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Marines Destroy Hidden Iraqi Artillery
Aired April 08, 2003 - 15:11 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: More -- more U.S. troops are pouring into Baghdad every day. And as they arrive, they're greeted by Iraqi weapons fire.
CNN's Martin Savidge is now in the southeastern edge of Baghdad with the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The Marine unit that we're embedded with came into the actual city of Baghdad early this morning, actually before the sun came up, crossing over a canal, and then entering into Baghdad proper.
As they came in, they came through a grove -- a huge grove, almost a forest of palm trees. And there they came under attack and under fire. As they suppressed that and began to investigate it, they found a huge stash of artillery pieces, anti-aircraft guns and other various forms of ammunition and hardware. And so the Marines quickly went about the job of destroying it.
This is sort of demolition that is done on the fly here. The Marines are obviously still trying to push forward through their objectives. So this is not something carefully planned and drawn out as you might do with a specific demolition team. Instead, it is Marines going through the underbrush there, quickly locating the Iraqi artillery and then using air grenades or incendiary grenades, lobbing them into place there and then running out of the way before they detonate. And there's not only the danger of the initial explosion, but of course all the ammunition that supports that artillery that is there. And, as a result of that, there are secondary explosions that come and go quite frequently.
So this was occupying about a good part of an half hour to an hour for those forces. As they went through that palm grove and methodically piece after piece, wanted to make sure it wouldn't be used again, wanted to make sure, specifically, if anybody came in behind them, they wouldn't be using it to attack them from the rear. And that was their operation there.
Then they moved into an industrial complex. They did run into fighting there. At times, the fighting was intense. Tank fire, mortar fire coming at them. Also heavy machine gun fire outgoing. Marines were heavily outgunning whoever was attacking them. And they came across a stash of what appears to have been a Republican Army guard headquarters or at least a position that might have been in place there to defend. They didn't find anybody there. They did find a lot of equipment that appears to have been abandoned in a hurry, including chemical suits, gas masks, rubber boots, gloves, canisters and medicines, including, we are told, atropene (ph).
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: That was CNN's Martin Savidge with the 7th Marines in southeastern Baghdad on the scene for us.
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 8, 2003 - 15:11 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: More -- more U.S. troops are pouring into Baghdad every day. And as they arrive, they're greeted by Iraqi weapons fire.
CNN's Martin Savidge is now in the southeastern edge of Baghdad with the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The Marine unit that we're embedded with came into the actual city of Baghdad early this morning, actually before the sun came up, crossing over a canal, and then entering into Baghdad proper.
As they came in, they came through a grove -- a huge grove, almost a forest of palm trees. And there they came under attack and under fire. As they suppressed that and began to investigate it, they found a huge stash of artillery pieces, anti-aircraft guns and other various forms of ammunition and hardware. And so the Marines quickly went about the job of destroying it.
This is sort of demolition that is done on the fly here. The Marines are obviously still trying to push forward through their objectives. So this is not something carefully planned and drawn out as you might do with a specific demolition team. Instead, it is Marines going through the underbrush there, quickly locating the Iraqi artillery and then using air grenades or incendiary grenades, lobbing them into place there and then running out of the way before they detonate. And there's not only the danger of the initial explosion, but of course all the ammunition that supports that artillery that is there. And, as a result of that, there are secondary explosions that come and go quite frequently.
So this was occupying about a good part of an half hour to an hour for those forces. As they went through that palm grove and methodically piece after piece, wanted to make sure it wouldn't be used again, wanted to make sure, specifically, if anybody came in behind them, they wouldn't be using it to attack them from the rear. And that was their operation there.
Then they moved into an industrial complex. They did run into fighting there. At times, the fighting was intense. Tank fire, mortar fire coming at them. Also heavy machine gun fire outgoing. Marines were heavily outgunning whoever was attacking them. And they came across a stash of what appears to have been a Republican Army guard headquarters or at least a position that might have been in place there to defend. They didn't find anybody there. They did find a lot of equipment that appears to have been abandoned in a hurry, including chemical suits, gas masks, rubber boots, gloves, canisters and medicines, including, we are told, atropene (ph).
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: That was CNN's Martin Savidge with the 7th Marines in southeastern Baghdad on the scene for us.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
