'l—’V * % By The
pcf Associated Press
Edited by Jennifer O Cilka
Official satisfied with first week of war
_ . . • i «-r»i_t_____ • 4< •
WASHINGTON - The nation’s top
military official today expressed sat
isfaction with the results of the first
week of the Persian Gulf war, but said
Iraq is “an enemy that is ingenious”
whose air force may yet “choose to
come out and challenge us.”
For now, said
Gen. Colin
Powell, chair
man of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff,
Iraqi air power
has been “totally
ineffective,"
leaving the
United States and its allies with sig
nificant air superiority in the opening
phase of the g ulf war.
In a Pentagon briefing that marked
the one-week mark of the war to
liberate Kuwait from Iraq, Powell
said more than 10,000 allied sorties
had destroyed 41 Iraqi aircraft, either
in air-to-air combat or on the ground.
The Iraqis have an estimated 700
aircraft.
Defense Secretary Richard Cheney
preceded Powell to the lectum and
told reporters that “there may well be
surprises ahead for us,” including
possible Iraqi air strikes, terrorist at
tacks and additional missile attacks.
Cheney acknowledged that Iraq’s
mobile Scud missile launchers were
proving more difficult than expected.
Powell said the United States has
lost at most one plane in air-to-air
combat. Total U.S. losses in the first
week amount to 10, he said.
"« —
There may well be
surprises ahead for us.
Cheney
U.S. Defense Secretary
-ft -
Cheney cautioned against expec
tations of a quick end to the war,
saying, “A military operation of this
intensity and complexity cannot be
scored every evening like a college
track meet or basketball game,*’ he
said.
Powell and Cheney both urged the
public, and the media, to understand
that it was not possible to know how
badly tne turious air campaign nau
damaged Iraq’s military capability.
Powell said the one-week mark
was time to “take stock and dampen
the oscillations between euphoria and
distress.” He spoke about the mood
around Washington, perhaps around
the country, when the early air suc
cesses did not lead to a one-week
victory.
He said Marine forces are assembled
offshore, adding, “We are really just
starting in earnest” to force Iraq from
Kuwait. He described an enemy that
is well dug in, with complex commu
nications and a sophisticated supply
system.
“Our strategy for dealing with this
army is very simple: First we’re going
to cut it off, then we’re going to kill
it. liit' iia^i cumj 13 3iiniig mere
dug in, waiting to be attacked, and
attacked it will be,” he said.
He said allied forces were “assem
bling a fairly sizeable ground force
that can finish the job if necessary.”
Armed with charts, maps and
graphs, Powell said allied forces have
achieved air superiority in the war,
but said “there still will be losses’’ in
the days ahead. Even so, he said, air
attacks can begin to concentrate in
southern Iraq and around Kuwait,
where Iraq has massed tens of thou
sands of troops.
Yet, he added, “We’re dealing with
an enemy that is resourceful, an en
emy that knows how to work around
problems, an enemy that is ingenious.
We are not getting complacent.”
i • _ __^
Northern front troops
anticipate ground war
NEAR THE IRAQI BORDER.
Saudi Arabia In a gas line such as
this desert has never seen, assault
helicopters swarm in like black death,
filling up for a ground war their crews
expect any day.
At a highway cloverlcaf, Ameri
can MPs hunker down behind a con
crete block barrier painted, “Pink
Floyd, The Wall,” wailing for their
piece of the war.
In a truckstop curry joint, two British
artillerymen, “Desert Rats,” shake their
heads in grim anticipation of a weeks
long onslaught they predict will be
far worse than is widely believed.
By a roadside phone booth, Omani
soldiers in faded combat turbans wait
cheerfully to ring up their families,
hopeful that their next call - if Allah
wishes - will be made from liberated
Kuwait City.
Desert Storm is getting ready to
break, and all concerned are con
vinced that a hard rain is going to fall.
On the surface, the mood is mostly
positive, even relaxed.
Full alert conditions did not stop a
Bedouin from threading his pickup
load of confused sheep beneath the
revolving blades of U.S. Army heli
copters awaiting fuel on an aban
doned stretch ot tarmac.
