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War, War, War See other War, War, War Articles Title: Rockets spread fear in Baghdad's Green Zone Sun Mar 30, 1:48 PM ET BAGHDAD (AFP) - With volleys of mortars and rockets raining down daily on Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone, security rules for soldiers and diplomats in the complex have taken on a chilling new urgency. Two US officials and two Iraqi guards of Sunni Vice-President Tareq al-Hashemi have been killed since last Sunday, when the first waves of attacks began on the zone, seat of the Iraqi government and home to foreign embassies. Some staff members of the US embassy admit they are in a state of constant fear and prefer to sleep on cots inside the embassy building -- formerly a palace of Saddam Hussein -- than in their less-safe living quarters. Warning alarms in the Green Zone, the most shelled 10 square kilometres (four square miles) of Baghdad, give about three seconds to find shelter in one of the numerous "duck and cover" concrete bunkers, a US military officer said. "As you drive through, you are constantly assessing where is the nearest bunker," he added. The officer, who would not be named because he is not authorised to speak to the media, demonstrated to an AFP reporter an incident this week which illustrates the predicament facing those out in the open when the sirens sound. "We were driving here and the bunker is over there," he said, pointing up the road to a shelter about 50 metres (yards) away. "We heard the alarm and I decided to race for it," he added, pushing his foot on the accelerator in a speedy real life re-enactment. Screeching to a halt outside the bunker, he added, "We stopped here and ran inside the bunker. As we got inside a mortar landed on a building about 30 yards away. We could have been killed." For those not able to reach a bunker, the instructions are clear -- lie flat on one's stomach and wait until the all-clear. "Shrapnel flies upwards and the theory is that if you are lying flat you may be saved -- though your ears may be ringing," said Major Tom Holloway, spokesman for the British military in the southern city of Basra. The British base at Basra airport is constantly bombarded with mortar shells and rockets, and artillery batteries are spaced on the perimeter of the sprawling base to engage mortar teams. At the British base, where rockets and mortar bombs are a scary consequence of living within range of Shiite militiamen, troops wear body armour and helmets whenever they leave "hard" buildings -- those that can withstand rocket and mortar attacks. Troops sleep in beds built under a protective hard cover in small cubicles known as "Stonehenge". One photograph of a recent mortar strike shows the entire bulding damaged but the "Stonehenge" system untouched. Joggers at the British base are permitted to go out without protective gear but they have to run in pairs and not at night. In Baghdad's Green Zone, the usually ubiquitous joggers are nowhere to be seen and soldiers in the streets and manning checkpoints now constantly wear body armour. The high profile Green Zone has long been a target of militiamen and insurgents but the intensity of "incoming" fire in the past week was last seen at the height of the violence more than a year ago. "The atmosphere is tense," said a US embassy staffer who asked not to be named. "Our nerves are shot. We are always afraid." The top US commander in Iraq has blamed neighbouring Iran for the rocket bombardments of the Green Zone over the past week, many of which have fallen wide of their target and killed and injuring Iraqis in neighbouring suburbs. General David Petraeus said last week that the projectiles are "Iranian-provided, Iranian-made rockets" and added that Iran's actions were "in complete violation of promises made by President (Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad and the other most senior Iranian leaders to their Iraqi counterparts." Local US commanders say the rocket fire originates from Sadr City, bastion of the Mahdi Army militia of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in eastern Baghdad, where Iraqi and US troops have been battling Shiite gunmen since last week. Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
#1. To: Fire in the hole (#0)
My dream is for the Green Zone to take in a minimum of 3,000 incoming mortar's per day until we retreat in complete defeat.
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