US and British forces advanced through southern Iraq, some racing unimpeded across the desert, others meeting hostile fire. Hundreds of Iraqi soldiers surrendered.
The forces reported their first combat casualty, a US Marine killed in southern Iraq.
Twelve more Marines — eight British and four American -‒ died when their helicopter crashed and burned in Kuwait. Officials said the crash was not caused by hostile fire.
Hoping Iraq might capitulate, US military commanders held back-channel negotiations with Iraqi commanders and refrained from all-out bombardment. Instead, US missiles and bombs struck specific targets –including the main presidential palace in Baghdad and strongholds of the Iraqi army’s elite Special Republican Guard.
The spokesman for British forces in the Persian Gulf said coalition troops might enter Baghdad within the next ”three or four days”.
Group Captain Al Lockwood, speaking to reporters at the main allied command center in Qatar, said the US-led attack could enter the Iraqi capital swiftly.
”If I was a betting man, and I’m not, I would say hopefully within the next three or four days,” the British news agency Press Association quoted Lockwood as saying.
In western England, American B-52 bombers began taking off from a British air base. Officials refused to disclose their mission; they would be capable of reaching Iraq in about six hours.
US officials said Iraqi forces appeared cut off from their leadership after the initial missile attack on a Baghdad compound.
It was struck because of intelligence reports that Saddam Hussein
was inside.
The officials said there was no definitive word on whether Saddam was caught in the attack, but they indicated that medical workers were summoned to the compound after it was hit.
Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Sa’eed al-Sahhaf acknowledged on Friday that one of Saddam Hussein’s homes was hit in Thursday’s bombing, though he said no one was hurt.
”They rocketed the residence of his household,” he said. ”But thank God they are all safe,” he told reporters in Baghdad, the Iraqi capital.
Saddam appeared on Iraqi television on Thursday a few hours after the attack; US intelligence experts are analysing the footage to determine if it was taped before the air strike.
The official Iraqi News Agency said 37 people were injured in Thursday night’s raid at heart of Baghdad and in other locations inside and outside the city. The Iraqi military said four soldiers were killed and six others wounded in Thursday’s air strikes, but gave no figures for losses in ground combat.
In the war zone, one convoy from the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force was targeted by Iraqi rockets and small-arms fire just after it crossed over the border from Kuwait, according to a BBC reporter with the unit. Another Marine unit, the 7th Infantry’s 3rd Battalion, had to delay its foray into Iraq after it was reported that numerous tanks were sighted unexpectedly on the Iraqi side of the border.
The unit took small-arms and artillery fire on Thursday night and at one point a US Cobra helicopter accidentally fired a missile at an American tank, injuring one soldier and forcing abandonment of the smoldering tank.
But overall, resistance to the allies was limited. Within a few hours of crossing into southern Iraq, the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit encountered 200 or more Iraqi troops seeking to surrender.
One group of 40 Iraqis marched down a two-lane road toward the Americans and gave up. They were told to lie face down on the ground, then were searched by Marines.
US forces took the border town of Safwan, where residents waved at Marines but said little. A woman threw herself to the feet of soldiers until a man hurriedly came and led her away. Another man showed a bloody hand and said his wife was shot in the leg by the Americans.
Iraq’s forces appear to have pulled back to Basra. ”Iraq officers have split and run right back to Basra,” said Capt. Joe Tlenzler, a spokesperson for the 1st Marine Division.
Soldiers from the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division also crossed into Iraq and encountered several Iraqi armored personnel carriers, destroying at least three, troops reported by radio. British troops moved on the strategic al-Faw peninsula — Iraq’s access point to the Persian Gulf and the site of major oil facilities.
US Marines seized a portion of the main road leading from Kuwait into the southern Iraqi city of Basra, suppressing earlier resistance from Iraqi mortars and arms.
Supported by Cobra attack helicopters and howitzers, Marine tanks and armored vehicles rolled down Route 80 through the demilitarised zone between Kuwait and Iraq.
A Kuwaiti military spokesman said late Friday that an Iraqi missile had been destroyed by three Patriot missiles in the afternoon. Col. Youssef al-Mullah did not say where it happened.
Still waiting back in Kuwait was the 3rd Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division.
Sgt. Jose Rivera (24) slept in the bed of his truck, then awoke to get ready for a push into Iraq.
”With all the training in the rear, I feel prepared,” said Rivera. ”I’m nervous, but not scared.”
Iraqi troops set fire to 30 of the hundreds of oil wells in the region, British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon said. Iraq has 1 685 oil wells and exported two million barrels daily before the war.
Thousands of anti-war activists protested in the United States, blocking streets, boycotting classes and chaining themselves together. More than 1 500 people were arrested, mostly at a raucous demonstration in San Francisco.
”Support the US or keep your mouth shut,” said one sign in Mississippi.
More than 1 300 people were arrested in San Francisco, and one protester died after falling from the Golden Gate Bridge.
”America is different today,” said Jason Mark, a San Francisco activist. ”We’ve just launched an unprovoked, unjust war.”
Large anti-war protests also took place in many cities abroad.
Demonstrators marched in Manila, Philippines; Beijing; Rome; Berlin; Stockholm, Sweden; and the West Bank. More than 100 000 protesters rallied in Athens. – Sapa-AP