OK, same article the scare head below pointed to:
Iraq's Republican Guard -- Saddam Hussein's most loyal fighters -- and a convoy of at least 1,000 enemy vehicles appeared ready to go on the offensive Wednesday against coalition forces marching toward Baghdad.
Hmm. Have these guys never heard of the Highway of Death? I would think that anything coming south at this point would be destroyed without a second thought. And the weather is supposed to be clearing...
Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf said Wednesday that more than 500 people were wounded and about 200 houses destroyed as U.S. troops stormed through Nasiriya.
War is hell.
Iraq also said two cruise missiles struck a residential area of Al-Shaab in Baghdad on Wednesday, killing 14 people and injuring 30 others. Central Command is checking into the report. A spokesman noted that coalition forces take "extraordinary" measures to protect civilians.
I have to say that what I saw on TV looked an awful lot like the aftermath of a car or truck bomb, suggesting to me that this was an attempt to make the coalition look bad. Even so, if cruise missiles actually did go off target and hit a residential area, again:
War is hell.
From another article, Iraqi reaction to the so-called cruise missile bombing:
Hundreds of people milled around on the street in front of the gutted market. Some of them shook their fists in anger."This is barbarian!" shouted Adnan Saleh Barseem. "It's proof that their aggression is collapsing."
Crowds consisting of residents of some of the damaged apartments began to chant: "Oh, Saddam, we sacrifice our souls and blood to you."
And farther down in the same article:
"We are determined to defend our capital after what we have seen of our brothers' resistance in the south," Baghdad truck driver Ahmed Falah said. "The whole world is with us now, even the weather, because the sandstorm has brought benefits to us. They are the storms of God."
If you idiot Iraqis would turn on your leaders and shoot your officers, this war could be over very quickly, and a lot fewer of you would die. And if God is trying to screw anyone over with the sandstorm, rest assured that a sandstorm doesn't screw up our JDAMs. A target is at the same GPS coordinates regardless of the weather. (This is not to say that wind gusts couldn't bodily throw a weapon off course, but YET AGAIN: WAR IS HELL.)
