March 19, 2003: President Bush’s Address to the Nation on Iraq

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Focus On: Commander in Chief

 

March 19, 2003: President Bush’s Address to the Nation on Iraq

 

By: Callie OettingerDate:March19 , 2012

 

My fellow citizens, at this hour, American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people, and to defend the world from grave danger.

 

On my orders, coalition forces have begun striking selected targets of military importance to undermine Saddam Hussein’s ability to wage war. These are opening stages of what will be a broad and concerted campaign. More than 35 countries are giving crucial support, from the use of naval and air bases, to help with intelligence and logistics, to the deployment of combat units. Every nation in this coalition has chosen to bear the duty and share the honor of serving in our common defense.

 

To all the men and women of the United States Armed Forces now in the Middle East, the peace of a troubled http://www.commandposts.com/2012/03/march-19-2003-president-bushs-address-to-the-nation-on-iraq/

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Operation Iraqi Freedom: March 19–21, 2003

 

By: Walter J. BoyneDate:March19 , 2012

 

Just as SOF operations had hunted down missiles and other important Iraqi weapons, many important initial air attacks came one day before “G” Day, March 20, the launch of ground operations. These included intensified action by Operation Southern Watch aircraft using PGMs against military targets in both southern and western Iraq. The targets included communications sites, mobile early-warning radar, an air-defense command center, SAM systems, long-range artillery positions, and an air traffic control facility at Basra. The air traffic control facility’s wartime mission was to direct antiaircraft fire against coalition aircraft.

 

At 5:43 A.M. on March 20, Baghdad time, four bombs came whistling out of the dark, followed almost immediately by forty missiles, their lethal contents guided by laser and by the GPS. Signals from space took them unerringly to their surprise destinations. The first attack came not with shock and awe but with a blinding series of concussions that saw picked targets in Baghdad collapse into a heap of smoking rubble. The targets reportedly included the residence of Qusay Hussein, where Saddam was supposed to be holding a meeting. Intended by President Bush as a decapitation http://www.commandposts.com/2012/03/operation-iraqi-freedom-march-19%e2%80%9321-2003/