1000 missiles, 3 dead.

mike65

From BBC -

Baghdad is still reeling from a sustained air assault by coalition forces, in which the US says more than 1,000 cruise missiles were fired at the Iraqi capital in 24 hours.

Iraqi health minister says three people killed in overnight raids on Baghdad.

I'm assuming we can trust the Iraqi gov on such figures...

I realise such figures would never placate the anti-war
movement but given the howling rage that "hundreds of thousands will die" to quote Charles Kennedy its pretty impressive and to me shows that the US/UK strategy
is being impressivly marshalled and that the bombs have got smarter after all...

Mike.

Biffa Bacon

Originally posted by mike65
I realise such figures would never placate the anti-war
movement but given the howling rage that "hundreds of thousands will die" to quote Charles Kennedy its pretty impressive and to me shows that the US/UK strategy
is being impressivly marshalled and that the bombs have got smarter after all...

Of course. Just don't expect the idiotarians to admit they were wrong.

Frank Grimes

There's been one night of bombing, I'd wait another while before patting the US/UK on the back for a job well done. I'm sure the families of those 3 people will take great comfort in the fact that there was "only" 3 deaths last night.

mike65

Frank, its a war...

If your loved ones get killed it does'nt matter how many or few die. Thats obvious enough. The point is that the anti-war propaganda would have had us belive the
Shock and Awe tactic would mean Dresden Mk2, instead the power, the water, the phones and even the bloody telly is still on. War will never be civilised or anything other than the failure of politics but it is, with care and
lost of money, less appalling than would otherwise be the case. Not an easy point to make but one worth making.

Mike.

Frank Grimes

Mike, it's the reasons behind the "war" that's the problem for me. I'm glad the fatalities weren't higher, but it should not be happening in the first place. But that's just my own opinion.
But there are only so many things they can target in the city, and if there's a prolonged hold-out by the Iraqi military, they might start picking other targets e.g power, water etc.
Plus, all it will take is for one of the missles to go astray....

Redshift

It was interesting to see southern Iraqi people jumping for joy and shouting pro america and anti saddam slogans now of course that they are safe from saddam and his henchmen at the same time you see people in Baghdad rallying behind Saddam and shouting anti American slogans. I suspect the reality is a vast number of Iraqi people are secretly glad that saddam will soon be deposed, but at the moment they are too afraid to say it as unlike most of the rest of the world the Iraqi people have no freedom of expression a freedom that we take for granted unless of course they want to die a most barbaric death along with their families. The Iraqi people deserve freedom and this war will ultimatley set them free. I think war is an unfortunate situation to be in but politics will never work with sombody like Saddam Hussein.

There will always be casualties in a war. the fact that the casualties at the moment is so low is commendable to the US & the UK. People here know that i don't appreciate the US in regards to this war, but i have to "take my hat off to them" for this.

However, this is the start of the war. I'll be more impressed once the war is over and they can say the same. Once American troops start dying in the streets of Baghdad, and troops have been fighting solid for three days, the number of mistakes will rise. I'm not saying the targeting of civilians will be intentional, but mistakes will happen.

In this intelligence is the key. We all saw how the US responded to a intelligence report that saw Saddam, and almost immediately an artillery barrage was approved to target him. While its impressive that they responded so quickly, it does bear in mind that to respond so quickly means that they didn't have enough time to confirm intelligence. What happens if they place a sight of saddam, launch a strike, and then realise afterwards that they've just hit a hostel, or hospital?

Mistakes will happen. Casualties, will occur regardless of any statement that they might have made regarding their intent to avoid such casualties.

Sand

Yep there does seem to be a lot of goodwill (That guy with the shoe battering Saddams portrait as the allied soldier cut it down ) but the allies will have to capitalise on it quickly by pumping in humanitarian support right after the troops. The rather bizzare incident that Sky News reporter found himself in where a man drove up with bullet holes in the front of his car, and (apparently - language was proving a bit of barrier ) claimed he had been shot at by British soldiers, whilst a British officer claimed he had been ambushed ( didnt say by who though ) and had suffered a shrapnel wound as opposed to a bullet wound - but that he was okay and medical aid would be arriving. The man concerned and his friends seemed rather annoyed though, as hed have a right to be if hes right.

