-Caveat Lector- >>>This is cool! Now, instead of having just one group of Iraqi expatriots wanting to go back and change things, there'll now be several. The "Co- lishun" wants to put Chalabi the Crook back in there and one day they'll find a use for one of the other members of the groups. A<:>E<:>R <<<
The Washington Times www.washingtontimes.com http://www.washtimes.com/national/20030331-26329118.htm Kin of Saddam's aides fleeing Rowan Scarborough THE WASHINGTON TIMES Published March 31, 2003 Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said yesterday that family members of Saddam Hussein's closest aides are fleeing Iraq, and that the United States has not seen or heard the Iraqi leader and his two sons since the allies bombed a leadership bunker March 19. Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the allies will be "patient" in deciding when to attack the Republican Guard outside Baghdad. But he called "way off base" a press report that the Pentagon plans to wait 30 to 45 days to attack, as air strikes hit Iraqi tanks and artillery. "This is going to be a tough war, a tough slog yet," Gen. Myers said on NBC's "Meet the Press." "We have no plans for pauses or cease-fires or anything else," Mr. Rumsfeld told ABC's "This Week." U.S. warplanes, including a massive armada of long-range bombers, pounded leadership positions in Baghdad, igniting a fire that raged before dawn today at the Iraqi Information Ministry. The attacks targeted leadership and command and control centers in Baghdad and were carried out simultaneously by multiple B-1, B-2 and B-52 bombers, the U.S. Central Command said. Another series of massive explosions shook the Iraqi capital as dawn broke today, and the sound of aircraft was heard overhead. It was not immediately known what was hit. Mr. Rumsfeld said yesterday that the campaign has taken a heavy toll on the Iraqi leadership. "We know that there are people fleeing from the senior regime leadership's family. ... We haven't seen Saddam Hussein or his son in close to eight days." The allies sprung a surprise attack March 19 in the war's opening shot. The United States received intelligence that Saddam, his sons, Qusai and Uday, and other leaders were staying in a bunkered complex on Baghdad's southern fringe. Two Air Force F- 117A stealth fighters penetrated Iraqi airspace undetected, and each dropped two EGBU-27 "bunker buster" bombs on the compound. Six to 10 sea-launched cruise missiles then hit the compound. "They have seen an attack on their leadership and we have not seen their leadership since," Mr. Rumsfeld said on "Fox News Sunday." "All we know is that since then we have not seen Saddam Hussein or his sons live anywhere or heard any reports [of them] live." Mr. Rumsfeld dismissed videotapes of Saddam's broadcasts on Iraqi TV. "They don't look legitimate to me," he said. He said it was "interesting" that Saddam's personal bodyguard was seen at a weekend press conference standing behind Iraqi Defense Minister Sultan Hashem Ahmed. Intelligence officials believe the bodyguard provided security only to the dictator. "We're aware of it, and we find it interesting," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "It may be an indication that Saddam Hussein is not moving around much." Gen. Myers said there are "lots of rumors in Baghdad about where Saddam is, where his first wife is, and those sorts of things, where the sons are. These are good things, because there is doubt in a lot of their minds." Gen. Tommy Franks, who is running the war from a command center at Doha, Qatar, told reporters yesterday, "I have not seen credible evidence over the last period of days since we started this operation that this regime is being controlled by the top, as we understand the top." Mr. Rumsfeld said there are sites of weapons of mass destruction south of Baghdad and around Saddam's hometown of Tikrit that have not been inspected because they remain under Iraq's control. "The bulk of it is in the area south of Baghdad down near Karbala," he said, referring to the holy city 50 miles south of Baghdad where a major battle is brewing between the Republican Guard and the allies. "The bulk of the weapons of mass destruction activity and sites [are] south of Baghdad and north of Baghdad, up near Tikrit. We aren't there. That's the area we haven't arrived in yet. ... We know where they are." The Washington Times reported last week that U.S. officials have pinpointed a site they believe has chemical weapons, but that they had not gained access to it. Navy, Air Force and Army aircraft continue a relentless bombardment of Saddam's best troops, the Republican Guard. U.S. officials said yesterday that in the past 24 hours, the coalition had increased the daily number of air sorties from 