t r u t h o u t | Updated-Report
Monitoring the Assault on Iraq
(This page will be up-dated often)
Wednesday 26 March 2003
12:15.am.pdt.usa
For a second straight day sandstorms are predicted to slow the US advance on Baghdad. While US military might continues to prove too much for Iraqi forces in direct confrontation the conflict nonetheless seems to descend into a morass. The US is calling for reinforcements from stateside and a quick end is nowhere in sight. The danger to Iraqi civilians becomes greater as the invading armies push towards the major population centers. The UN has called for immediate action to provide aid to civilians. The US and UK say they are concerned, but at present their invasion appears to thwart relief. | Marc Ash -- TO
6:10 p.m.est.usa
CNN is reporting on what they describe as the largest battle of the war taking place near Karbala. American forces are engaged in this fight with little or no air cover due to a large sandstorm. Eleswhere, some 650 Iraqi expatriates have left Jordan to fight against American forces in Iraq. Meanwhile, Major Gen. Peter Wall, second in command of British troops, cannot confirm exactly what is happening with the so-called "uprising" in Basra. | William Rivers Pitt -- TO
10:09.am.pdt.usa
Fighting -- for the time -- has slowed substantially due to weather not favorable to offensive military actions, i.e. Sand Storms. The current position of the US-UK assault planers is that aid and relief can only be provided to areas that have been "liberated." For the time it appears that those areas that are under liberation-assault are the ones who need aid most urgently. Republican Guard units defending Baghdad had taken substantial air fire as part of a pre siege offensive. The extent to which those units can still operate effectively is an unknown. Iraqi military and para-military units are showing a willingness to take defensive positions in residential areas. Human rights groups fear that a US-UK assault might not spare the inhabitants of those residential areas in an attempt to engage Iraqi defenders and take Baghdad. | Marc Ash -- TO
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