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TITLE: Abrupt End to Britain's Quest For Conciliation |
AUTHOR: Kim Sengupta |
PUB: The Independent |
DATE: February 17, 2001 |
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The latest air strikes against Iraq come against a climate in which operations against Saddam Hussein were steadily scaling down and the British Government was using a more conciliatory tone towards Baghdad. But that was two weeks ago. In the intervening days the new Bush administration in Washington, with its veterans of the Gulf War, has honed its hard line towards President Saddam. The Ministry of Defence and the Foreign Office were last night echoing the line that the air strikes were in reaction to more provocation by the Iraqis, that they had fired more missiles and anti-aircraft artillery in the first six weeks of this year than the whole of the last. Yesterday's raids are seen as an extension of the festering conflict in two ways. It is the first time that allied planes had struck suburbs of Baghdad since the big operation of 1999, and they also took place on the orders of President George Bush given on Thursday. Until now the allied aircraft had been engaging the Iraqis in immediate reaction to attacks rather than carrying out premeditated engagements. The operation involved about 70 aircraft. Britain contributed four GR1 Tornados flying from Kuwait, two F3 Tornados from their base in Saudi Arabia and two VC10s flying from Bahrain, used for mid-air refuelling. The strike force did not cross the 33rd parallel inside the southern no-fly zone. They used their guided Smart missiles and bombs to hit their targets north of the line. The main attack was on a large command and control centre 10 miles south of Baghdad, the capital, which is alleged to have been stocked with the most modern surveillance radar equipment. According to defence sources all six targets, five outside the no-fly zone, had been reconnoitred through spy satellites and intelligence gathering missions by aircraft before the attack. Both the Pentagon and the MOD claimed that all the targets were away from civilian areas. The attack and its severity would have surprised the Iraqis A senior aide to Tariq Aziz, Deputy Prime Minister, recently said the Baghdad regime expected the strikes to be scaled down. He said: "They are not really damaging our military capability. The Americans and the British must know that the Russians, the French and the Chinese are increasingly against this. We don't expect them to increase these bombings.'' But that was before the new Bush administration expressed determination to turn the screw on Iraq. According to Whitehall sources the decision to carry out the attacks was taken on Wednesday and Dick Cheney was one of the chief hawks. Before he resigned to become George Bush's running mate, Mr Cheney was the chief executive of the oil supplies company Halliburton, which extensively traded with President Saddam through its European subsidiaries. END |