Posted on 04/08/2003 9:55:33 AM PDT by HAL9000
BAGHDAD (AFP) - More than 100 children held in a prison celebrated their freedom Tuesday as US marines rolled into northeast Baghdad amid chaotic scenes which saw civilians loot weapons from an army compound, a US officer said.Around 150 children spilled out of the jail after the gates were opened as a US military Humvee vehicle approached, Lieutenant Colonel Fred Padilla told an AFP correspondent travelling with the Marines 5th Regiment.
"Hundreds of kids were swarming us and kissing us," Padilla said.
"There were parents running up, so happy to have their kids back."
"The children had been imprisoned because they had not joined the youth branch of the Baath party," he alleged. "Some of these kids had been in there for five years."
The children, who were wearing threadbare clothes and looked under-nourished, walked on the streets crossing their hands as if to mimic handcuffs, before giving the thumbs up sign and shouting their thanks.
It was not clear who had opened the doors of the prison.
Civilians also took advantage of the collapse of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's authority to grab weapons from an army base, said Group Sergeant Jeff Treiber.
As marines were alerted by radio that civilians had seized weapons, Treiber warned that anyone seen to be armed could be a target of US-British coalition forces.
"With the weapons they are becoming combatants," said Treiber. "If they don't take the weapons they will be fine."
Other residents stole air conditioning units, television sets and furniture from government buildings in an echo of the looting that was seen in the southern city of Basra.
A 19-year-old called Haider said people had been ransacking government compounds since the morning to steal weapons and furniture.
"Since the morning, nine o'clock, they have been looting. They are stealing weapons and I took three doors," he said.
At one stage the marines opened fire after coming under attack from snipers, leaving at least two civilians wounded.
One man needed treatment for gunshot wounds to his stomach and left arm.
But his friend, Abdul Amir Jaffa, said he did not resent the Americans despite the shooting.
"Americans are coming to free us," he told AFP.
The marines became increasingly edgy as crowds of people took to the streets to observe their progress.
"It's a problem with so many people in the area. Its hard to tell if there are enemy forces among them. You have to be careful returning fire with civilians all over the place," Lieutenant Anthony Sousa said.
Troops from the Marines' 1st Expeditionary Force also entered Baghdad on the east of the city Tuesday as thousands of armoured vehicles and Humvees poured into the capital for a showdown with Saddam Hussein's troops.
First Michael Moore wants to take away our guns, now he wants to jail children . . . .
The "watchers" must be desperately trying to leave Iraq now, because they know their lives won't be worth a fart in the very near future. The people must have some idea as to who the "watchers" are.
So they could be transformed by prison life into feral psychopaths -- Sadaam was looking ahead to the time when he would need a next-generation of thugs and enforcers
THAT struck me funny! LOL!
I think the concern is that WE don't always know who is who.
Or they're doing some serious backpedaling because they are worried that we are going to find out just how deeply "embedded" France was with Saddam and they're trying to cover their butts now.
.
For someone that seems to be reasonably intelligent and somewhat well educated, you aren't very bright.
Did you write a report, at the time you were doing inspections in Votkinsk in the Soviet Union in 1988 that said the group your wife worked for was full of spies?
No. I indicated that given past models of Soviet penetration techniques that these young girls, of which my wife was one, who were brought in by the Soviets to carry out translation services had been used in the past to attempt sexual compromise. I subsequently wrote a series of reports that said this did not appear to be the case in Votkinsk. In fact, because of the human intelligence work I did in the Soviet Union I was able to ascertain that the girls were actually dissatisfied with the Soviets. They showed a tendency to speak out against the KGB to the U.S. inspectors.
I suspect the reason for Ritter's sudden aboutface was that he was in fact compromised by the Soviets through these women and maybe even his wife. With Saddam giving him $400,000 and the Soviets (now Russia) having compromising videos, it is easy to see how Scotty may have had a change of heart.
Uh, oh! This is likely to get the NPR folks's knickers in a twist!
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