Posted on 12/26/2002 11:35:30 AM PST by Sparta
BAGHDAD, Iraq - The Iraqi army said Thursday it has been holding exercises in central Iraq aimed at countering an American attack, another sign that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s government may believe war is inevitable.
The soldiers showed they were ready "to foil the schemes of America and its evil allies and to respond to the aggressors and bury their low schemes," Fadel Mahmoud Ghareib, in charge of the ruling Baath party's Babil province branch, was quoted as saying in the army's Al-Qadissiya newspaper.
The newspaper said troops had practiced fighting in rural and populated areas in Babil, and rehearsed techniques of "distracting the enemy in different directions by using light and medium weapons."
The newspaper did not say when the games were held, whether they were still underway or how many troops participated.
Meanwhile, Iraq continued to cooperate with U.N. weapons inspectors, who on Thursday visited a technical university that employs a scientist interviewed earlier this week about Iraq's nuclear program.
If Iraq can persuade the inspectors it is not hiding nuclear, chemical and biological weapons or the missiles to deliver them, it might avoid a U.S. strike. But the inspectors have said an Iraqi weapons declaration is wanting.
On Wednesday Saddam, in a speech read by a state television announcer, said Iraqis should be ready "to sacrifice their soul and life in defense of the nation."
Saddam added Iraqis should be shielded from foreign ideas that might shake their resolve. The statement followed a decision to maintain a ban on satellite television dishes in Iraq.
The United States and Britain have threatened war to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. U.N. inspectors have been working in Iraq since Nov. 27 under a U.N. Security Council resolution that threatens serious consequences if Iraq is found to have nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.
Thursday, the inspectors returned to Baghdad's University of Technology. The inspectors went to the chemistry, engineering and computer departments and several labs, where they checked equipment tagged during U.N. inspections years ago, university head Mazen Mohammed Ali told reporters.
In the first round of inspections in the 1990s, after Iraq's defeat in the Gulf War (news - web sites), the United Nations (news - web sites) destroyed tons of Iraqi chemical and biological weapons and dismantled Iraq's nuclear weapons program. Inspectors do not believe they got all Iraq's banned arsenal, and that monitoring regime broke down in 1998 amid U.N.-Iraqi disputes.
At the university Thursday, Ali said the inspectors wanted to know how the institute was organized and what research it undertook for the government.
"They did not ask for specific names; they did talk with heads of departments and with staff of the university," he said.
Tuesday, inspectors interviewed a University of Technology professor, Sabah Abdel-Nour, who had worked in a nuclear program Iraq says is now closed down.
Abdel-Nour, who refused to be interviewed without Iraqi officials present, told reporters later he had been asked about any progress Iraq may have made since inspectors were last here in 1998. He said Iraq was not hiding any weapons of mass destruction.
October 2001 - The United States has quietly acknowledged that Iraq and Syria have rapidly developed military cooperation. U.S. officials and defense sources said Iraq and Syria have been coordinating in military exercises as well as communications, command and control. They said the cooperation has increased significantly in recent months...The source said Iraqi and Syrian troops have integrated their anti-aircraft and command and control systems along their mutual border.
Iraqi's practicing waving flashlights to distract us...
LOL!
Stay Safe !!
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