Looting, cheering in Baghdad streets
| Graphic: Iraq falling under U.S., British control |
By Ellen Knickmeyer and David Crary
Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq Widespread, often jubilant looting of government buildings erupted today in Baghdad neighborhoods taken by U.S troops, a clear sign that Saddam Hussein's authority was collapsing. Army and Marine units pushed from the east and west to link up in the city center.
"Thank you, thank you, Mr. Bush," some of the looters shouted.
On a Baghdad street, a white-haired man held up a poster of Saddam and beat it with his shoe. A younger man spat on the portrait, and several others launched kicks at the face of the Iraqi president.
"Come see, this is freedom. This is the criminal, this is the infidel," he said. "This is the destiny of every traitor. He killed millions of us."
"We are with the U.S.!" said one man, carrying a rifle with one hand.
U.S. commanders also focused attention on another target Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, still a stronghold of loyalist troops. The fate of Saddam remained unknown; his supporters retained control of the upscale Baghdad neighborhood targeted by four 2,000-pound bombs in a U.S. strike aimed at killing the Iraqi president.
Elsewhere in the capital, however, U.S. forces steadily expanded their reach, securing a military airport, capturing a prison, setting fire to a Republican Guard barracks. They are now operating in every quadrant of the city.
The Marines pushed forward today, securing routes inside the city and pursuing roving bands of three or four Iraqis armed with rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons.
In one sector of southeastern Baghdad taken by the Marines, numerous civilians were out and about in the streets, some giving thumbs-ups to U.S. troops.
The two commanders discussed what buildings could be used to house U.S. military units and a new government to replace Saddam's.
"That's the next mental jump, is for the Iraqis to realize that even if he (Saddam Hussein) is still alive, he's not in charge anymore," Perkins said.
There were signs that the Iraqi government's efforts to sustain its public relations campaign were collapsing. State television went off the air yesterday, and today, foreign journalists said their "minders" government agents who monitor their reporting did not turn up for work.
Tikrit, in the desert about 90 miles to the north, was defended by well-trained troops, and is home to many of Saddam's most devoted followers.
The city of 260,000 is considered one of the few remaining strongholds of the Iraqi regime.
Capt. Frank Thorp, a U.S. Central Command spokesman, said coalition airstrikes were targeting the Republican Guard's Adnan division in Tikrit, "shaping the battlefield" before U.S. ground forces move in.
Coalition rescue teams were searching today for the crew of a F-15E fighter jet that went down on a mission near Tikrit. The U.S. Central Command said the cause of the incident was unknown; but if shot down, it would be only the second coalition plane felled by Iraqi fire.
The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of two main Iraqi Kurdish groups opposing Saddam, claimed yesterday that Saddam was hiding in Tikrit.
U.S. officials said they didn't know if he had escaped Monday's bombing of a site in Baghdad's al-Mansour neighborhood where he and at least one of his sons reportedly were meeting.
Residents of al-Mansour estimated that 14 people, including at least seven children, were killed and scores wounded in homes and shops adjacent to the targeted site.
The toll of journalists killed in the war reached 10, with three killed in U.S. military strikes yesterday in Baghdad.
In the southern city of Basra, Group Capt. Al Lockwood, a British spokesman, said British forces were shifting from a combat role to peacekeeping duties, and were finding the task of restoring order in Basra challenging.
"It's a large town we are quite thin on the ground," he told BBC radio. "We need to instill the confidence of the community in the remnants of the police force that have not been tainted by Saddam Hussein's regime."