Capt. Robert Belletier of the U.S.
First Cavalry Division climbed out of
a Blackhawk helicopter as it settled
down to a rumbling idle, in line with
12 Cobras, Apaches and little Bell
choppers.
“We’re all set,” said Belletier, a
southerner from Atlanta with an easy
laugh. “We hear about all those Scuds
in Dhahran, and we’re happy to be up
north where it’s safe.”
But when pressed to reflect on
what might lie ahead in the next few
weeks, his face took on that half
somber, half-quizzical look so com
mon among al lied troops on the north -
em frontier.
“It’s gonna take longer than we
thought,” said Cpl. Dave Hoernie, of
Harrisburg, Pa., who ended up in the
desert from his former base in Stuttgart,
Germany, where his wife is also an
MP.
Two British artillerymen preferred
to speak frankly rather than give their
names. One, a veteran non-commis
sioned officer who had learned les
sons the hard way, had no illusions.
“It will take five weeks at the least,
from the word ‘go,’ and it will be
bloody difficult,” he said. “A bloke’s
dug in with his artillery, he’s going to
fight you, isn’t he?”
He described U.S. land forces as
hampered by too many overconfident
young troops who had little idea of
what they faced.
“I don’t mean to be impolite about
the Americans, but they’re not ready,”
he said. “Too many aren’t serious.”
Neither British nor other allied
troops were ready either, he added.
“We wili be soon, but I hope we don’t
have to go too fast.”
He warned that Iraqi heavy artil
lery was well-sheltered, with under
ground stocks of conventional and
chemical warfare shells. Oil-filled
trenches and tank traps would be hard
to breach. Meanwhile, allied ground
forces and materiel were within range
of the long guns.
Asked how he thought the cam
paign would go, the officer looked up
and answered with a long, worried
frown.
Sgt. Abdul Hamid, 26, in the army
of Oman since he was 15, did not
have the concerned look. He seemed
less worried about Saddam Hussein’s
army than about getting a phone line
home.
Here is a guide to the basic types of weapons that ordinary soldiers use
to fight a modern war. Examples of common U.S. models of each type
are shown, along with the typical firing trajectory and effective range.
Rifle Most soldiers carry a DIRECT FIRE if;-:
rifle, but they are useful 1,300 ft. :
^—• only for shooting at t JL
enemy troops you can M
\L>^' ^M16A2 see. an infrequent event.
Rifle with grenade launcher direct fire
Adding a grenade launcher 800
|to a rifle gives a ^
soldier more explosive
VM16A2 punch at dose range._ ^^MF
Machine gun AREA F,RE
The main soldier-killer in Up to 6,000 ft.
World War I, useful
against low-flying
aircraft.
Rocket launcher direct fire
Light shoulder-tired 1,000 ft.
PSHBBr- rockets are _ - —
potent weapons * i
at 4 against light tanks.
By firing in a high arc, INDIRECT
mortars can hit targets
behind hills and Range ||
oostacies. wfth closely r depends on
spaced blasts_ ^ ammunition
Howitzer Howitzers'low arc firing can INDIRECT FIRE
- Mi'* deliverpowerful
shells laWy accurately ^ 0 nles
over long ranges
..
missile Guided weapons GUIDED FIRE
. achieve accurate 200-12,000 ft.
firing without
TOW wastinS shots, but
| ^ are very expensive
. ...—..—-... .
AP/T. Dean Capie
L,ninest courts
try student leader
for 1989protests
BEIJING - A Chinese people’s
court Wednesday put on trial Wang
Dan, the most-wanted student leader
of the 1989 pro-democracy move
ment that was crushed by Communist
authorities.
Wang is at least the 25th activist to
be tried or sentenced this month as the
government seeks to wrap up such
cases while the world is preoccupied
with war in the Persian Gulf. Wang,
23, has been jailed 19 months.
His name topped a police list of
the 21 most-wanted student leaders
after the democracy movement was
put down in an army assault across
Beijing on June 4,1989. Hundreds of
people were killed. J
Wang was arrested the next month (
while meeting with a Taiwanese re
porter to ask for help in fleeing China.
