G.I. Held In Attack On U.S. Soldiers
An American soldier was arrested in connection with a grenade and small-arms attack that injured at least 14 others at Camp Pennsylvania in northern Kuwait, reports CBS News Correspondent Mark Strassman, who is on the scene with the Army's 101st Airborne Division.
Strassmann said three grenades were rolled into three officers' tents at the camp. When officers ran from the tents, they were hit by small arms fire.
An American soldier described as an engineering sergeant who was in charge of guarding the grenade depot was being held for questioning. Two Kuwaitis who served as translators were also being questioned.
The American was found injured and hiding in a bunker. Asked if he was hurt throwing a grenade, Strassman reports the soldier replied, "Yes."
Separately, Strassmann reported, an Iraqi rocket fired at U.S. forces in Kuwait was destroyed by Patriot missiles launched from nearby Camp New Jersey.
The attacks on U.S. troops came as the massive American air assault on Baghdad continued. Thunderous blasts struck throughout the day, sending towers of smoke into the air.
On the ground, U.S. and British forces crossed the Euphrates River and were halfway to the capital on Saturday, their swift advance unimpeded by lingering resistance in the cities of Basra and Umm Qasr.
Officials said 1,000 to 2,000 Iraqi soldiers were in allied custody and many others gave up the fight. But CBS News National Security Correspondent David Martin reports a confrontation may be brewing with Saddam's elite Republican Guards near the town of Karbala. The guards may have chemical weapons, Martin says, and are considering whether to use them.
In other major developments:
The Republican Guards are better trained, better equipped and more loyal than the regular Iraqi army, which has put up little resistance to coalition forces so far.
CBS News Military Analyst Gen. Joe Ralston says they're "a capable force but no match for the U.S., though we could wind up with significant casualties."
Warplanes could be heard overhead in Baghdad for a second straight day, but the strikes were less intense than the heavy assault Friday night, which raised fireballs in the city and smashed a number of palaces and government buildings.
Elsewhere, U.S. aircraft bombed Iraqi tanks holding bridges near Basra, the country's second-largest city. In northern Iraq, air strikes and anti-aircraft fire were reported late Saturday in the area of Mosul, a strategic oil site.
U.S. forces also fired Tomahawk cruise missiles at suspected positions of the Ansar al Islam guerrillas, which the United States accuses of ties to al Qaeda terrorists.
An apparent car bomb killed at least five people, including an
Australian cameraman, at a road checkpoint in northeastern Iraq near the Ansar al-Islam camp. At least eight people were injured.
Brig. Gen. Stanley McChrystal of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said U.S. forces launched 500 cruise missiles against Iraq over the past day, along with several hundred precision bombs.
He said ground forces were moving with "impressive speed" but there is concern that battles could lie ahead. McChrystal also said no scud missiles have been fired by Iraq, and that no scuds or weapons of mass destruction have been found inside the country.
A Central Command spokesman said some coalition forces have moved the same distance as the longest maneuver of the 1991 Gulf war in one quarter of the time.
The spokesman, Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, said coalition forces had seized three southern oil facilities, at al Faw, Mina' al Bakr and Khawr al Amaya. They found weapons, ammunition and explosives there.
In his first appearance of the war, the invasion commander said the invasion was succeeding in throwing Saddam Hussein's government into disarray.
"There is a certain confusion that is going on within the regime. I believe the command and control is not exactly as advertised on Iraqi television," Gen. Tommy Franks said.
The fate of the Iraqi leader remained unknown to the U.S. and British officials trying to kill him.
"Actually, I don't know if he's alive or not," said U.S. Gen. Tommy Franks, the war commander.
Saddam was shown on Iraqi TV again Saturday but there was no telling when the tape was made.
U.S. officials had no new, credible intelligence showing whether he had survived assaults on his compounds, or whether he might have been wounded.
Iraqi officials said three people were killed and 200 wounded, mostly civilians, in the first night of the U.S. bombing barrage.
However, the International Committee of the Red Cross on Saturday said the casualty toll was least 100 people from the strikes. The ICRC said earlier that one person died and 14 were wounded on the first day of the war.
At Al Yarmouk Hospital, one of the critically injured was Amal Hassan Kamel. She was in the hospital with her 8-year old son Wa'ad Hashim, who was injured in both legs by shrapnel.
"The Americans have no conscience," Kamel said. "What have our children done to deserve this?"