Tank army advances to Baghdad

By ANDREW LAXON and AGENCIES

US and British forces were racing across the southern Iraqi desert towards Baghdad last night as American officials talked up hopes of a quick and relatively small-scale war.

Television viewers watched live pictures of tanks speeding hundreds of kilometres into Iraq and meeting virtually no resistance.

Reporters with the troops said scores of Iraqi soldiers were surrendering to US Marines and British commandos, who hoped to reach the Iraqi capital within three or four days.

But coalition forces also suffered early casualties when a US Marine helicopter crashed in an accident in northern Kuwait, killing all eight British and four American soldiers on board.

A US Marine in the 1st Expeditionary Force in the ground assault in southern Iraq became the first reported combat casualty of the war.

Iraqi fire forced one Marine regiment to retreat at the Kuwait border. It later broke through with the help of British artillery and raised the Stars and Stripes flag over the new port of Umm Qasr. The old port remained in Iraqi hands, but the British predicted it would fall.

In other developments late yesterday:

* Iraqi forces set fire to up to 30 oil wells near the southern city of Basra, causing a rise in oil prices and fears of environmental disaster.

* British commandos and US Navy Seals captured the Al Faw peninsula on the Persian Gulf, a route for oil tankers.

* Intelligence sources said US special forces had captured the Kirkuk oil fields in northern Iraq.

* The first American B-52s to take off from England left Fairford airbase in Gloucestershire late last night, all eight armed with missiles.

* The Washington Post reported that Saddam Hussein was inside a Baghdad bunker hit by bombs or missiles, but Iraq's Information Minister, Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf, said Saddam was safe.

* Europe suffered another terrorism scare when the poison ricin was found in a locker at a Paris train station.

One flying armoured column of US troops was at least 200km inside Iraq last night (NZT), racing north at up to 50km/h in the direction of Baghdad, a Reuters correspondent with the troops reported.

Luke Baker said the 3rd Infantry Division - travelling in a convoy of more than 2000 tanks, assault vehicles, Humvees, trucks and fuel tankers - had not come under fire since starting its advance from Kuwait.

David Fox, also from Reuter, said he saw 30 huge fireballs on the horizon near Basra within 15 minutes and heard US bombers overheard, suggesting the city was under heavy bombing and artillery fire.

In southern Iraq, reporters travelling with US military units reported flames on the horizon over Iraq's al Rumeila oil field.

Iraqi forces set fire to wells or pipelines, in a repeat of Saddam's tactics in the 1991 Gulf War. They also set alight oil-filled defensive trenches.

"Oil trenches are burning all over southeastern Iraq right now," said one Marine intelligence officer.



In earlier attacks, more than two dozen Tomahawk missiles launched by US and British submarines and warships rocked Baghdad, hitting the main presidential palace, the Ministry of Planning, the strongholds of Saddam's Republican Guard, an office of Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz and the security organisation headed by Saddam's younger son, Qusay.

The ruins of Qusay's compound were still smouldering after 24 hours. It was not known if he was in the building.

CIA analysts say it was Saddam, not one of his doubles, who appeared on Iraqi television shortly after the US tried to kill him and his top aides in the opening salvo. But they did not know however, were not sure if the appearance was live or pre-recorded, leaving doubt if Saddam was alive.

Later a statement in his name offered a bounty of 100 million dinars ($NZ60,373) for any Iraqi fighter who shot down an enemy warplane and half that for a helicopter. Soldiers were promised 50 million dinars for capturing a pilot or soldier and 25 million for killing one.

The International Red Cross said the first wave of US missile strikes on Baghdad killed one person and wounded 14. There were no independent reports of casualties from the second attack, but Iraq said the missiles hit non-military targets, killing one civilian and injuring 37.

Iraq's ineffectual response has apparently persuaded the Pentagon to continue its limited missile strikes and ground advance, holding off on its widely publicised "shock and awe" blitzkrieg.

The change in tactics could avoid widespread civilian casualties and long-term damage - and win over worldwide public opinion running strongly against the war.

Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the US still hoped a full-scale war could be averted.

"Pressure is continuing on the Iraqi regime," he said. "We still hope that it is possible that they will not be there without the full force and fury of a war."

US intelligence officials have been telephoning Republican Guard officials at their homes and trying to negotiate their surrender, said administration officials.

The Turkish Parliament yesterday voted to open the country's airspace to US warplanes.

But it did not address a longstanding US request to let 62,000 troops open a second front by crossing Iraq's northern border from Turkey.

In Afghanistan, American forces made 12 arrests in the parallel Operation Valiant Strike, which involves more than 1000 US troops against Taleban rebels.

While the US Congress united across party lines last night to support the war, millions of people around the world took to the streets again yesterday to oppose it.

Meanwhile the FBI, acting on information from the alleged mastermind of the September 11, 2001, attacks, issued an alert for a Saudi-born pilot, Adnan G. El Shukrijumah, 27, who may be part of a new al Qaeda plot against the US.

An FBI official said the detained Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had identified El Shukrijumah as an "integral part" of the plot.

Herald Feature: Iraq