British invaders "nowhere near" capturing Basra

[Charles Brown <BrownBingb@xxxxxxx>]

LONDON (March 28) - British forces are ''nowhere near'' capturing the key
city of Basra in southern Iraq, a British commander said Friday, adding that
coalition forces underestimated the level of resistance by forces loyal to
President Saddam Hussein.

Basra was ''clearly nowhere near yet in our hands,'' British military
spokesman Col. Chris Vernon told Sky News television. ''We have no way at the
moment of getting humanitarian aid into Basra.

''But as we begin to pressurize Basra and begin to dominate it militarily, it
is fixed in military terms,'' Vernon said from southern Iraq. ''Nothing can
move in or out militarily. We should move toward a day when we can get
humanitarian aid into Basra.''

British troops ringing Iraq's second city have come up against stiff
resistance over the last week, particularly from militia linked to the ruling
Baath party. Aid agencies say lack of drinking water and medical supplies
mean Basra's 1.3 million people are facing a humanitarian crisis.

Vernon suggested that although British forces had little difficulty
overcoming regular Iraqi troops, they were finding the paramilitary forces
harder to beat than anticipated.

''Where we come across the Iraqi army, our assessment was they are defeated
very, very easily conventionally,'' he said. ''The irregular resistance, we
thought there was going to be some. It's probably true to say, its level of
resolve and numbers might have anticipated our initial assessments.''

Gen. Michael Jackson, the British chief of general staff, rejected reports
that coalition forces had become ''bogged down'' by weather and greater than
expected resistance from Iraq.

''Armies cannot move forever without stopping from time to time, to regroup,
to ensure that their supplies are up and even, believe it or not, soldiers
need a bit of sleep from time to time,'' Jackson said at a briefing in
London.

''So this 'bogged down' is a tendentious phrase. It's a pause whilst people
get themselves sorted out for what comes next.''

British troops destroyed a column of 14 Iraqi tanks moving out of Basra on
Thursday. British commanders said Baath militia were forcing regular Iraqi
troops to confront coalition forces by taking their families hostage.

''There's been artillery coming out of Basra for the last five days now.
We're not actually engaging into the center. But we have engaged around the
outsides,'' Vernon said. ''The key to Basra is to eradicate the Baath party
control and the irregular forces operating under their control, so that the
lid is taken off the people.''

Basra has so far been the main engagement for British forces in the U.S.-led
operation to dislodge Saddam and rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction.

Twenty-two British troops have been killed so far, including two soldiers
ambushed last Sunday and whose dead bodies were shown on television earlier
this week.

The sister of one of the soldiers was quoted Friday as denying Prime Minister
Tony Blair's claim that he had been executed by Iraqi forces.

Nina Allsopp was quoted by The Daily Mirror newspaper as saying the army had
told her that her brother, Sapper Luke Allsopp, died instantly in combat.

On Thursday, Blair referred to the two men as ''executed British soldiers''
and called their treatment ''an act of cruelty beyond comprehension.''

 AP-NY-03-28-03 1439EST

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