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CNN Live At Daybreak
12 Years Ago, Allied Invasion of Iraq Was Going Full Bore
Aired January 17, 2003 - 05:34 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Let's head to Kuwait. On this day 12 years ago, the Allied invasion of Iraq was going full bore. A dozen years later, the massive buildup for a possible new war against Iraq is in full swing.
CNN's Martin Savidge is live in Kuwait City with the latest -- and, Martin, even though those chemical warheads were empty, that's got to make people in Kuwait even more nervous than they already are about chemical warfare.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it has raised the anxious level here in Kuwait, obviously. One of the biggest concerns the Kuwaiti people have had is the fear of some sort of retaliation if there is, in fact, a war. And chemical warheads are their greatest concern. They have already distributed gas masks in this country. So hearing this discovery is not going to soothe anybody's feelings right now.
Let's talk about the buildup. And today here in Kuwait is delivery day, not so much military personnel, but a lot of equipment is rolling in. This is coming specifically for the U.S. Marines, the Marines that are here in country already or Marines that are on the way, and it's coming off of what are called pre-positioning ships.
Now, according to the Marines -- they won't tell us exactly how many ships have come in and they won't exactly say where they're being offloaded, only that it's at an undisclosed port here in Kuwait. But it's a process that began yesterday and is continuing today.
We can tell you this, the prepositioning fleet comes under the control of the military sea-led command. There are about 13 of these vessels that are scattered all around the world. They don't look like U.S. Navy ships. They look more like conventional container ships. However, the cargo they carry is anything but conventional. It includes things like ammunition, equipment and, of course, military vehicles.
These ships are divided into squadrons that are placed in, well, spots around the world such as, say, the Indian Ocean, Diego Garcia, which is where these probably have come from, the Mediterranean and also from the Western Pacific. It is said that each squadron of these ships carries enough equipment to support a Marine air/ground task force for about 30 days.
As we say, the offloading began yesterday, continues today. That's a lot of stuff that is rolling off right now. When it comes to specific numbers of troops, that gets more difficult to ascertain because those numbers are carefully guarded secrets on the part of any military, but especially the U.S. military. Officially, it's reported there are about 10,000 U.S. troops that are in Kuwait. I was here in September and October. They said there were 10,000 then. There's obviously been a buildup so that number doesn't seem too accurate. Others have said no, there's about 17,000 U.S. troops that are here in Kuwait and even that is thought to be a greatly generic kind of number here.
The reason we can't physically do a head count, if we wanted to do that, is the fact that you don't see the troops. When they arrive here in Kuwait, they're quickly whisked off to prepositioned bases in the northwestern part of the country, up near the Iraqi border. And about a third of Kuwait now has been deemed off limits on the part of the Kuwaiti government because it's being used for training purposes. So you're not going to do a head count. Just be safe to say the troops are coming in and so is a lot of equipment -- Carol.
COSTELLO: Oh, yes. Let's talk about more equipment coming into the Persian Gulf now, because the Pentagon is sending more big guns to the Persian Gulf, and I mean really big guns, and a lot of them, two to four more aircraft carrier battle groups are expected to be ordered to the region, perhaps as early as this week. They include the George Washington in Norfolk, Virginia, the Theodore Roosevelt off the coast of Puerto Rico, and the Kitty Hawk in Yokosuka, Japan, and the Abraham Lincoln in Perth, Australia. The Harry S. Truman and the Constellation carrier battle groups already are in the Persian Gulf.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired January 17, 2003 - 05:34 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Let's head to Kuwait. On this day 12 years ago, the Allied invasion of Iraq was going full bore. A dozen years later, the massive buildup for a possible new war against Iraq is in full swing.
CNN's Martin Savidge is live in Kuwait City with the latest -- and, Martin, even though those chemical warheads were empty, that's got to make people in Kuwait even more nervous than they already are about chemical warfare.
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it has raised the anxious level here in Kuwait, obviously. One of the biggest concerns the Kuwaiti people have had is the fear of some sort of retaliation if there is, in fact, a war. And chemical warheads are their greatest concern. They have already distributed gas masks in this country. So hearing this discovery is not going to soothe anybody's feelings right now.
Let's talk about the buildup. And today here in Kuwait is delivery day, not so much military personnel, but a lot of equipment is rolling in. This is coming specifically for the U.S. Marines, the Marines that are here in country already or Marines that are on the way, and it's coming off of what are called pre-positioning ships.
Now, according to the Marines -- they won't tell us exactly how many ships have come in and they won't exactly say where they're being offloaded, only that it's at an undisclosed port here in Kuwait. But it's a process that began yesterday and is continuing today.
We can tell you this, the prepositioning fleet comes under the control of the military sea-led command. There are about 13 of these vessels that are scattered all around the world. They don't look like U.S. Navy ships. They look more like conventional container ships. However, the cargo they carry is anything but conventional. It includes things like ammunition, equipment and, of course, military vehicles.
These ships are divided into squadrons that are placed in, well, spots around the world such as, say, the Indian Ocean, Diego Garcia, which is where these probably have come from, the Mediterranean and also from the Western Pacific. It is said that each squadron of these ships carries enough equipment to support a Marine air/ground task force for about 30 days.
As we say, the offloading began yesterday, continues today. That's a lot of stuff that is rolling off right now. When it comes to specific numbers of troops, that gets more difficult to ascertain because those numbers are carefully guarded secrets on the part of any military, but especially the U.S. military. Officially, it's reported there are about 10,000 U.S. troops that are in Kuwait. I was here in September and October. They said there were 10,000 then. There's obviously been a buildup so that number doesn't seem too accurate. Others have said no, there's about 17,000 U.S. troops that are here in Kuwait and even that is thought to be a greatly generic kind of number here.
The reason we can't physically do a head count, if we wanted to do that, is the fact that you don't see the troops. When they arrive here in Kuwait, they're quickly whisked off to prepositioned bases in the northwestern part of the country, up near the Iraqi border. And about a third of Kuwait now has been deemed off limits on the part of the Kuwaiti government because it's being used for training purposes. So you're not going to do a head count. Just be safe to say the troops are coming in and so is a lot of equipment -- Carol.
COSTELLO: Oh, yes. Let's talk about more equipment coming into the Persian Gulf now, because the Pentagon is sending more big guns to the Persian Gulf, and I mean really big guns, and a lot of them, two to four more aircraft carrier battle groups are expected to be ordered to the region, perhaps as early as this week. They include the George Washington in Norfolk, Virginia, the Theodore Roosevelt off the coast of Puerto Rico, and the Kitty Hawk in Yokosuka, Japan, and the Abraham Lincoln in Perth, Australia. The Harry S. Truman and the Constellation carrier battle groups already are in the Persian Gulf.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
