World Beat: Iraq
Air strikes hit Iraqi market

By Aaron Weiner
The Flat Hat

Errant U.S. air strikes possibly struck a Baghdad market early Wednesday morning, according to the March 26 edition of The Washington Post. Iraqi officials claimed that 14 civilians were killed and at least 30 were wounded.

Some reports put the total as high as 15 dead. It is still unconfirmed whether or not the air strikes were of U.S. origin.

Reports suggest this is the likely cause, but neither The Washington Post nor CNN.com could independently verify that U.S. munitions caused the damage.

Such an event would be the first major civilian incident so far in the current war with Iraq.

Before the market was attacked, Iraqi officials claimed that 78 civilian deaths had occurred due to air strikes, but this claim could also not be independently verified.

Until now, every level of the U.S. military has emphasized the precision with which air strikes have landed.

Recently U.S. Central Command stated that it had used precision-guided weapons to attack missiles and launchers located in residential areas of Baghdad within 300 feet of homes.

President George W. Bush hailed the "lethal precision" of the air campaign Wednesday morning.

Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, at the daily U.S. Central Command briefing in Qatar, said he did not know if a coalition strike hit the area, but if it did, it would have been a mistake.

Allied forces, he said, "have a very, very deliberate process for targeting" that is unlike any other in the world.

Brooks said the Baghdad market incident will be investigated but it was important to keep in mind that coalition forces had observed Iraqi fighters forcing Iraqi civilians to march out in front of them, as well as the placement of Iraqi military supplies and troops near civilian structures.

"Iraqi civilians [are] being marched out in front of irregular formations while they are firing," Brooks said. "Iraqi civilians are being killed on the battlefield by Iraqis. I can't make that point more strongly than I've just done."

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Wednesday he was "increasingly concerned" about civilian casualties in Iraq.

He urged the warring sides to take "all necessary steps" to protect civilians.

Meanwhile, the war continues at a fast pace, despite being slowed by battlefield confusion and a sandstorm, which many Iraqis have claimed to be an act of God.

U.S. war planners may have miscalculated the strength and capability of paramilitary fighters in Iraq, a Pentagon official said Wednesday, according to CNN.com, as the first week of fighting came to an end.

Fighters of the Fedayeen Saddam, one of Iraq's most feared paramilitary groups, along with members of the ruling Baath Party and other security forces, have launched several attacks against U.S. and British forces in the past week.

"We may have underestimated that they were dispersed to so many places across Iraq to enforce regime discipline," the Pentagon official said. "It's clear now they dispersed sometime before the war began."

Members of the group have caused problems for coalition forces in some areas, where they have disguised themselves as civilians to ambush troops or pretended to surrender and opened fire, acts the United States has called "serious violations of the laws of war."

Fighting was reported Wednesday in Karbala, Najaf, Nasiriya and Basra, all cities south of Baghdad. There was no indication of when coalition forces might reach the Iraqi capital.

Bush said Wednesday that the "military is making good progress" but that the war is far from over in Iraq.

"As they approach Baghdad, our fighting units are facing the most desperate elements of a doomed regime," Bush told troops in a speech at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida, the home of U.S. Central Command, according to a CNN.com report from March 27.