March 20, 2003

SO FAR SO GOOD, 2

SO FAR SO GOOD, 2

A correspondent with 7th Cavalry Regiment (the divisional recce battalion of the 3rd Mechanized Infantry Division) reports on CNN he's been driving across Iraqi desert for two hours without halting. They're halfway to Busayyah, then, and will probably keep moving til dawn. They're on hard pack and have been running through Gulf War I wreckage, so 3rd Infantry is definitely going northwest in the general direction of Samawah, at least for the moment.

UPDATE: Pike's outfit is now reporting that a large part of 2nd Marine Division has deployed to Jordan, and may now be moving into Iraq from that direction. That's the first major operational surprise, if true.

Posted by BruceR at 08:53 PM

SO FAR SO GOOD 1

SO FAR SO GOOD

1 Marine Division, possibly with some Royal Marine assistance, seems to have taken the border town of Umm Qasr. No surprise there, it was going to happen in the first few hours anyway, but it's notable the Brits definitely seem to be parcelled out rather than together, and 1 Mar Div is heading north along the littoral as predicted. Here's a map that may help show what's going on a little more clearly.

Posted by BruceR at 05:34 PM

WELL, THEY GOT OFF Harry

WELL, THEY GOT OFF

Harry "Psycho" Schmidt and his wingman will not face court martial for the bombing error that killed four Canadians, an American military tribunal has ruled today.

Posted by BruceR at 03:32 PM

STILL NO SIGN OF THOSE

STILL NO SIGN OF THOSE BANNED WEAPONS

The WashPost is now reporting the three Iraqi missiles so far have been an obsolescent naval SSM (aimed into Kuwait) and two short-range Ababils (aka Al Samoud 1), all from the Basra area. Neither would have been UN-prohibited weapons, or chem-capable.* It was no doubt a case of use it now or lose it anyway.

*(How do you know that, BruceR? -ed). The Scuds used in the last war, all but about 9 of which have been long accounted for, had diameters of approximately 90 cm. If those missiles are still in existence, they could conceivably be a chem threat. The Ababil/Al Samoud missile program that the UN allowed Iraq to continue postwar has focussed on 50 cm frames. Even the famous British report last September didn't identify them as chemical carriers. So to believe the Iraqis have any chemical missile capability left, you have to believe that they have, entirely in secret and without open testing, successfully completed an entirely new chemical warhead program since the last war, with a final product half the size of anything they've done before. By the way, the Ababil is estimated to have about the same explosive power as one 1,000 lb aerial bomb (each of the 40 cruise missiles fired last night had about the same)... and a rather ludicrous circular error of probability to boot. The firers probably counted themselves lucky to hit Kuwait. The idea they were aimed at any specific troop formation is laughable.

Posted by BruceR at 12:55 PM

EVERYTHING'S BEEN RUINED BY MATT

EVERYTHING'S BEEN RUINED BY MATT GROENING

There's a woman walking around outside carrying a sign saying "Bush! Beware the ides of March!" This would actually have been an impressive allusion, if this war had been before the Simpsons' Stonecutters episode. Instead of thinking of Plutarch and Shakespeare, I've got quotes from the Book of Homer running through my head now:

Lisa: Remember Dad, "All glory is fleeting."
Homer: So?
Lisa: "Beware the Ides of March."
Homer: No!

Posted by BruceR at 12:47 PM

SOMEONE GET ME COPY DESK

SOMEONE GET ME COPY DESK

Jaff's dozen Patriotic Union of Kurdistan militamen chatted non-stop, despite their leader's warning -- until an Iraqi mortar suddenly exploded some distance away... And then another mortar exploded a safe distance away, from another Iraqi position along the front line north of the oil rich town of Kirkuk...

--Toronto Star today

I hate it when my mortars explode. Really messes up the gunline...

(Okay, one last time. A mortar is a firing system, like a cannon or a missile launcher. It fires a shell. The shell explodes. For Sandro Contenta to talk about exploding mortars around him to the military reader is like reading that several submarines detonated on the outskirts of Baghdad last night. It looks and sounds ridiculous. Copy desk, come on: save the poor man from his own ignorance. He's just a reporter, after all.)

Posted by BruceR at 08:36 AM