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Military Analysis of New Explosions in Baghdad

Aired March 31, 2003 - 14:38   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.


WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: I want to go back to Baghdad right now, where we're seeing extensive smoke now surfacing over the city skyline. Once again, explosions had been heard in the Iraqi capital just a little while ago. Now we see the result of those explosions. More smoke coming up, as you can see, on these live pictures in Baghdad just after 10:30 p.m. local time, a time when the U.S. and its coalition partners like to go after specific targets in and around the Iraqi capital.
Many of those targets, we're told -- some of those six Iraqi Republican Guard divisions encircling Baghdad, not necessarily inside Baghdad itself. That's where the special Republican Guard are set up, a totally separate unit of Saddam Hussein's military. But clearly the U.S. Going after some targets.

General Don Shepperd, U.S. Air Force retired, is watching these pictures with us. So what do you make of this latest smoke that we're seeing, General Shepperd, similar to what we've seen over the past few days.

RET. MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, U.S. AIR FORCE, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, Wolf, I could tell you better if I could see it during the daylight. But give me -- let me give you a little tutorial on smoke.

Basically, small bombs make small smoke and big bombs make a lot of smoke. If you see a huge explosion with a lot going straight up in the air, that's, generally speaking, a "bunker buster" that buries deep under the ground. If you see a big explosion with kind of a round plume, if you will, it's probably a surface blast, and of course the smaller bombs make smaller.

Now, in addition to that, I look at the color of the smokes. Generally speaking, gray or white smoke means a structure fire and a black smoke means a petroleum fire. We've seen a lot of the petroleum fires, a lot of them set by the Iraqis themselves to obscure visibility over Baghdad, and then some of it, possibly, petroleum storage being hit by the -- by the coalition, Wolf. But it's very hard to tell at night.

BLITZER: Reuters is now reporting, General Shepperd -- they have an eyewitness in Baghdad -- saying two huge explosions had been heard in central Baghdad. And as we can see, fire rages, the normal aftermath of a bombing campaign.

Central Baghdad would not necessarily be those six Republican guard divisions but presumably could be what we've seen extensively over the past few days, more of an effort to weaken Iraq's telecommunications capability, specifically in and around the Ministry of Information and Iraqi television which the U.S. military, including the chairman of the Joint Chiefs only yesterday -- General Richard Myers -- saying they're going after Iraqi television. They don't want the Iraqi leadership to be on the air any longer. They've not yet succeeded in completely getting them off the air, although they have taken them off the air for a few hours at a time.

Why is it so hard, General Shepperd, to destroy Iraqi TV capabilities?

SHEPPERD: Well, Wolf, the Iraqis have had many years to prepare for this. There are literally tens, if not hundreds of alternate sites from which they can broadcast. And they can also do it with mobile equipment.

So as this mobile equipment and alternate sites are being occupied around the city, it is very likely that these will become targets. However, the coalition has to be very careful with the type of weapon used.

Renay San Miguel and I did a piece here just about an hour ago on the various methods of taking this out without destroying all the buildings. In addition, as the leadership moves around into new underground bunkers or new locations, all of those become targets for the coalition. So you could be seeing strikes in expanded areas around Baghdad as the leadership moves and as, of course, as Republican Guard Forces move either to or through positions around Baghdad, Wolf.

BLITZER:: All right, General Shepperd, Reuters is moving another bulletin right now. Eyewitness saying that these bombs have targeted presidential -- a presidential complex used by Saddam Hussein's son. Clearly, there are two sons, Uday and Qusay.

Christiane Amanpour is in southern Iraq. She's watching. She's monitoring these developments. As these air strikes continue in central Iraq in and around Baghdad, Christiane, it's having an impact, I assume, on the British forces where you are as well. They get encouraged, I assume, when they hear reports that the U.S. is undermining, degrading, if you will, the capabilities of the Iraqi leadership.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, actually, you know, they don't really brief us that much on what the Americans are doing in Baghdad. That's essentially an American part of this war, as you know.

We do get briefings, a little bit, as to what 5th Corps and the other U.S. Army units are doing progressing towards up Baghdad. But really the bombing of Baghdad is not actually having much impact on the operations down here or on the way, the rest of the coalition.

