U.S. jets bomb Basra paramilitary meeting (200 Paramilitary Dead?)

Reuters | 3/29/03

[kattracks]

U.S. jets bomb Basra paramilitary meeting

AS SAYLIYA CAMP, Qatar, March 29 (Reuters) - U.S. warplanes have used laser-guided bombs to destroy a building in the southern Iraqi city of Basra where some 200 paramilitary members were meeting, U.S. Central Command said on Saturday.

A spokesman at Central Command's battle headquarters said early reports indicated that "no one came out" of the shattered two-story structure.

The spokesman said the bombing was part of the campaign to take Basra, Iraq's second largest city, from forces loyal to President Saddam Hussein.

Iraqi forces have prevented U.S.-led forces from seizing control of Basra, although British officials say there have been signs of civilian unrest inside the city. British troops say they control the city surroundings, but have not yet moved in.

Central Command said in a statement that two F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jets dropped bombs on the paramilitary meeting, terming it "an emerging target."

The bombs used in the night-time attack had a delayed fuse so they penetrate the building before exploding, minimizing damage to the surrounding area, including a church, the statement said.

03/28/03 22:11 ET

[Torie]

Christians used to be 10% of the population in Iraq 20 years ago. (Large numbers of them now live in Dearborn, Michigan among other places.) It is down to 1.5% now which still adds up to about 250,000 folks or so. Aziz is or was Christian, albeit a wayward one.

[WRhine]

This happened because a couple of SF or SAS fellows saw it happening in the middle of Dodge. They called in a couple of loitering Strike Eagles. The rest is history.

That is probably how it came down. Our enemy can run, and make taunts but they can't hide...not from our guys.

[2Jedismom]

I'll say! I did not know that! Thank you!

[Kevin Curry]

A church??? Are there Christians in Iraq??

There are. In fact there is some speculation that the Pope speaks softly if at all about Saddam but never wastes an opportunity to excoriate Bush and Blair is that he is trying to keep Saddam and his thugs from turning their wrath on Iraqi Christians.

[Torie]

I guess maybe they don't get American television or something. I am still skeptical, but I hope we got lucky.

[AGreatPer]

Don't know where to post this comment so will do it here.

I am shocked at Syria providing supplies. Sure thought it would be Iran. Hey, what do i know anymore.

[Husker24]

Yes, Tarik Azzize(or however the hell its spelled) is/was a Christian.

[Mad_Tom_Rackham]

Knowing the way the media has been reporting things, the number of Ba'athists will drop from 200 to 100 to 50 to 20.

200 to 100 to 50 to 20 to 50 women blown to pieces while buying food for their poor starving children.

[veronica]

Fox reporting Reuters office nearby damaged.

[Malsua]

two words.

Die Douchebag

[jern]

U.S. warplanes strike gathering of 200 Saddam paramilitaries in Basra
18 minutes ago

By NICOLE WINFIELD, Associated Press Writer

CAMP AS SAYLIYAH, Qatar - U.S. warplanes destroyed a two-story building in the besieged Iraqi city of Basra where some 200 Iraqi paramilitary fighters were believed to be meeting Friday, the U.S. military said.



There was no immediate word on casualties from the attack by a pair of F-15E Strike Eagles, targeting units loyal to Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) that British officials say have clamped down on a restive population in Basra.


Earlier Friday, the paramilitaries — known as "Saddam's Fedayeen" — fired mortars and machine guns on about 1,000 Iraqi civilians trying to leave Basra, forcing some to retreat back to the southern city, British military officials and witnesses said.


British forces surround the city — Iraq (news - web sites)'s second-largest, with a population of 1.3 million — and want to open the way for badly needed humanitarian aid. But they have yet to move in, facing what would likely by tough street-by-street resistance from the militiamen.


In London, British defense officials said Saturday that a British soldier was missing and believed killed after armored vehicles came under attack in a possible "friendly fire" incident near Basra. Four other soldiers were injured.


The Ministry of Defense said it was investigating reports the soldiers — members of the Household Cavalry Regiment — had been fired on by U.S. warplanes during fighting Friday.


British and American military officials at Central Command in Doha, Qatar, also said they were investigating the incident.


