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Marines Detonate Bridge Near Baghdad

Aired April 07, 2003 - 11:23   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.


BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: British Prime Minister Tony Blair, U.S. President George Bush, flying there today to talk about Iraq, the Middle East peace process and peace for northern Ireland.
Suzanne Malveaux, ahead of the team there in Belfast, joins us live now to talk about these big three pieces of the pie.

Suzanne, hello.

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Bill.

It is really a very ambitious agenda that the two leaders are going to take on, but we have been told, yes, those three items. President Bush left early from the White House. He'll be arriving in Belfast later this afternoon. This is the third time the two leaders have met in as many weeks.

And top of the agenda, of course, is a post-Saddam regime. We know that France, Germany and Russia really want to see a predominant role of the U.N. to play in that regime.

But the United States, the Bush administration, has made it very clear over the last week or so, that they say they will be in charge, the allied forces. They are looking at a limited role for the U.N.

Where Mr. Blair stands is somewhere in the middle. That is where the delicate negotiations will take place in their discussion.

One of the main challenges really here is whether or not they can come up with a U.N. resolution that the U.N. Security Council will pass that really gives a sense of legitimacy to a new Iraqi government, this interim Iraqi authority.

The other issue that they're facing as well is one of timing. When do they bring this about? When is it important to get those people on the ground? There's somewhat of a disagreement within the administration itself. The Pentagon looking to move sooner as opposed to later, saying that really they want to put an Iraqi face on this.

But the State Department taking a more measured look at this, a measured tone. But as we know, Bill, a lot on their plate. We'll see what they come up with. The two leaders are going to meet for dinner this evening, and then private discussion tomorrow -- Bill.

HEMMER: All right, Suzanne, let's talk about Middle East peace, a topic that's been pushed to the background because of the war in Iraq right now. What is the proposal that seems to be emerging right now in terms of a road map there?

MALVEAUX: Well, absolutely, Bill, it's a very important point. And Mr. Blair has been pushing the bush administration to be more aggressive in asserting its commitment to the Middle East peace process, the road map, as they like to call it. They are waiting, essentially, for the Palestinian leadership, the prime minister, to really get their components, their elements of their government together before they move forward.

But Mr. Blair really sees this as a credibility issue, because at the same time, they want to garner the type of support from Arab nations. They feel they will not be able to do so when it comes to building Iraq, unless they deal evenhandedly with the Middle East peace crisis. That is one of the reasons that that's coming up in this meeting, and one of the reasons it came just a week ago at Camp David -- Bill.

HEMMER: Suzanne, thank you. Suzanne Malveaux, again, reporting on the ground there in Belfast.

As Suzanne mentioned, later tonight, the two leaders will hold a dinner, and a lot to talk about there.

Let's talk more about it. From London right now, Jamie Rubin is back with us, former assistant secretary of state, back with us here on CNN.

Jamie, good to have you back, and welcome.

JAMIE RUBIN, FMR. ASST. SECY. OF STATE: Thank you, Bill.

HEMMER: I want to know, first of all, what's the sense you're getting in London, regarding Tony Blair and U.S. President George Bush? Do they feel a sense of vindication, based on the amount of criticism they were taking only 10 days, or two weeks ago, and now, looking at this conflict, not near an end, but quite close to it possibly, and not only three weeks olds.

RUBIN: Absolutely. You need to distinguish here between the military and political side. On the military side, I really believe that the Blair government is beginning to feel vindicated. You can tell the way they're talking, the way their soldiers on the ground are talking, with these moves inside Basra, where the British are now almost completely in charge of Basra, with the moves inside Baghdad, that they've gotten past that first hurdle, where everybody said everything was going wrong and not the way they expected it.

So on the military side, I think they're going to have a fair degree of meeting of the minds and comfort level. But when it comes to the political side, that's a completely different story, and I think there really are big issues between Bush and Blair that they're going to have to hash out.

HEMMER: And how do we hash them out? We heard Kofi Annan just about 90 minutes ago, talking about what he believes truly is a significant role for the U.N. to play in Iraq, but then you have this counterbalance here, about the difficulties going through the Security Council prior to the beginning of this war.

How is all of that meshed together, or is it, successfully?

RUBIN: Well, I think it can be done, but it's going to require magnanimity on the part of the U.S. administration, and it's going to require some flexibility on the part of the French, and Germans and Russians who opposed this war, and those qualities have been sadly lacking to date.

