Iraqi troops leave Baghdad, aim for US force, says CNN

10.45am

UPDATE - KUWAIT - A column of Iraq's elite Republican Guards has streamed out of Baghdad heading towards US forces massed near the southern Iraqi city of Najaf, says CNN television.

CNN correspondent Walter Rodgers, who is travelling with the US 7th Cavalry, said the Iraqi column was moving under cover of a sandstorm which has buffeted Iraq for the past day.

He said US troops were preparing for a possible confrontation within hours and air strikes had been called in.

A US military spokesman in Central Command war headquarters in Qatar said he could not confirm the report.

Such an Iraqi move would likely be aimed at slowing the advance of US troops towards the capital Baghdad.

"It is not known if the Iraqis would attack US units at night in a sandstorm but that is a possibility and everybody's sitting on a very tight hair trigger," CNN's Rodgers reported.

In Baghdad, the Iraqi military said in a statement handed to Reuters that the Republican Guards had engaged the Americans in battle for the first time since the start of the US-British invasion of Iraq six days ago.

The statement gave no details and it was not clear whether the statement was referring to the troops reportedly heading to Najaf.

The Iraqi statement vowed that Iraqi resistance to the US-led invasion would stiffen in the near future.

"The coming days will be more difficult and harsher on them. By God they have no way out of this deadly trap except to admit defeat and flee," said the 18-page statement, which was also read on Iraqi state television.

"After the invaders received painful blows from the sons of Iraq, now is the turn of the heroic elite divisions of the men of difficult missions, the men of the great leader Saddam Hussein, the heroes of the Republican Guards... At dawn today they carried out their first devastating operations inflicting fear and panic in the hearts of the enemy."

Commanded by his youngest son Qusay, the 60-80,000 men in the six divisions of the Republican Guard are mostly minority Sunni Muslims like Saddam himself and are traditionally the shock troops of his armed forces.

The cream of the force is the Special Republican Guard, four more-trusted brigades totalling up to 25,000 men from Saddam's al-Bu Nassir tribe and clans from his home region around Tikrit.

Set up in the 1990s and trained in commando tactics and urban warfare, their job is to protect Baghdad, Saddam's power base around Tikrit, his palaces and other symbols of his rule.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq