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| Iraq |
| Special Forces Arrive in Northern Iraq |
| 2003-03-23 |
| BAKRAJO, Iraq: Four U.S. military cargo planes carrying several hundred Special Forces troops landed overnight at this airstrip in Iraq's Kurdish-held north in advance of a new front in the ground war against Iraq, Kurdish officials said today. The troops would deploy "around the area," a senior Kurdish official said. Later today, journalists watched as a convoy of three buses and three trucks carried about 100 U.S. troops into the Halabja Valley near the Iranian border, where two nights of airstrikes have targeted an Islamic extremist group associated with al Qaeda. The airstrikes, which a Kurdish official said may have killed more than 100 of Ansar al-Islam's 700 to 900 fighters, were scheduled to continue for at least one more night before ground forces move forward, officials said. U.S. troops will take part in the ground offensive, the Kurdish official said, but declined to say in what numbers. Before today, estimates of U.S. troops in the north ranged from 60 to 130. Most of the arriving U.S. forces are expected to steer toward the larger war against the government of Saddam Hussein, with Special Forces troops preparing the way for an airborne assault aimed at taking the strategic oil cities of Mosul and Kirkuk. This morning and again after sunset allied warplanes bombed artillery and rocket positions near Mosul, the Kurds said. "This thing is changing. It's changing big time," said the Kurdish official, referring to U.S. plans for Iraq's north. "There are many surprises in this war. Many, many surprises." |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |
| #1 Awesome! |
| Posted by: Anna 2003-03-23 20:06:16 |