Kurdish peshmerga guerrillas were advancing on Tikrit, the powerbase of Saddam Hussein’s regime, last night as reports from the city suggested resistance had collapsed except for skirmishing.
Kurdish commanders said their forces had reached defensive lines two miles from the city before pulling back. Air strikes were continuing and refugees from Saddam’s birthplace said there was looting on the streets and that most of the military forces had fled.
Coalition planners had expected forces loyal to the regime to make a last-ditch stand in the city, about 190 kilometres north of Baghdad, after regrouping. Tens of thousands of soldiers from the Republican Guard and Special Republican Guard were believed to have fallen back to the city. If alive, Saddam was considered likely to be hiding there with members of his close family and entourage.
However, it looked increasingly possible that the US Marines’ advance from the south would be unopposed. To the north and east of the city, lightly armed American forces rushed into areas cleared by Kurdish forces. Large numbers of special forces have already moved in around the perimeter of Tikrit, which sits on a bend in the river Tigris.
Some light Iraqi resistance was encountered. At Riyaz, about 60 kilometres south-west of Kirkuk, The Observer saw several dead Iraqis, killed in a fire fight, and many abandoned armoured vehicles. Several peshmerga have been killed, though it is unclear if they were shot by Iraqi forces or by Arab farmers protecting their property as armed looters flooded into villages behind the coalition forces.
The degree of resistance in Tikrit will depend on whether years of favoured treatment make the people of Saddam’s home town stand by him to the end. A high proportion of senior figures in his regime, particularly the armed forces, came from the city.
US-led forces have been bombarding Tikrit for weeks, attacking what were thought to be among the strongest military defences in Iraq.
Michael Clarke, director of the International Policy Institute at King’s College in London, said it may have been reinforced by troops that have disappeared from other cities, including Baghdad.
‘Iraq has 50 000 troops there, maybe more, though it’s not clear how many would fight,’ he said. ‘It has the Adnan Division which so far hasn’t entered the fighting. You can add to that the normal garrison troops and the special security service that [Saddam’s son] Uday controlled.’
However Kurdish military sources said the allies would be able to exploit strong dislike of Saddam among Tikriti tribes who did not benefit from his rule. But US and British officials say they are in no rush to launch a ground assault.
‘The land campaign, when it comes, will be done on a timescale which fits our plan,’ said Group Captain Al Lockwood, representative for British forces at war HQ in Qatar.
Peshmerga continued to pull back from the key city of Kirkuk yesterday. Their seizure of control after the Iraqi army pulled out on Thursday prompted threats of military intervention in northern Iraq by Turkey. Ankara is concerned that possession of the oil-rich city might allow the Kurds to set up an independent state, inspiring a rebellion among Turkey’s Kurdish minority.
Jalal Talabani, leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, said half his forces had been withdrawn. ‘We are moving the remainder,’ he told reporters. Mam Rostam, a senior Kurdish commander, said fighters originally from Kirkuk would remain.
American forces had managed to secure much of the city yesterday and end widespread looting, largely targeted at Kirkuk’s Arab and Turkmen ethnic minorities.
However, Mosul remained anarchic, with firefights between looters, locals, pro-Saddam militia and American forces. Although US troops set up checkpoints draped in the stars and stripes at key intersections, disorder continued. Fedayeen militia and hardline Islamic militants from outside Iraq continued to snipe at the American soldiers.
US military planners say the war is far from over, though few pockets of Iraqi resistance remain anywhere in the country.
‘If Tikrit falls, and is like other cities we’ve gone into and there’s an end to any presence of the regime and removal of military forces, it’s just one more city,’ Brigadier General Vincent Brooks told a news conference in Qatar.
He said that the United States had other objectives than overthrowing Saddam, such as ending Iraq’s ability to produce nuclear, chemical or biological weapons. – Guardian Unlimited Â