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30-3-2003 Sunday Mirror GULF WAR II: SPECIAL TROOPS KILL 200 IN RAID FORCES' WORST NIGHTMARE..THEN SCOTS GO IN By GETHIN CHAMBERLAIN on the outskirts of Basra IT'S 6am and Basra is burning, black clouds of oily smoke drifting over the city to the east, the sound of gunfire rolling across the canal. The television mast that dominated the skyline is gone and many of the militia men who have tormented the British troops laying siege to the city and fired on their own people as they tried to flee lie dead. Just hours earlier, a squadron of the Special Boat Service operating inside the city had noticed several hundred of Saddam Hussein's supporters going into a building for a late Friday meeting. They called in two US F-15E Strike Eagle jets patrolling nearby which immediately attacked the building with laser-guided missiles, destroying it. "We saw several hundred people going in. No one came out," a British spokesman said. Now, for the last 15 minutes the city has been rocked by huge explosions as the Challenger tanks and Warrior armoured vehicles of the Black Watch battle group launched a push into the city, fighting their way through a barrage of mortar fire and rocket propelled grenades to a position 2.5 miles inside the city limits, the furthest forward so far. On the Iraqi side of the Shatt Al Basrah canal there are two sudden, violent explosions as mortars open up on the armoured vehicles guarding the approaches to the bridge. Even on the far side of the canal, the shock waves take the breath away. Just an hour after Iraqi fighters took the British troops by surprise and sent them diving for cover under their vehicles with a sneak rocket attack, the Black Watch was exacting its revenge. That yesterday morning's thrust into Basra had been planned for hours did not matter: they had survived a close shave and someone would pay With their commanding officer Lt Col Mike Riddell-Webster in the turret of his Warrior, they race into the town across the bridge. Explosions echo around the city as they advance, firing at gunmen who pop up from their dug-in positions to take them on. From every direction comes the sound of gunfire, but exposed to the heavy guns of the British vehicles, the defenders are fighting a losing battle. Manning the gun in the turret of his Warrior, Lee Webb is relishing the chance of action. Everywhere he looks, there are Iraqis shooting at him, men on roofs firing rocket propelled grenades, Iraqi gunmen leaning out of windows to open up with AK-47s. "The adrenaline was pumping, all I could think about was just looking for the next target," Lee says. A massive statue of Saddam Hussein is blown to smithereens by Tank commander David Ross, who later says drily: "I just wish it was the real thing." Nearby is Sgt Dougie Dunbar, 40. He says: "It's my first stint facing the mortar attacks and artillery and that's when you realise it's real." As the first wave heads back over the bridge to the relative safety of the far bank, the statue of Saddam is in ruins. The British hope that their action will show to the civilian population that the Iraqi regime is losing its grip on the city. But daring though the raid is, they still have a mountain to climb to avoid the dreaded prospect of street fighting. Even in the satellite town of Az Zubayr, 20km to the south west, they have struggled to break down the dogged resistance of the militia men. While the majority of the local population have given them a guarded welcome, they have continued to face daily attacks from irregular forces in civilian clothes. Reports from within Basra suggest they face an even more stubborn resistance, with Saddam Hussein apparently determined not to let the coalition forces establish a grip on the south of the country. Intelligence sources suggest that at least 18 people have been executed in the past few days as the regime battles to assert its control over the civilian population. The dead include civilians, soldiers and the tribal leader Rahim Bezoni, all killed for refusing to back the fight against the British forces attacking the city. The man known as Chemical Ali is believed to have brought with him 500 men from a special security guard, placing two of them with each military commander. As the sun rises higher over the bridge, the remaining tanks and the other armoured vehicles begin to roll back over the bridge. The occasional explosion shows that it's not over yet, there are still those in the city determined to fight on, or too frightened to stop. Back home, 10,000 people marched through Edinburgh in an anti-war demonstration.
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................................................................................................................. Copyright ©2004 Gethin Chamberlain. All rights reserved. |
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