Baghdad ablaze as ‘shock and awe’ begins
In a night of mass destruction, the US and allied forces pummelled Baghdad with a deadly array of weaponry.
Ground troops could storm Baghdad in a matter of days after the US 3rd Infantry Division advanced within 200 miles of the Iraqi capital.
Late last night leading elements of a coalition armoured column were at the gates of Basra, Iraq's second city. There were sporadic reports of the city having fallen, but none of these were confirmed.
Big explosions were also heard around the city of Kirkuk in the north, and anti-aircraft guns peppered the skies over Mosul.
In a day of swift developments, US and British marines captured the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr while troops also seized two airfields in the Iraqi desert 140 and 180 miles (225km and 290km) west of the capital, part of a move to encircle Baghdad.
Fires raged across the Iraqi capital, with President Saddam Hussein's "Old Palace" compound, the main seat of government, among the targets hit at the start of "A-Day" marking the beginning of the air war. There were reports that the Old Palace was hit by a dozen bombs.
As a huge fire raged in the south of the city, the US military said last night up to 1,000 targets would be attacked during the course of the night.
During the bombing in Baghdad, the district housing and information ministries and Iraqi television stations were among those hit, but state television remained on air.
In a lull after the first blitz, the station broadcast footage showing Saddam and his son Qusay, but it was unclear when the footage was shot. There were persistent reports that Saddam was injured or killed in Wednesday night's raid on Iraq.
The US Navy launched some 320 Tomahawk cruise missiles each one costing US$1m from ships in the Gulf and the Red Sea into Baghdad, senior US officials said.
RAF fighters and Royal Navy submarines firing cruise missiles were also involved alongside US warships and warplanes.
The bombing began shortly after 1700GMT and reached a first dramatic crescendo in Baghdad around an hour later when strike after strike was caught by live television lighting up the capital's skyline. The assault raged as the US said coalition forces had pushed 100 miles into Iraq, one-third of the way toward the Iraqi capital.
America unleashed its promised war of "shock and awe" with a massive aerial bombardment into Iraq, that aimed to destroy 1,000 sites.
There were no indications last night of the amount of deaths caused but in a city with a population of five million, hundreds of casualties were expected.
Baghdad was bombarded in an assault intended to paralyse the Iraqi military and force Saddam into submission.
US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the air attacks would be of a "scope and scale which made it clear to Iraqis that Saddam and his regime were finished". "They are beginning to realise, I suspect, that the regime is history and as that realisation sets in their behaviour is likely to begin to tip and to change.
"Those close to Saddam Hussein will likely begin searching for a way to save themselves," Mr Rumsfeld said. Iraqi troops were reported to be surrendering across the country in "significant numbers" as US and British armoured columns punched deep into Iraq. Reports that senior Iraqi military officials were in talks about surrender were dismissed last night by Iraqi officials. A spokesman defiantly rejected talks of surrender and called US President George W Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair "criminals".
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