But if they were to try to come together there is a way to do this. And the way to do this is to have the period in which Jay Garner, the retired American general, is running the country be as short as possible, and find a way, perhaps with the involvement of the secretary-general of the United Nations, to get a group of Iraqis both inside and outside Iraq to come together in some interim authority, some interim Iraqi government, that would then be legitimatized by the United Nations Security Council, not as a permanent government, not as the final government. That would come much later, after some elections or some other processes to choose the Iraqi government, similar to what we did in Afghanistan.

But if the United States insists on running the country for many, many months before transitioning to some Iraqi group that would then be able to be endorsed by the U.N., that's going to be a big problem. Because what is not understood well in America, I don't think, is that, unlike the war, where the United States and the British, if they didn't like what was happening on the second resolution, could just throw their hands up and say we tried, and then go to war, in the case of the post-war period, this time the British, the Germans, the French, the Russians, they have leverage. They have a need to endorse the lifting of economic sanctions on Iraq and the allowance of international reconstruction to go in and take control of the assets there. That can't be done without the acquiescence of the opponents of this war. So both sides have to find a way to work together.

HEMMER: Jamie, I got to get back to our imbeds, but quickly here you mentioned a short time, a short period of time before it's handed back to the Iraqis. How do we define that? Paul Wolfowitz said yesterday perhaps six months. In your estimation, what is a safe amount of time before the Iraqis really start getting ticked off and saying, we want our country back?

RUBIN: Well, I think what Wolfowitz was talking about was six months until you get to the legitimate Iraqi government, the government that's selected by the Iraqi people. I don't think he ruled out some period, like six weeks, where the Americans would take over, run the industries, run the ministries, run the oil production, get things started, allow the U.N. to deliver aid, and during those six weeks, you'd have to select a group of Iraqis that would then be endorsed after that six-week period by the Security Council. That's the way to unlock the rule.

HEMMER: OK got it. Jamie, thanks. Jamie Rubin, thanks. We will talk again, I am certain.

Earlier today, just a few minutes ago, I mentioned this bridge near Basra. I misspoke completely. I meant Baghdad, southeast of Baghdad. We do believe this is over a canal that feeds into the Tigris river. Marty Savidge, embedded with the Marines, is providing us this image here, along with his photographer, Scott McWinney (ph), by way of video videophone.

We are told, perhaps within three minutes, the Marines might be ready to detonate this bridge, damage, we're told, as result of fighting over the past 24 hours.

Before we get back to Marty by telephone, Lisa Rose Weaver is situated just outside of Baghdad, I believe.

Lisa, what's happening there?

LISA ROSE WEAVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, yes, Bill. I am just at the perimeter of the International Airport. In the distance to my northeast, I can hear the 3rd Infantry exchanging pretty heavy artillery there with Iraqi forces at the front line. I'm not sure exactly how far away that is for me, several kilometers.

It's not anything that I can see, but I can certainly hear it.

Meanwhile, we arrived here. I am embedded with a Patriot missile battery. It arrived here a few hours ago, and some of the forces here found some old bunkers that the Republican National Guard had apparently left in very much of a hurry. They found quite a lot of unused ammunition, no evidence of chemical weapons, although there were gas masks thrown on the floor, along with clothes and food, some old bread and potatoes, and strangely, baby formula, which one of the investigators here speculates the Republican National Guard may have been eating for nutrients, assuming that bread and potatoes was all else that they were eating.

It happens to be fairly quiet now, but again, intermittent artillery exchange between the 3rd ID and Iraqi forces off to my north -- Bill.

HEMMER: Lisa, thanks. Lisa Rose Weaver, again, embedded right near Baghdad.

Back to Marty now.

Marty, have those vehicles moved out? Are we ready for what we're awaiting now?

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I believe we are, Bill. They have lifted, actually using desk (ph) cord and what they call sort of igniters. So it's not like somebody's standing by with a button to push. This is the boat that you may have seen earlier underneath the pylons there. What they did was they rolled up there, the demolition experts, and then they triggered the igniters , which is really just like -- well, a little more sophisticated than flint against steel. But we are told should be pretty close now, but they had a ten minute fuse, and they measured out. And so like I say, it's not down to the exact second science, but there are a lot of Marines that have gathered here for this event, probably not the most significant event in this war, but it is something they know is going to happen. And the Marines do like to see things go. They're always willing to look at the action. So we'll wait.

HEMMER: Marty, as we wait, I'm assuming this bridge is beyond repair. Am I right?

