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Hundreds reported dead Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/afp/20030325/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_worldwrap&e=2http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/afp/20030325/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_worldwrap&e=2
Yahoo! News Tue, Mar 25, 2003
Mideast - AFP
Hundreds reported killed in desert battle; Britain says uprising in Basra
2 hours, 36 minutes ago
BAGHDAD (AFP) - US and Iraqi forces fought the biggest battle of the Iraq (news - web sites) war so far in sand storms south of Baghdad while the British military said Iraqi forces had fired on civilians in the city of Basra after an uprising against President Saddam Hussein (news - web sites).
A US Defense Department official said between 150 and 500 Iraqis were killed Tuesday near An Najaf, about 200 kilometers (120 miles) south of Baghdad.
The official said the US 7th Cavalry Regiment fought Iraqi infantry after coming under rocket propelled grenade fire.
He said there had been estimates of between 150 and 500 Iraqi dead but no reports of US casualties. There was no immediate word from the Iraqi side of a battle.
The US-British coalition also pounded the outskirts of the Iraqi capital with air strikes on the sixth day of the US-led war to topple and disarm Saddam in a bid to weaken his elite Republican Guard.
The US army was fewer than 100 kilometers (60 miles) from Baghdad but their advance was slowed by sand storms which dramatically reduced visibility.
The war spotlight moved to Basra after the British military said Saddam's forces had fired mortars on Iraqi civilians.
"Following a number of reports of insurrection in Basra, it has been confirmed in theatre that Iraqi forces have fired mortars against their own people," Britain's Defence Ministry said in a statement.
"These mortars and some artillery pieces have been destroyed by coalition forces," the statement said.
A British officer outside the city said: "We have seen a large crowd on the streets. The Iraqis are firing their own artillery at their own people. There will be carnage."
Major General Peter Wall, commander of British forces in the Gulf, said in Qatar that the rebellion seemed to be in its "infancy".
US Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) said he had heard reports of an uprising but had no confirmation. While Iraqi Information Minister Mohammad Said al-Sahhaf slammed the reports as "provocative lies". The correspondent of Al-Jazeera, the Arab television network, in Basra also said he had seen no sign of a rebellion.
Basra's 1.2 million people have been without electricity and water since Friday and aid groups have warned of a humanitarian crisis looming in the city.
The allies initially said they had no plans to enter Basra, but British military spokesman Group Captain Al Lockwood said the 7th Armoured Brigade, or Desert Rats, "continued to face stiff opposition" at its outskirts.
"We will probably need to go into Basra and meet any resistance," Lockwood told CNN.
The allies reported gains in the south, saying they finally seized the key port of Umm Qasr on the Kuwaiti border and crossed the Euphrates river at Nasiriyah to press northwards toward the scene of the battle at An Najaf.
The outskirts of Baghdad took a new battering as night fell Tuesday when a series of intense bombardments, clearly audible from the centre of the capital, appeared to target the southern suburbs where Republican Guard units are protecting the approach.
Iraqi state television was knocked off the air for 45 minutes by the latest raids.
The battle for Baghdad was nearing a critical phase, with US troops backed by Apache helicopter gunships primed for an all-out assault on the Republican Guard.
US officers said 30 to 40 Apaches, the US military's most fearsome attack helicopter, had made initial runs against Saddam's crack troops.
The US Third Infantry Division was closest to Baghdad, positioned near Karbala, about 100km (60 miles) from the capital, field reports said, with the US 101st Airborne Division crawling up from the southwest and the Marines to the east.
But their advance through the desert was slowed by the strong winds and swirling sand which dramatically reduced visibility.
A US Apache and a Black Hawk helicopter attached to the Third Infantry Division went missing in southern Iraq when visibility was cut to 100 meters (yards), said a senior US officer.
Two British troops were killed and two severely wounded in a friendly fire incident between two of the British army's high-tech Challenger II tanks in fighting outside Basra, British officials said.
About 20 British troops have now been killed in war accidents and combat. There are about 16 American dead but several are missing and seven are believed held prisoner.
US President George W. Bush (news - web sites) said the allies were "making good progress" and vowed Saddam's regime would be overthrown but US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned the war was "much closer to the beginning than the end."
General Richard Myers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, also insisted that "the toughest fight is ahead of us" and the resistance will get stronger as troops approach Baghdad.
"Our coalition is on a steady advance. We're making good progress," Bush said in a speech at the Pentagon (news - web sites) in which he asked Congress for 74.7 billion dollars (70.13 billion euros) to cover the costs of the war.
The White House said 62.6 billion dollars would pay for the deployment of more than 250,000 US troops, another 4.24 billion will help shore up anti-terrorism measures in the United States, five billion will aid key allies and 2.4 billion will go toward humanitarian relief and reconstruction in Iraq.
"We cannot know the duration of this war, yet we know it's outcome. We will prevail. The Iraqi regime will be disarmed. The Iraqi regime will be ended," Bush said.
Small numbers of Iraqi soldiers in Umm Qasr embarrassed the might of the US-British armies where overwhelming firepower and numbers eventually crushed the final pockets after six days of fighting.
In Nasiriyah, a column of about 4,000 US Marines ran the gauntlet of heavy Iraqi fire to cross the Euphrates River in a city located about a third of the way north from Kuwait to Baghdad.
More than 100 Iraqi bodies littered the road north from Nasiriyah and the smell of burnt flesh filled the air.
Umm Qasr and Basra are seen as vital to establishing a humanitarian corridor for non-governmental organisations to deliver desperately needed aid to the rest of the country.
With Umm Qasr finally under control, officers said aid would arrive in the port on Wednesday after British and US Navy minesweepers cleared a shipping channel.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites) announced meanwhile that he would go to Washington for talks with President Bush on Thursday.
Blair promised that the coalition will this time finish the job of ending Saddam's reign.
In the Middle East, anger at the war remained strong with hundreds of thousands protesting in the Syrian capital Damascus and some 50,000 out in force in the Lebanese capital Beirut.
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