The allies will have to ensure that such incidents are weighed against massive aid for the people - it is as important as the purely milatary side of things. They need to slap some common sense into their soldiers too - the raising of the US flag, though no doubt innocent on the soldiers behalf, sends out the wrong message to the Iraqis.

Dotsie~tmp

The reson there are small numbers of dead is because all those buildings are empty. They arent running things from government buildings. The Iraqies learned from the first war. Military hardware and troops are also hidden in built up areas populated by civillians. The US knows this and they know they will quickly meet the limitations of bombing (even hight precision) once they are on Baghdads doorstep and all the possible and obvious targets have been hit.

The only way forward from that position is either to lay siege (acoording to the US Badhdad has very extensive underground city with long term food and munitions in supply), beging shelling and bombing outskirts where defnders may be dug in to soften up for the attack (civillian casualties will mount quickly) or commit troops for close quarters combat with prior hevy weapons support so to limit the civillian deaths. In this case however this would come at a cost to American lives as history has shown in places like Monte Cassino, Stalingrad and Me Kong that even when a city is razed by shelling it almost impossible to efeect its defenders without direct troop action. Technology will have little use in this environment, espicially air support.

All this is based on a presumption that the troops in Baghdad are acyually up for a fight and that Saddam isnt dead. Im not sure if the Americans even know this hence Bushs warning that it may not all be easy. I hope the regime is as fragile as they are claiming because if it isnt i dont see how they will avoid large civillian and USUK losses.

Frank Grimes

Looks like there's been some "collateral damage" in Basra. Sky News is saying there's 57 dead.

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/middleeast/view/35507/1/.html
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_219199,0005.htm

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

Woden

i find military casualities in the war acceptable, if the u.s bomb a barracks and soldiers are killed then fair enough, similarly if u.s marines are KIA then fair enough, these people, well the u.s soldiers anyway, choose to be in the army and are aware of the consequences of there choice, similarly the iraqi's do not have to fight ref: the surrender of troops, civilian casualities well thats a different matter, although i admire the precision of the bombs many with accuracy of up to 10m.

/edit post, i'd like to add however that i think conscripts which try to surrender but are still killed e.g those two guys who wanted to surrender but where killed by an air strike well that is also a different matter. On a personal note i found the image of the these two men on the front of "ireland on sunday" with there white flag who would have surrended quite disturbing hence the edit.

bonkey

Originally posted by Biffa Bacon
Of course. Just don't expect the idiotarians to admit they were wrong.

At least they wait until the war is over before making declarations about whether or not something did or did not happen.

I can see how that would invite scorn.

Then again, its no different to how US told us how it had been the most successful war in history, despite claiming that the prisoners they took during this war were not Prisoners of War, or indeed that the war was not over, and could indeed last for years.

Why, only today, Donald Rumsfeld was telling us how shining an example it was, and soon the Iraqis would be equally grateful when they - like the Afghanis - had a government that was truly representative of the people and which was egalitarian and non-oppressive.

Does this garner your scorn as well?

jc

jc

Victor

Originally posted by Dataisgod
On a personal note i found the image of the these two men on the front of "ireland on sunday" with there white flag who would have surrended quite disturbing hence the edit.

I did some googling, the white flag actually isn't protected, it is the intermediary(s) - called parlementaires (together with a flag bearer, an interpreter, and a trumpeter or drummer) that are protected.

http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/5a780f680129b33841256739003e6367/def436bd33c40c10c12563cd005156c0?OpenDocument

http://www.adtdl.army.mil/cgi-bin/atdl.dll/fm/27-10/Ch7.htm

Brief article http://www.crimesofwar.org/thebook/parlementaires.html

Woden

fair enough if they aren't protected by the law and such but morally i found it wrong.

Sand

Was the situation how those guys with the white flag died known? I saw the picture myself but it ( the paper ) didnt elaborate - I assume they either decided to surrender a bit too late or they were getting ready to pull the false surrender trick that the Iraqis have been pulling the odd time. Or even again they became victims of the distrust and caution that tricks such as the above cause.