In other words, the British troops are responding. For them, they have this area of responsibility and they're already occupied quite heavily with trying to neutralize the Iraqi resistance in Basra, which is proving to be a lot stronger than they had though and it's taking them a lot longer than they had anticipate to get Umm Qasr, for instance, Zafyan (ph), Zuber (ph), all these town in the south on the port and up towards Basra. So that's taking a lot of time, a lot of effort, not just in terms of war fighting but also psychological operations, psychological warfare and an attempt to bring humanitarian aid in to try to get the people on the side of the U.K. and U.S. attempt here in -- in Iraq.

BLITZER: Christiane, the kind of bombing that we've seen in Baghdad -- I don't believe any thing similar has happened in Basra, even though that city is still not under coalition control. Have there been significant airstrikes around Basra?

AMANPOUR: No. In a word, no. They're being absolutely -- really, very, very cautious on how exactly they go after Basra.

And it's not that they want to, at least so far -- we've been told that they're not planning to sort of go in and conquer Basra. What they've been trying to, and it's gone on for nearly two weeks now, is basically sit outside and gradually and increasingly put the pressure on the city. They have the west, they have -- or rather the western outskirts. They've now consolidated around the south, the southeastern part of Basra. And they're trying to put the pressure specifically on the Ba'ath Party political structure and on the irregulars who are really fighting in there against the British forces outside.

So what they're trying to do is break the back of the political control there and they think that by doing that, they will give the people space to -- quote -- use this word -- "rise up," and essentially welcome the British in. But so far, there isn't any notion that they're going to the kind of sort of assault, the street- by-street fighting that one would have to do potentially to take a city the size of Basra.

BLITZER: Christiane, stand by. I want to get back to you in a few moments. The president of the United States is about to speak in Philadelphia. He's going to be speaking about homeland security, the role of the U.S. Coast Guard, but also, presumably, he's going to be speaking about the situation in Iraq as well.

As we look at the pictures from Baghdad, I want to bring our viewers -- let our viewers here the president 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 March 31, 2003 - 14:38   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: I want to go back to Baghdad right now, where we're seeing extensive smoke now surfacing over the city skyline. Once again, explosions had been heard in the Iraqi capital just a little while ago. Now we see the result of those explosions. More smoke coming up, as you can see, on these live pictures in Baghdad just after 10:30 p.m. local time, a time when the U.S. and its coalition partners like to go after specific targets in and around the Iraqi capital.
Many of those targets, we're told -- some of those six Iraqi Republican Guard divisions encircling Baghdad, not necessarily inside Baghdad itself. That's where the special Republican Guard are set up, a totally separate unit of Saddam Hussein's military. But clearly the U.S. Going after some targets.

General Don Shepperd, U.S. Air Force retired, is watching these pictures with us. So what do you make of this latest smoke that we're seeing, General Shepperd, similar to what we've seen over the past few days.

RET. MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, U.S. AIR FORCE, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, Wolf, I could tell you better if I could see it during the daylight. But give me -- let me give you a little tutorial on smoke.

Basically, small bombs make small smoke and big bombs make a lot of smoke. If you see a huge explosion with a lot going straight up in the air, that's, generally speaking, a "bunker buster" that buries deep under the ground. If you see a big explosion with kind of a round plume, if you will, it's probably a surface blast, and of course the smaller bombs make smaller.

Now, in addition to that, I look at the color of the smokes. Generally speaking, gray or white smoke means a structure fire and a black smoke means a petroleum fire. We've seen a lot of the petroleum fires, a lot of them set by the Iraqis themselves to obscure visibility over Baghdad, and then some of it, possibly, petroleum storage being hit by the -- by the coalition, Wolf. But it's very hard to tell at night.

BLITZER: Reuters is now reporting, General Shepperd -- they have an eyewitness in Baghdad -- saying two huge explosions had been heard in central Baghdad. And as we can see, fire rages, the normal aftermath of a bombing campaign.

