of the U.S. 4th Infantry Division.

Although no Iraqi chemical or biological weapons have yet been deployed or found, chemical alert and response units were close behind the forward U.S. troops Tuesday just in case. Large numbers of Iraqi gas masks and other protective gear have been found by advancing coalition forces, suggesting that Iraqi units are ready for chemical warfare.

The airstrikes against the dug-in RG units were backed up by the artillery from the U.S. 3rd Division, their shells now able range up to 10 miles from Baghdad itself. Units of the 3rd Division hooked around the key town of Karbala and established firing positions and pushed forward observation posts to bring direct fire only Iraqi defensive positions.

The 5 RG divisions are anchored on the Medina armored division, the strongest of all, which began the war with 20,000 troops and 270 of Iraq's most advanced Soviet-built T-72 tanks. They are outmatched by the U.S. M1-A1 Abrams tanks, which can pick them off at a distance while remaining out of rage of the T-72 guns -- if the visibility is clear enough.

Coalition spokesmen said Tuesday they believed the Medina division had lost up to a third of its force, and was reduced to filling its ranks with makeshift recruits rounded up from nearby villages. The remnants of another RG battalion surrendered to U.S. troops Tuesday, after days of battering from the air.

Two of the other RG divisions south of Baghdad, the Hamurabi and the Al-Nida, are armored units, but equipped with 1960s vintage T-62 tanks, and thought to number not much more than 10,000 troops each. The Baghdad mechanized infantry division, already worn down by a series of defensive battles against advancing U.S. Marines in the south, has been reinforced by the Nebuchadnezzar RG division which was brought down from Tikrit over the last week.

The objective of coalition commanders is to destroy these RG divisions where they stand, rather than let them fall back into Baghdad to stiffen the city's defenses. Once inside the city, where they can take cover from coalition air power, they could be a much more difficult to tackle than they are now on the relatively open ground south of Baghdad.

Coalition military sources said the advances upon Baghdad, and first ground war clashes with the Republican Guard, decisively refuted the media suggestions over the weekend of a pause in operations. They dismissed suggestions of a "race for Baghdad" between the two prongs of the U.S. advance, the Marines from the south and the 3rd Infantry Division from the southwest, noting one of the key breakthroughs to the town of Hindiya was achieved by the 101st Airborne.

"The 101st sent small reconnaissance teams by helicopter deep into Iraqi lines, where they spotted and targeted Iraqi positions and then called in artillery and air strikes," a military source in Kuwait told United Press International. "So when the main assault went in, the Iraqis had very little left to stop it."

The capture Monday of the bridge over the Euphrates at Hindiya means that the two advancing U.S. columns can now communicate directly, and coalition commanders can use it to seize tactical opportunities and push reinforcements from one front to the other.

Meanwhile in southern Iraq, British troops took the final bridge around Basra, virtually sealing off the city except for a small land route up the eastern bank of the Tigris. The British are still deliberately holding back from a full-scale assault on the city, but nibbling at its edges and raiding and bombing the buildings from which Saddam Hussein's loyalists try to maintain their grip on the city.

British Marines stepped up their patrols around Basra after two Iraqi Seersucker missiles, Russian-based projectiles modified from anti-ship missiles, were fired overnight. One landed close to the British prisoner of war camp outside Umm Qasr, where over 3,000 Iraqi prisoners are held. The other stuck close to a site previously occupied by the headquarters of the Royal Marine Commandos.

A missile related to the Seersucker, the Silkworm, hit a Kuwait City shopping mall over the weekend. No casualties were reported from the explosion, which occurred in the early hours of Sunday morning.



TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: baghdad; baghdaddefense; iraq; iraqifreedom; laststand; republicanguard; war
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To: browardchad; hchutch
What do Saddam Hussein and George Armstrong Custer have in common?

Neither one had any idea where the fatal Tomahawk came from :o)
21 posted on 04/01/2003 10:16:42 AM PST by Poohbah (Crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women!)
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To: BlueLancer
If they try to counter attack it's going to be like Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg. Knee deep in blood.

Hair, teeth, and eyeballs
22 posted on 04/01/2003 10:16:58 AM PST by johnb838 (Understand the root causes of American anger)
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To: Wright is right!
The RG vehicles don't have rear-view mirrors.

Good thing, eh?

23 posted on 04/01/2003 10:17:26 AM PST by Jim Noble
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To: Stentor
My favorite Major Bobism was that the "operational pause" was like a butcher sharpening his knife before starting work. Even the Fox crew got quiet.

I heard it too and had to grin.

Let's start the chant: MOAB-MOAB-MOAB-MOAB-MOAB...

24 posted on 04/01/2003 10:18:17 AM PST by trebb
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To: Kozak
They left out "Elite" from the title.