SAVIDGE I would say.

HEMMER: I would say I'm right.

SAVIDGE: The concussive force just from this vantage point was pretty strong. Now we are going to wait and see just to make sure nothing's going to come flying out on to our head. The smoke is completely obliterated the bridge site, and the flash was so intense I'm having a hard time focusing my eyes.

But we will give it a few seconds here, wait for the smoke to clear. Got a cheer from the Marines. They obviously were impressed by that.

So anyway, the demolition guys didn't hold back on any of their charges on this, judging by the force of the explosion and the way we felt it here. We're just going to wait for the smoke to clear.

But I think you could probably safely say, judging by that, mission accomplished. Now the idea was not to take down the whole bridge, just to take down that center span. And as the dust clears, I think you can start to see that they achieved just that -- Bill.

HEMMER: Wow.

Marty, back up a little bit. Heavy intense fighting over the past 24 hours that led to the damage with that bridge. Hang on a second, Marty.

I believe we've got the -- let's go back a second for our viewers and roll it again, without me talking this time, and watch it.

So we'll wait. You can hear the Marines give up their holler.

Hey, Marty, take us back to realtime right now. What happened 24 hours ago with the intense fighting around that bridge?

SAVIDGE: Well, this bridge was obviously a key crossing point. Any bridge across any waterway at this point close to Baghdad as we are, will be. And it was the job of the 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines, that were spearheading the drive across. First, they had to get through this village here, and it was quite a firefight that was going on last night, RPGs, AK-47 fire and artillery that was being lobbed around the Marines. So they had to fight their way to this position on the banks of this particular canal.

Then at daylight, they were poised to cross over on that bridge, and there was an armored personnel carrier that we understand that was struck by artillery and that two Marines were killed in that strike. We also understand that there may have been other casualties that were suffered as they fought their way through the village. The village is now fully in the control of the U.S. Marines. And there are armored personnel carriers and Humvees, and just lot of, I was going to say leather -- That's the slang jargon that the Marines use to talk of themselves -- now in the alleyways and freeways of this town.

As we drove in, it was interesting that, after the heavy firefight, a lot of people waving, and I'm talking about Iraqi civilians. A lot of people cheering and expressing what seemed to be happiness over the fact that the marines have liberated this particular spot. So it was an intense fight to get here, but now that the units have crossed, pushed over, we are told they are not meeting significant resistance on the other side -- Bill.

HEMMER: Yes, Marty, listen, if you could, if you can have Scott go in. We're told the image is getting very dark as the evening grows longer there in that part of Iraq. If you could maybe go in on that span that's been detonated at this point, and as he does, Marty, maybe you could give our viewers a better idea as to how the temporary construction of a bridge right near you off to the right, how long that took to get done, and also how long it may take for this group of Marines across that river now.

SAVIDGE: Well, I was a little bit drowned out by the sound of that earth mover as it went by. But if you could ask me that question again, I'll be able to hear now.

HEMMER: All right, it's not an exact science, that's clear. If you could have Scott McWinny (ph) maybe go in on that span that's been blown away, so we can see just how precise the detonation was. And while we do that, let our viewers know, again, how long it took to set up that temporary bridge with the number of Humvees and amphibious assault vehicles right now that are moving across that bridge.

SAVIDGE: OK. You're looking at the segment that was destroyed. It's a bit deceiving to you, only because these are actually two spans side by side. What they did was they took out the portion of the heavily damaged span. There's another span that's intact. They're still going to make a determination whether that will be safe for civilian use or not.

In the meantime, it is not probably strong enough or secure enough for the military hardware. We're talking tanks and armored personnel carrier. That's why the engineering unit created this temporary bridge. It was up in a matter of hours, I suppose, and they had units going across.

So they -- as you mentioned before, they practiced this a lot. They even have competitions when they're not doing wars, to see how quickly they can assemble a bridge, and it's usually achieved fairly quickly. You have a lot of prefabricated parts, and it's a matter of setting them down, bolting them together, and they float on pontoons, and then the equipment rolls across. So they will now start pouring all of the Marine assets across their bridge.

We're watching now -- you see -- I'm sure you can't in this light, but that bulldozer is actually starting to move across the other span. So I think we're going to get a pretty test as to how strong the remaining structure is. But again, there were two bridges side by side. They brought down the one that the Iraqis had partially destroyed in their retreat.

HEMMER: Got it. Marty, thanks and have a good night. Thanks for sharing that with us, and to your crew and Scott McWinny (ph) as well.