A small notice announcing Wang’s
trial was posted outside the Beijing
Intermediate People’s Court. It said
he was charged with “counter-revo
lutionary propaganda and incitement,”
the charge most frequently used against
political prisoners.
Court officials refused to say if
Wang’s family was allowed to attend
the trial, which was closed to the
public.
The trial recessed later Wednes
day without any verdict being an
nounced.
Wang, a history student at Beijing
University, had organized campus
discussions on political reform even
before the democracy movement
began. Inspired by Soviet glasnost,
he wrote an article advocating China
take the same path.
In April 1989, when college stu
dents put up posters to moum the
death of former Communist Party
leader Hu Yaobang, Wang was among
the first to urge they channel their
grief into efforts to change the sys
tem.
No help from banks
Soviet monetary change threatens savings
MOSCOW - Soviets have grumbled
for years that shortages and inflation
have made their rubles nearly worth
less.
Their complaints became reality
late Tuesday when President Mikhail
Gorbachev announced he was pull
ing out of circulation the green 50
ruble and tan 100-ruble notes.
By dawn Wednesday, long lines
had formed at banks in Moscow,
Leningrad and other cities with Sovi
ets anxious to cash in their high-de
nomination ruble notes so that they
are not left with worthless pieces of
paper.
“My friend called last night, and
her 90-year-old mother was in tears,”
said a woman who stopped by a bank
near th6 Kiev railroad station.
“She saved 2,000 rubles ($3,224)
in an envelope for her own funeral,"
said the woman.
Under government decree, any
large-denomination bills not turned
in by Saturday are worthless. Any
body who tries to turn in more than
his monthly salary is to be questioned
about where the money came from.
For millions of Soviets, it, will be
impossible to produce written rec
ords of legal transactions in new small
businesses, or the source of a life
time’s savings.
Prime Minister Valentin Pavlov
has said as much as one-third of the
cash is in the form of big bills. The
government’s move apparently was
intended to slash inflation by cutting
the excess supply of rubles.
Professional black marketeers long
ago switched from dealing in rubles
to convertible currencies and are
unlikely to be affected by the change.
But people temporarily holding
large amounts of cash earned from
selling or buying cars, video record
ers and other such consumer items
faced financial disaster.
Meanwhile, the government re
stricted withdrawals from bank ac
counts to 500 rubles ($806) monthly.
That is almost twice the average
monthly salary of 267 rubles ($430),
but only slightly more than it costs to
buy a pair of fashionable sneakers at
inflated prices in the unofficial econ
omy.
The government said it would
replace the bills with new ones later.
But much about the program was
unclear, and appeared unlikely to be
cleared up before the deadline to turn
in the old money.
“Some may challenge the social
justice of the president’s decree, but
they cannot say that the Soviet lead
ership remains idle while the country
stands on the brink of total economic
collapse,” said Tass news agency
analyst Andrei Orlov.
Ivan Silayev, prime minister of
Boris Yeltsin’s Russian republic, said
parliament there would discuss the
reform on Thursday. But despite
Yeltsin’s disagreements with Gor
bachev on economic issues, Russia’s
position “will not be an explosive
stand,” said Silayev.
Bank employees were quoted by
Tass as saying they were caught
completely unaware by the govern
ment move.
Many eloerly Soviets distrust banks
because they have lived through pre
vious such reforms, and prefer to keep
their money in cash at home.
According to the decree, retirees
can exchange 200 rubles (S322) of
big bills. Others can exchange a
month’s salary, up to 1,000 rubles
($1,612).
Netfra&kan
Editor Eric Planner
472- 1766
Managing Editor Victoria Ayotte
Assoc. News Editors Jana Pedersen
Emily Rosenbaum
Editorial Page Editor Bob Nelson
Wire Editor Jennifer O'CIIm
Copy Desk Editor Diene Brsyton
Sports Editor Psul Do meter
Diversions Editor Connie Sheehan
Classified Ad Manager Annette Sue per
Publications Board
Chairman BNI Vobejda
436-9993
Professional Adviser Don Walton
473- 7301
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