1,000 to 1,800. About half those sorties were attack missions, and more than half of those were against the Guard. The air strikes have focused on the Guard's Medina division, which defends Baghdad's southern flank, as the U.S. Army's 5th Corps continued to move in the vicinity of Karbala in preparation for the war's first major land battle. The plan is to destroy tanks, armored personnel and artillery pieces from the air to the point where the division is no longer a cohesive fighting unit. That will enhance the ability of the 5th Corps., led by Lt. Gen. William Wallace, to destroy the division with the fewest casualties possible. A Pentagon official says the allies want to roughly cut the Medina division's strength in half using air strikes, and that the goal is nearing. The official said Gen. Wallace recently told Gen. Franks that his corps, led by the 3rd Infantry and 101st Airborne divisions, are ready to attack. "There is probably some modicum of command and control of the Republican Guard divisions," Gen. Myers said on CNN's "Late Edition" as he and Mr. Rumsfeld made the rounds on Sunday TV talk shows. "But I think the further away you go from Baghdad, that their ability to command and control their forces is probably degraded, and in some cases significantly." Commanders yesterday said that U.S. and British forces are slowly gaining control of the south from marauding Fedayeen Saddam fighters whom the Bush administration now calls "death squads" for their killing of Iraqi civilians and for their terrorist tactics. "They have undoubtedly killed more Iraqi people than have been killed in the war by the coalition," Mr. Rumsfeld said. The air war is increasingly targeting the band of Saddam loyalists who have ambushed and killed U.S. troops along a 200-mile supply line. On Friday, an Air Force F-15E bombed a meeting of 200 Fedayeen inside Basra, Iraq's second-largest city. As in other southern towns, the civilian- clothed, AK-47-armed Fedayeen in this city are forcing the regular army to fight and preventing civilians from getting food and water. The Air Force said yesterday that it took the battle against the Fedayeen to Baghdad by putting a satellite-guided bomb on the fighters' barracks in an eastern area of the city called Ar Rustamiyah. Major allied operations were in progress yesterday from Basra to near Baghdad. British armored troops and commandos secured a neighborhood outside Basra and killed scores of fleeing Fedayeen, who are bolstered by Republican Guard officers sent from the north. The Army's 101st Airborne, which on Friday launched a strike behind enemy lines against the Republican Guard, encircled the city of Najaf in central Iraq in another anti- Fedayeen operation. "This is our type of fight," said Command Sgt. Maj. Marvin Hill. "This is probably the most dangerous part of combat and that's urban. Sometimes you don't find out who the enemy is until they're shooting at you." Farther north, elements of the 3rd Infantry moved inside 50 miles from Baghdad. The allies are now operating out of six air bases in Iraq, including a strip at Tallil near Nasiriyah where A-10 tank-killers are launching missions. The Marines Task Force Tarawa seized more territory in Nasiriyah, the site of several deadly ambushes against U.S. troops, including one incident that killed nine Marines. Marines found 3,000 chemical-protection suits in the city last week. Yesterday, they found 300 more, plus atropine injectors and two chemical decontamination vehicles. U.S. Central Command said it represents evidence that the Iraqi military plans to use chemical weapons. A new wave of attackers may be headed to Iraq, posing another problem for allied forces fighting the Fedayeen. The Palestinian terrorist group Islamic Jihad, which sends suicide bombers to kill Israeli civilians, faxed a statement saying it was sending these killers to Baghdad. The 5th Corps has killed thousands of Fedayeen and other loyalists who attack their well-defended positions on foot or on trucks, armed with rifles and rocket-propelled grenades. Gen. Myers said coalition forces now control a former terrorist camp in Kurdish- controlled Iraq belonging to the group Ansar al-Islam, which has ties to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda terror network. The general said Ansar was working there to produce chemical weapons. Deadly ricin that showed up in the apartment of terror suspects in London is likely to have come from the compound. U.S. and British aircraft attacked the camp, employing AC- 130 gunships. • This article is based in part on wire service reports. Copyright © 2003 News World Communications, Inc. All rights reserved. Return to the article Forwarded for your information. 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