In Friday night's airstrike, the two warplanes fired laser-guided munitions fitted with delayed fuses — meaning they penetrated the building before detonating to minimize the external blast effect. The Central Command statement said a church 300 meters (yards) from the two-story building was undamaged.


The statement did not say how it was known that 200 paramilitaries were holding a meeting.


British military spokesman Col. Chris Vernon said Friday that British forces are "nowhere near" capturing the city.


Basra was "clearly nowhere near yet in our hands," Vernon told Britain's Sky News television. "We have no way at the moment of getting humanitarian aid into Basra."


He said coalition forces have underestimated the level of resistance by loyalist forces and paramilitaries and said Basra's civilians need to be convinced that coalition forces will support them if they revolt against Saddam.


Significant numbers of civilians have reportedly been coming out of Basra every day for the past few days to get food aid from points outside the city and then returning, a senior British defense official said.


More civilians tried to leave Friday, but Iraqi paramilitary forces opened fire on them to block them from leaving, the official said on condition of anonymity.


An initial group of about 1,000 people made it out safely, fleeing to the west of Basra, said Lt. Cmdr. Emma Thomas, a spokeswoman for British forces in the Persian Gulf.


She said the firing started when a second group of about the same size tried to flee the city.


British pool reports described Iraqi forces with mortars mounted in pickup trucks firing on the fleeing civilians. Panicked women and children scattered on a bridge over a canal and down its embankments to avoid machine-gun fire, the reports said.





One Iraqi woman badly wounded by shrapnel was carried into a British vehicle that whisked her off for treatment.

"Here perhaps are the first pieces of evidence of Iraqi people trying to break free from the Baath party regime and the militia," Vernon, the British military spokesman, told Sky News. "And clearly the militia don't want that. They want to keep their population in there, and they fired on them to force them back in."

British troops in the town of Zubayr, near Basra, took over a children's health center that apparently had been converted into an armory by the Iraqi militia and Saddam's Baath Party, according to a reporter with The Scotsman who was with the Black Watch forces.

A 30mm anti-aircraft gun was perched on the roof and boxes of children's medicines were discovered next to rooms packed with rocket propelled grenades, AK47 rifles and thousands of rounds of ammunition, the news report said.

[Mad_Tom_Rackham]

[The bombs used in the night-time attack.]

Isn't that cheating?

The French will be outraged. We didn't even give them a chance to surrender.

[the_doc]

Skeptical of what? That we actually got them?

I don't see why not. We obviously have agents in Basra--just as we have them in Baghdad. Our agents found out the Fedayeen's meeting place and called us with the GPS coordinates. A relatively few minutes later we blew it to pieces.

That's the way we do things nowadays. It's why the Pentagon says we are roughly ten times as powerful now as in 1991.

[Mad_Tom_Rackham]

Personally, I'm looking forward to see the the Iraqi's are going to have a briefing tonight after we bombed the information ministry! LOL

The bombing of the Information Ministry is certainly new information.

[MississippiMan]

I find it hard to believe that two hundred perps would be so stupid as to all gather in one building, particularly in Basra.

Normally I'd agree but the Iraqi military has a history of really dumb moves. BTW, whatever happened with that 1000-vehicle convoy heading south from Baghdad? Heard about it constantly for a day, then nothing.

MM

[the_doc]

Also, keep in mind that the Fedayeen do not have a long history of understandable paranoia like Saddam. They would not be as careful about their meetings as he would be.

That's what really doomed them.

[Jmann]

Propaganda and misinformation are wonderful things.

In times like these, who knows what to believe?

FOX, CNN, MSNBC.

Tools of the left, or of the right?

Personally, I feel we are being jerked, yanked, misinformed, manipulated, and whitewashed.

Although I wasn't born there, you could say I'm from Missouri.

[Teetop]

True, but how are they going to "spin" it into us not bombing the building though? LOL Boiler explosion? LOL

[Calamari]

They might be running low on virgins by now.

[Frank_2001]

Delayed fuse gives 'em just enough time to turn around and say "What the F-"KABOOM!:) Have fun with your virgins, scumbags!