Battle for Nassiriya: US marines pounded Nassiriya with heavy artillery fire yesterday, and moved a light armoured battalion through the southern Iraqi city, opening a second route north to Baghdad.
A sustained wave of bombing an area south-east of the capital was under way last night after another day of at least four plane and missile attacks on the city.
After suffering significant casualties there in two days of fierce fighting, US forces blasted rounds of 155mm artillery, sending clouds of smoke pluming above Nassiriya, which straddles the Euphrates river.
Reuters correspondent Sean Maguire said US troops he was with had been due to secure two bridges over the Euphrates, about 375 km south-east of the capital, but had been held up by stiff Iraqi resistance late on Sunday and again yesterday.
He said US planes roared over Nassiriya, though it was not clear if these were on bombing runs.
Yesterday evening, he said, a battalion had pushed through the city, coming under small arms fire. South of the Euphrates, US marines were dug in with large columns of heavy armour.
"We can see impact flashes in the city," Maguire said from a position around five km south of Nassiriya, adding he could see thick black smoke billowing from what looked like an oil storage depot on fire.
Gen Tommy Franks, commander of the US-led invasion, told a briefing his forces had entered Nassiriya.
"We're in there now, and we're going to stay there." US marine Capt James Ryans said four of his men were injured by a single mortar fired from north of the river.
Reuters correspondent Matthew Green, with the marines, said a convoy of US military supply vehicles stretched for miles along the highway closer to Baghdad, bypassing Nassiriya, and heading up the south and west bank of the river.
CNN television cited US commanders saying the American death toll since Sunday had risen to 10 and could rise further. The number of wounded stood at 12, with another 16 missing.
US troops captured the northern ends of the two bridges in the east of Nassiriya early on Sunday, opening the way for forces to head north toward the Tigris river and Baghdad. But units of the Fedayeen, an irregular militia force of loyalists to President Saddam Hussein, counter-attacked.
US officers suggested late on Sunday that the bridgeheads were now secure but the area in between was not.
Iraqi Information Minister Mr Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf said on Sunday that foreign invaders headed to Nassiriya had been "taught a lesson they will never forget". Last night, Iraqi TV said that six members of the Ba'ath Party were killed in Nassiriya. Iraqi defence officials said 25 bodies of US soldiers had been found on the battlefield.
Iraq also said yesterday that farmers had shot down two US helicopters south of Baghdad and vowed to show the pilots on television. Gen Franks confirmed the loss of one Apache Longbow helicopter.
Iraqi television showed pictures of the downed Apache in a field surrounded by Iraqis waving rifles. The black helicopter, still armed with guided missiles with US markings on them, appeared intact with no sign of having been shot down. Two helmets were shown at the scene but there was no sign of the crew in the television videotape.
Mr al-Sahaf told a news conference: "Farmers shot down two Apaches. We showed one today and might show the second and the pilots.
"We are holding several other American and British prisoners and we may show some of them. . .They are supporting the criminals, the Zionist regime, and they are talking about the Geneva Convention, so we will continue showing whichever mercenaries fall into our hands."
Iraqi television interviewed the Iraqi farmer it said had shot down the Apache. "It was shot down by the rifle of a heroic farmer from Kerbala, Ali Obeid Mingash, from the Hindiyah tribes. He is a brave fighter, he is one of the sons of great Iraq," said the television correspondent.