U.S. warplanes continued their assault on the Iraqi leadership yesterday, blowing away the Baghdad headquarters of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath Party with Tomahawk missiles.
The precision strike took place shortly after the United States unleashed two of its monster 4,700-pound bunker-buster bombs on a communications site inside the Iraqi capital.
A U.S. military official said the allied forces believed the party headquarters was being used as a command and control center for the “death squads” that have been using guerrilla warfare and terror tactics against Iraqi citizens and coalition troops.
Witnesses said eight people were killed in the afternoon strike at the office inside the Mansour district, including party militia members and civilians.
The missile attack also demolished some nearby houses, witnesses said.
“It basically turned the block into rubble,” said Reuters reporter Nadim Ladki.
The United States has been targeting the offices of Saddam’s political party all over Iraq after obtaining intelligence that the offices were being used to direct military attacks.
Allied forces have already destroyed party offices in An Najaf, Nasiriyah and Basra, hoping to disrupt military communications.
That also was the goal of the bunker-busters, which targeted a telecommunications center in downtown Baghdad using satellite-guided technology.
The massive blast gutted the building and sent a spectacular tower of smoke churning high into the air.
Husein Moeini, the city’s telecommunications director, said he believed people were buried beneath the center’s rubble, but journalists who arrived at the scene less than three hours after it was hit did not see a rescue operation under way.
The bunker-buster, officially the Enhanced Guided Bomb Unit-28, is the largest bomb dropped so far in Operation Iraqi Freedom. The two bombs were dropped by a B-2 stealth bomber.
The explosion, televised live, was so massive that the Pentagon had to issue a statement denying it used the Massive Ordnance Air Burst – the biggest conventional weapon in the U.S. arsenal at more than 15,000 pounds.
The strike was part of a second phase of the “shock and awe” campaign designed to take out Iraqi military and leadership communications, now that it’s clear Saddam survived the initial airstrike on his compound and appears to be directing Iraqi resistance to the allied invasion.
The bunker-buster is an enhanced version of big bombs that were rushed into development during the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
They are satellite-guided to their targets by a global-positioning device and fitted so they can be used by the radar-evading B-2 rather than a more vulnerable F-15 Eagle.
They contain 630 pounds of high explosives and can penetrate through 20 feet of concrete and 100 feet of rock and dirt before exploding, according to Air Force officials.
They are equipped with special timed fuses that detect the layers of earth before detonating.
With Post Wire Services
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SUPPLYING THE TROOPS (graphic)
As U.S. ground forces move from Kuwait toward Baghdad, they are faced with the challenge of keeping supply lines open across long stretches of hostile territory. Some supplies were pre-positioned and some can be dropped by helicopter, but much of the cargo must be taken across country in convoys of trucks.
CONSUMPTION STATISTICS
FUEL
* An armored division: 565,000 gallons per day
* A Cobra attack helicopter: 150 gallons per hour
* An M1 Abrams tank in one hour of cross-country travel: 60 gallons per hour
WATER
* A division of 16,000 men and their equipment in an arid environment: 320,000 gallons per day
AMONG THE MILITARY MOVERS
HMMWV TRUCK: Carries 4,400 pounds
M1083 STANDARD CARGO TRUCK: CArries 10,000 pounds
XM1091 FUEL/WATER TANKER: Carries 1,500 gallons
HEAVY EXPANDED MOBILITY TACTICAL TRUCK: Carries 2,500 gallons of fuel or serves as cargo haul or crane.
SOURCE: Defense Department, Globalsecurity.org
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THE TOLL OF WAR
DEAD
U.S. MILITARY IN COMBAT: 21
ALLIED MILITARY IN COMBAT: 2
ACCIDENTAL/FRIENDLY FIRE
U.S.: 6
ALLIES: 18
MISSING
U.S.: 21
ALLIES: 2
JOURNALISTS: 10 (m)
JOURNALISTS: 16 (s, lcf)
POWs
U.S.: 7
ALLIES: 2
IRAQI: About 4,500
Source: Reuters
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