Central Baghdad would not necessarily be those six Republican guard divisions but presumably could be what we've seen extensively over the past few days, more of an effort to weaken Iraq's telecommunications capability, specifically in and around the Ministry of Information and Iraqi television which the U.S. military, including the chairman of the Joint Chiefs only yesterday -- General Richard Myers -- saying they're going after Iraqi television. They don't want the Iraqi leadership to be on the air any longer. They've not yet succeeded in completely getting them off the air, although they have taken them off the air for a few hours at a time.

Why is it so hard, General Shepperd, to destroy Iraqi TV capabilities?

SHEPPERD: Well, Wolf, the Iraqis have had many years to prepare for this. There are literally tens, if not hundreds of alternate sites from which they can broadcast. And they can also do it with mobile equipment.

So as this mobile equipment and alternate sites are being occupied around the city, it is very likely that these will become targets. However, the coalition has to be very careful with the type of weapon used.

Renay San Miguel and I did a piece here just about an hour ago on the various methods of taking this out without destroying all the buildings. In addition, as the leadership moves around into new underground bunkers or new locations, all of those become targets for the coalition. So you could be seeing strikes in expanded areas around Baghdad as the leadership moves and as, of course, as Republican Guard Forces move either to or through positions around Baghdad, Wolf.

BLITZER:: All right, General Shepperd, Reuters is moving another bulletin right now. Eyewitness saying that these bombs have targeted presidential -- a presidential complex used by Saddam Hussein's son. Clearly, there are two sons, Uday and Qusay.

Christiane Amanpour is in southern Iraq. She's watching. She's monitoring these developments. As these air strikes continue in central Iraq in and around Baghdad, Christiane, it's having an impact, I assume, on the British forces where you are as well. They get encouraged, I assume, when they hear reports that the U.S. is undermining, degrading, if you will, the capabilities of the Iraqi leadership.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, actually, you know, they don't really brief us that much on what the Americans are doing in Baghdad. That's essentially an American part of this war, as you know.

We do get briefings, a little bit, as to what 5th Corps and the other U.S. Army units are doing progressing towards up Baghdad. But really the bombing of Baghdad is not actually having much impact on the operations down here or on the way, the rest of the coalition.

In other words, the British troops are responding. For them, they have this area of responsibility and they're already occupied quite heavily with trying to neutralize the Iraqi resistance in Basra, which is proving to be a lot stronger than they had though and it's taking them a lot longer than they had anticipate to get Umm Qasr, for instance, Zafyan (ph), Zuber (ph), all these town in the south on the port and up towards Basra. So that's taking a lot of time, a lot of effort, not just in terms of war fighting but also psychological operations, psychological warfare and an attempt to bring humanitarian aid in to try to get the people on the side of the U.K. and U.S. attempt here in -- in Iraq.

BLITZER: Christiane, the kind of bombing that we've seen in Baghdad -- I don't believe any thing similar has happened in Basra, even though that city is still not under coalition control. Have there been significant airstrikes around Basra?

AMANPOUR: No. In a word, no. They're being absolutely -- really, very, very cautious on how exactly they go after Basra.

And it's not that they want to, at least so far -- we've been told that they're not planning to sort of go in and conquer Basra. What they've been trying to, and it's gone on for nearly two weeks now, is basically sit outside and gradually and increasingly put the pressure on the city. They have the west, they have -- or rather the western outskirts. They've now consolidated around the south, the southeastern part of Basra. And they're trying to put the pressure specifically on the Ba'ath Party political structure and on the irregulars who are really fighting in there against the British forces outside.

So what they're trying to do is break the back of the political control there and they think that by doing that, they will give the people space to -- quote -- use this word -- "rise up," and essentially welcome the British in. But so far, there isn't any notion that they're going to the kind of sort of assault, the street- by-street fighting that one would have to do potentially to take a city the size of Basra.

BLITZER: Christiane, stand by. I want to get back to you in a few moments. The president of the United States is about to speak in Philadelphia. He's going to be speaking about homeland security, the role of the U.S. Coast Guard, but also, presumably, he's going to be speaking about the situation in Iraq as well.

As we look at the pictures from Baghdad, I want to bring our viewers -- let our viewers here the president 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