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 April 7, 2003 - 11:23   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: British Prime Minister Tony Blair, U.S. President George Bush, flying there today to talk about Iraq, the Middle East peace process and peace for northern Ireland.
Suzanne Malveaux, ahead of the team there in Belfast, joins us live now to talk about these big three pieces of the pie.

Suzanne, hello.

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Bill.

It is really a very ambitious agenda that the two leaders are going to take on, but we have been told, yes, those three items. President Bush left early from the White House. He'll be arriving in Belfast later this afternoon. This is the third time the two leaders have met in as many weeks.

And top of the agenda, of course, is a post-Saddam regime. We know that France, Germany and Russia really want to see a predominant role of the U.N. to play in that regime.

But the United States, the Bush administration, has made it very clear over the last week or so, that they say they will be in charge, the allied forces. They are looking at a limited role for the U.N.

Where Mr. Blair stands is somewhere in the middle. That is where the delicate negotiations will take place in their discussion.

One of the main challenges really here is whether or not they can come up with a U.N. resolution that the U.N. Security Council will pass that really gives a sense of legitimacy to a new Iraqi government, this interim Iraqi authority.

The other issue that they're facing as well is one of timing. When do they bring this about? When is it important to get those people on the ground? There's somewhat of a disagreement within the administration itself. The Pentagon looking to move sooner as opposed to later, saying that really they want to put an Iraqi face on this.

But the State Department taking a more measured look at this, a measured tone. But as we know, Bill, a lot on their plate. We'll see what they come up with. The two leaders are going to meet for dinner this evening, and then private discussion tomorrow -- Bill.

HEMMER: All right, Suzanne, let's talk about Middle East peace, a topic that's been pushed to the background because of the war in Iraq right now. What is the proposal that seems to be emerging right now in terms of a road map there?

MALVEAUX: Well, absolutely, Bill, it's a very important point. And Mr. Blair has been pushing the bush administration to be more aggressive in asserting its commitment to the Middle East peace process, the road map, as they like to call it. They are waiting, essentially, for the Palestinian leadership, the prime minister, to really get their components, their elements of their government together before they move forward.

But Mr. Blair really sees this as a credibility issue, because at the same time, they want to garner the type of support from Arab nations. They feel they will not be able to do so when it comes to building Iraq, unless they deal evenhandedly with the Middle East peace crisis. That is one of the reasons that that's coming up in this meeting, and one of the reasons it came just a week ago at Camp David -- Bill.

HEMMER: Suzanne, thank you. Suzanne Malveaux, again, reporting on the ground there in Belfast.

As Suzanne mentioned, later tonight, the two leaders will hold a dinner, and a lot to talk about there.

Let's talk more about it. From London right now, Jamie Rubin is back with us, former assistant secretary of state, back with us here on CNN.

Jamie, good to have you back, and welcome.

JAMIE RUBIN, FMR. ASST. SECY. OF STATE: Thank you, Bill.

HEMMER: I want to know, first of all, what's the sense you're getting in London, regarding Tony Blair and U.S. President George Bush? Do they feel a sense of vindication, based on the amount of criticism they were taking only 10 days, or two weeks ago, and now, looking at this conflict, not near an end, but quite close to it possibly, and not only three weeks olds.

RUBIN: Absolutely. You need to distinguish here between the military and political side. On the military side, I really believe that the Blair government is beginning to feel vindicated. You can tell the way they're talking, the way their soldiers on the ground are talking, with these moves inside Basra, where the British are now almost completely in charge of Basra, with the moves inside Baghdad, that they've gotten past that first hurdle, where everybody said everything was going wrong and not the way they expected it.

So on the military side, I think they're going to have a fair degree of meeting of the minds and comfort level. But when it comes to the political side, that's a completely different story, and I think there really are big issues between Bush and Blair that they're going to have to hash out.

HEMMER: And how do we hash them out? We heard Kofi Annan just about 90 minutes ago, talking about what he believes truly is a significant role for the U.N. to play in Iraq, but then you have this counterbalance here, about the difficulties going through the Security Council prior to the beginning of this war.

How is all of that meshed together, or is it, successfully?

RUBIN: Well, I think it can be done, but it's going to require magnanimity on the part of the U.S. administration, and it's going to require some flexibility on the part of the French, and Germans and Russians who opposed this war, and those qualities have been sadly lacking to date.

