Posted on 04/06/2003 9:56:11 AM PDT by HAL9000
BAGHDAD (AFP) - Around a dozen mortar shells landed Sunday in the Saadun area in the heart of Baghdad while rocket fire was heard downtown for the first time in the war, AFP reporters said.There was no immediate indication who fired the mortars or whether there were casualties from the shelling, which hit the busy commercial area near a hotel where most foreign journalists are staying.
The bombardment came at around the same time multiple rocket fire was heard in the Iraqi capital for the first time since US and British forces attacked Iraq on March 20 and launched a drive for Baghdad to oust President Saddam Hussein.
The blasts sounded similar to Katyusha rockets, which can be fired from small trucks. Katyushas have a range of around six kilometers (four miles). US forces also possess multiple rocket launchers.
Shortly beforehand, anti-aircraft gunners swung into action against war planes swooping over the capital.
The aircraft, which were invisible to the naked eye, roared overhead repeatedly during the day.
In the early afternoon, the capital came under heavy bombing of which the echoes were heard in the heart of the capital by AFP journalists.
The raids were so powerful they set off alarms of cars parked in the city center.
A US officer said Sunday that the US Army's 3rd Infantry Division now controlled the outer western side of Baghdad after destroying another Iraqi tank unit while the Marines were pushing towards the city from east of the Tigris river.
Maybe they're zeroing in on Saddam's ultimate corps d'elite: Arnett and Fisk
While we do use 4.2" mortars, they are not an inherently accurate weapon and therefore not the weapon of choice in a situation like Baghdad.
If they're not doing so already, the dead-enders will begin turn on each other. For these animals, it's the survival of the fittest, now.
We may also be having an inter-branch disagreement: sounds like you were infantry, I was an artilleryman. It's been 25 years since I spent a lot of time with the firing tables but I seem to remember that the 4.2 RPEs and DPEs were greater than the 105 and 155. 175, of course had very small DPE and huge RPE, being a gun, not a howitzer or gun/howitzer. And as for the 8" howizter (203mm), I've seen batteries at Sill put inert 8" rounds through holes the size of the windows of the blockhouse on Signal Mountain.
I suppose if you're really close, the 4.2 would be handier than a 155, but IIRC, the biggest problem with 4.2s was that they are almost never as accurately located as the artillery. That may have changed now with GPS, but we always had our batteries surveyed in, and the infantry with the 4.2s were sticking pins in a map and guessing.
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