I think the Republican Guard's stock has just been downgraded from "elite" to "endangered."

25 posted on 04/01/2003 10:19:57 AM PST by browardchad
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To: browardchad
So far, all the maps I have seen on television and online, show the 82nd Airborne still largely in Kuwait. What if they are secretly in the Western Desert of Iraq, and will be part of the northern force that will come down and drive through the weakened Iraqi defenses, to take Baghdad while the bulk of the RG divisions have deployed to the south, in repsonse to the 101, and the Marines? This may be another "Hail Mary" kind of operation, that we will only fully perceive after the fact?
26 posted on 04/01/2003 10:20:58 AM PST by Richard Axtell
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To: johnb838
"If they try to counter attack it's going to be like Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg. Knee deep in blood."

Or even worse ... Fredericksburg ...
Or Franklin/Nashville.

27 posted on 04/01/2003 10:21:15 AM PST by BlueLancer (Der Elite Møøsenspåånkængruppen ØberKømmååndø (EMØØK))
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To: aegiscg47
But what else can they do if their present forces in the south are inadequate? It's Hobson's choice.
28 posted on 04/01/2003 10:21:58 AM PST by expatpat
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To: Thebaddog
Man, they are doing things for us. GOOD!
29 posted on 04/01/2003 10:22:27 AM PST by madison46
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To: Richard Axtell
What if they are secretly in the Western Desert of Iraq, and will be part of the northern force that will come down and drive through the weakened Iraqi defenses

Quite a few people on FR think there's something in the Western desert of Iraq -- time will tell.

30 posted on 04/01/2003 10:24:04 AM PST by browardchad
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To: aegiscg47
"Replacing wiped out units with units from the North of the city only to have them destroyed in turn is great strategy. Haven't seen this kind of military genius since France in 1940"

Speaking of which, France's 6 million strong army (800,000 of them were on leave when Hitler attacked) managed to lose their entire country from the first day of the German invasion (May 10, 1940) to June 20, 1940.

Which brings up the obvious question: will Hussein last longer against 100,000 U.S./UK troops than France's 6 million versus the 102 Wehrmacht divisions of 1940?

31 posted on 04/01/2003 10:26:14 AM PST by Southack (Media bias means that Castro won't be punished for Cuban war crimes against Black Angolans in Africa)
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To: browardchad
A good read.
32 posted on 04/01/2003 10:26:34 AM PST by ChadGore (288,007,154 Americans did not protest the war today)
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To: browardchad
"...Red Zone around Baghdad, where local commanders may have authority to use chemical weapons..."

Seems like we should be making it clear that any Iraqi unit using chemical weapons WILL NOT BE PERMITTED to surrender!

That might give the occasional rational person something to think about...

33 posted on 04/01/2003 10:30:59 AM PST by Redbob
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To: BlueLancer
"The settlers get to shoot from behind the rocks and trees, and wear any color they want. The British have to wear red, and march in a stright line."
34 posted on 04/01/2003 10:32:11 AM PST by El Sordo
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To: Wright is right!
Methinks we have a few aces up our sleeves. We MUST, MUST, MUST not allow this to become a battle in the streets of Baghdad. We are going to do whatever necessary to avoid that. And let's have those 4,000 jihadi's from Syria, Lebanon, etc, join the RG in hell.
35 posted on 04/01/2003 10:33:12 AM PST by Trust but Verify
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
"You mean this 'elite' force won't last a week?

Who 'da thunkit?"

Ah, maybe that's "elite" with respect to the rest of the camel dung around there!

36 posted on 04/01/2003 10:33:31 AM PST by Redbob
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To: shotgun
"...our tanks also have and would rather use thermal imaging."

I'm guessing that a more important advantage is our computerized fire-control systems permitting our tanks to shoot "on the run" while a T-72 must stop to aim in order to have any chance at all of hitting its' target.

37 posted on 04/01/2003 10:35:51 AM PST by Redbob
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To: Redbob
Seems like we should be making it clear that any Iraqi unit using chemical weapons WILL NOT BE PERMITTED to surrender!

I doubt that they'll have the opportunity.

38 posted on 04/01/2003 10:39:35 AM PST by browardchad
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To: browardchad
a sixth RG Division, the al-Adnan, is also reported moving south from Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit to join them.

I wonder how they are getting there, without being blasted from the air? Who knows, maybe they are being blasted.

39 posted on 04/01/2003 10:41:45 AM PST by Mark17
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To: El Sordo; aegiscg47
"How long can you tread water?"
40 posted on 04/01/2003 10:45:20 AM PST by BlueLancer (Der Elite Møøsenspåånkængruppen ØberKømmååndø (EMØØK))
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