British military official: No pause in campaign
Flow of supplies will not be broken, he says
 |
Group Capt. Al Lockwood said, "We will continue our campaign."
Story Tools
SPECIAL REPORT
|
|
|
DOHA, Qatar (CNN) -- Denying reports of a pause in the push of coalition forces toward Baghdad, a British military spokesman said Saturday that the campaign against Iraq will continue.
"We will continue our campaign," said Group Capt. Al Lockwood, a British Central Command spokesman. "We will use air, and we will use whatever land forces we have available for contact to continue pressing towards our objective."
A Pentagon official said Friday that Air Force and Navy warplanes, along with Army and Marine Corps attack helicopters, were to begin an air campaign against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard arrayed south of Baghdad.
The goal will be to pick apart the Guard's armor and strike its leadership in the field, the official said.
"We need to use air power to obviously restrict and reduce the enemy's capability to attack, and we need to do it so that it's to our timing, when we are at the advantage," Lockwood said.
Media reports have said that U.S. commanders had ordered a four-to-six-day pause, after the rapid advance of forces to within 50 miles of the Iraqi capital.
Lockwood said the flow of supplies to front-line troops would not be interrupted, even though they had arrived on Baghdad's doorstep far more quickly than expected.
"What we're looking at here now is getting our troops fully equipped, rearmed if necessary, but more importantly, in the right positions for the next attack," Lockwood said.
EDITOR'S NOTE: CNN's policy is to not report information that puts operational security at risk.