But if they were to try to come together there is a way to do this. And the way to do this is to have the period in which Jay Garner, the retired American general, is running the country be as short as possible, and find a way, perhaps with the involvement of the secretary-general of the United Nations, to get a group of Iraqis both inside and outside Iraq to come together in some interim authority, some interim Iraqi government, that would then be legitimatized by the United Nations Security Council, not as a permanent government, not as the final government. That would come much later, after some elections or some other processes to choose the Iraqi government, similar to what we did in Afghanistan.

But if the United States insists on running the country for many, many months before transitioning to some Iraqi group that would then be able to be endorsed by the U.N., that's going to be a big problem. Because what is not understood well in America, I don't think, is that, unlike the war, where the United States and the British, if they didn't like what was happening on the second resolution, could just throw their hands up and say we tried, and then go to war, in the case of the post-war period, this time the British, the Germans, the French, the Russians, they have leverage. They have a need to endorse the lifting of economic sanctions on Iraq and the allowance of international reconstruction to go in and take control of the assets there. That can't be done without the acquiescence of the opponents of this war. So both sides have to find a way to work together.

HEMMER: Jamie, I got to get back to our imbeds, but quickly here you mentioned a short time, a short period of time before it's handed back to the Iraqis. How do we define that? Paul Wolfowitz said yesterday perhaps six months. In your estimation, what is a safe amount of time before the Iraqis really start getting ticked off and saying, we want our country back?

RUBIN: Well, I think what Wolfowitz was talking about was six months until you get to the legitimate Iraqi government, the government that's selected by the Iraqi people. I don't think he ruled out some period, like six weeks, where the Americans would take over, run the industries, run the ministries, run the oil production, get things started, allow the U.N. to deliver aid, and during those six weeks, you'd have to select a group of Iraqis that would then be endorsed after that six-week period by the Security Council. That's the way to unlock the rule.

HEMMER: OK got it. Jamie, thanks. Jamie Rubin, thanks. We will talk again, I am certain.

Earlier today, just a few minutes ago, I mentioned this bridge near Basra. I misspoke completely. I meant Baghdad, southeast of Baghdad. We do believe this is over a canal that feeds into the Tigris river. Marty Savidge, embedded with the Marines, is providing us this image here, along with his photographer, Scott McWinney (ph), by way of video videophone.

We are told, perhaps within three minutes, the Marines might be ready to detonate this bridge, damage, we're told, as result of fighting over the past 24 hours.

Before we get back to Marty by telephone, Lisa Rose Weaver is situated just outside of Baghdad, I believe.

Lisa, what's happening there?

LISA ROSE WEAVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, yes, Bill. I am just at the perimeter of the International Airport. In the distance to my northeast, I can hear the 3rd Infantry exchanging pretty heavy artillery there with Iraqi forces at the front line. I'm not sure exactly how far away that is for me, several kilometers.

It's not anything that I can see, but I can certainly hear it.

Meanwhile, we arrived here. I am embedded with a Patriot missile battery. It arrived here a few hours ago, and some of the forces here found some old bunkers that the Republican National Guard had apparently left in very much of a hurry. They found quite a lot of unused ammunition, no evidence of chemical weapons, although there were gas masks thrown on the floor, along with clothes and food, some old bread and potatoes, and strangely, baby formula, which one of the investigators here speculates the Republican National Guard may have been eating for nutrients, assuming that bread and potatoes was all else that they were eating.

It happens to be fairly quiet now, but again, intermittent artillery exchange between the 3rd ID and Iraqi forces off to my north -- Bill.

HEMMER: Lisa, thanks. Lisa Rose Weaver, again, embedded right near Baghdad.

Back to Marty now.

Marty, have those vehicles moved out? Are we ready for what we're awaiting now?

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I believe we are, Bill. They have lifted, actually using desk (ph) cord and what they call sort of igniters. So it's not like somebody's standing by with a button to push. This is the boat that you may have seen earlier underneath the pylons there. What they did was they rolled up there, the demolition experts, and then they triggered the igniters , which is really just like -- well, a little more sophisticated than flint against steel. But we are told should be pretty close now, but they had a ten minute fuse, and they measured out. And so like I say, it's not down to the exact second science, but there are a lot of Marines that have gathered here for this event, probably not the most significant event in this war, but it is something they know is going to happen. And the Marines do like to see things go. They're always willing to look at the action. So we'll wait.

HEMMER: Marty, as we wait, I'm assuming this bridge is beyond repair. Am I right?

SAVIDGE I would say.

HEMMER: I would say I'm right.

SAVIDGE: The concussive force just from this vantage point was pretty strong. Now we are going to wait and see just to make sure nothing's going to come flying out on to our head. The smoke is completely obliterated the bridge site, and the flash was so intense I'm having a hard time focusing my eyes.

But we will give it a few seconds here, wait for the smoke to clear. Got a cheer from the Marines. They obviously were impressed by that.

So anyway, the demolition guys didn't hold back on any of their charges on this, judging by the force of the explosion and the way we felt it here. We're just going to wait for the smoke to clear.

But I think you could probably safely say, judging by that, mission accomplished. Now the idea was not to take down the whole bridge, just to take down that center span. And as the dust clears, I think you can start to see that they achieved just that -- Bill.

HEMMER: Wow.

Marty, back up a little bit. Heavy intense fighting over the past 24 hours that led to the damage with that bridge. Hang on a second, Marty.

I believe we've got the -- let's go back a second for our viewers and roll it again, without me talking this time, and watch it.

So we'll wait. You can hear the Marines give up their holler.

Hey, Marty, take us back to realtime right now. What happened 24 hours ago with the intense fighting around that bridge?

SAVIDGE: Well, this bridge was obviously a key crossing point. Any bridge across any waterway at this point close to Baghdad as we are, will be. And it was the job of the 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines, that were spearheading the drive across. First, they had to get through this village here, and it was quite a firefight that was going on last night, RPGs, AK-47 fire and artillery that was being lobbed around the Marines. So they had to fight their way to this position on the banks of this particular canal.

Then at daylight, they were poised to cross over on that bridge, and there was an armored personnel carrier that we understand that was struck by artillery and that two Marines were killed in that strike. We also understand that there may have been other casualties that were suffered as they fought their way through the village. The village is now fully in the control of the U.S. Marines. And there are armored personnel carriers and Humvees, and just lot of, I was going to say leather -- That's the slang jargon that the Marines use to talk of themselves -- now in the alleyways and freeways of this town.

As we drove in, it was interesting that, after the heavy firefight, a lot of people waving, and I'm talking about Iraqi civilians. A lot of people cheering and expressing what seemed to be happiness over the fact that the marines have liberated this particular spot. So it was an intense fight to get here, but now that the units have crossed, pushed over, we are told they are not meeting significant resistance on the other side -- Bill.

HEMMER: Yes, Marty, listen, if you could, if you can have Scott go in. We're told the image is getting very dark as the evening grows longer there in that part of Iraq. If you could maybe go in on that span that's been detonated at this point, and as he does, Marty, maybe you could give our viewers a better idea as to how the temporary construction of a bridge right near you off to the right, how long that took to get done, and also how long it may take for this group of Marines across that river now.

SAVIDGE: Well, I was a little bit drowned out by the sound of that earth mover as it went by. But if you could ask me that question again, I'll be able to hear now.

HEMMER: All right, it's not an exact science, that's clear. If you could have Scott McWinny (ph) maybe go in on that span that's been blown away, so we can see just how precise the detonation was. And while we do that, let our viewers know, again, how long it took to set up that temporary bridge with the number of Humvees and amphibious assault vehicles right now that are moving across that bridge.

SAVIDGE: OK. You're looking at the segment that was destroyed. It's a bit deceiving to you, only because these are actually two spans side by side. What they did was they took out the portion of the heavily damaged span. There's another span that's intact. They're still going to make a determination whether that will be safe for civilian use or not.

In the meantime, it is not probably strong enough or secure enough for the military hardware. We're talking tanks and armored personnel carrier. That's why the engineering unit created this temporary bridge. It was up in a matter of hours, I suppose, and they had units going across.

So they -- as you mentioned before, they practiced this a lot. They even have competitions when they're not doing wars, to see how quickly they can assemble a bridge, and it's usually achieved fairly quickly. You have a lot of prefabricated parts, and it's a matter of setting them down, bolting them together, and they float on pontoons, and then the equipment rolls across. So they will now start pouring all of the Marine assets across their bridge.

We're watching now -- you see -- I'm sure you can't in this light, but that bulldozer is actually starting to move across the other span. So I think we're going to get a pretty test as to how strong the remaining structure is. But again, there were two bridges side by side. They brought down the one that the Iraqis had partially destroyed in their retreat.

HEMMER: Got it. Marty, thanks and have a good night. Thanks for sharing that with us, and to your crew and Scott McWinny (ph) as well.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com