News Digest Bsn-.
U.S. ships hit mines; allies await order
DHAHRAN, Saudi Arabia - On
call and on edge, U.S. and allied
troops awaited the fateful “go” order
Monday along the northern front.
American gunners pounded Iraqi
positions with artillery fire. Iraqi mines
afloat in the Persian Gulf damaged
two U.S. Navy warships. And Air
Force rescue helicopters plucked a
downed pilot to safety from deep inside
Iraqi-held territory.
“We are prepared to attack if nec
essary ... tomorrow,” said Brig. Gen.
Daniel Gazeau, deputy commander
of the French contingent.
The allies were ready, too, to de
fend against any Iraqi pre-emptive
attack aimed at disrupting their plans.
Mostol us believe he will try it,
said Marine Col. Carl Fulford. “What
option is left to him at this stage?”
At the command’s daily news brief
ing in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, the Marine
general reported that partly cloudy
weather Monday cut into the number
oC Desert Storm air sorties, reducing
them to 2,400 in 24 hours.
Almost 1,000 missions were flown
against the Republican Guard and
other Iraqi units in Kuwait and south
ern Iraq, where air strikes are “soften
ing up” the dug-in defenses Ln ad
vance of a U.S.-ied ground assault.
A recent change in air tactics was
giving American warplanes greater
success against Iraqi armor and other
targets, a U.S. military source said.
“We’re notcxpcriencing too many
misses. We’re really having a field
day taking out his tanks and artil
lery,” the source said, without elabo
rating or. the new techniques.
- u —
We are prepared to
attack if necessary...
tomorrow.
Brig. Gen. Daniel Gazeau,
deputy commander of the
French contigent in the gulf
-tf -
The lost plane was an Air Force F
16 fighter whose pilot bailed out 40
miles inside Iraqi-held territory, Neal
said. The spokesman did not specify
whether the plane went down in Iraq
or Kuwait, and said it was not imme
diately known whether the jet was
shot down or had a mechanical prob
lem.
Monday’s marine-mine explosions,
the first time U.S. vessels have struck
Iraqi mines in the war, came as doz
ens of warships crowded farther north
in the gulf in preparation for a pos
sible U.S. Marine amphibious land
ing.
A news-pool dispatch from the
USS Tripoli said sleeping crewmen
were jarred awake by a mine blast at
4:30 a.m. as the helicopter assault
ship led a minesweeping operation
off the Kuwaiti coast.
The explosion ripped a 16-by-20
fooi hole in the forward starboard
hull, 10 feet below the waterline, and
flooded several compartments, the
report said.
About three hours later, the USS
Princeton, a 1-year-old, $1 billion
Aegis missile cruiser struck another
mine about 10 miles away, Neal re
ported.
Because that blast damaged one of
the Princeton’s propeller screws, the
technology-laden ship was operating
at 50-percent power, Neal said.
Four sailors on the Tripoli and
three on the Princeton were slightly
injured, Neal said. He said both ships
remained “fully mission capable.’’
The pool report said the Tripoli sat
dead in the water after the explosion,
while work crews struggled to shore
up the hole and pump out compart
ments on three decks. The Tripoli
normally carries up to 2,000 combat
ready Marines, but military officials
indicated it might not have had a full
complement on board.
On the ground, the close-quarters
skirmishing of the weekend died down.
But U.S. artillery fire and attack heli
copters kept the Iraqis off balance
along the front lines, the U.S. com
mand reported.
Late Sunday, Marine Cobra heli
copters struck six Iraqi armored per
sonnel carriers, destroying two, it said.
In Baghdad, air raid sirens sounded
late Sunday and early Monday, and
bombs fell on the outskirts of the city,
but Iraqi officials said damage was
light, Associated Press correspondent
John Rice reported from the Iraqi
capital.
An Iraqi military communique
derided the allied air war in what
sounded like an effort to goad the
U.S.-led coalition into a ground con
frontation.
i uss
I Princeton ^ -4^
| —j}
Type: Aegis missile cruiser
Displacement: 9,460 tons, full load
Length: 566 feet
Crew: 358
Commissioned: Feb. 11,1989
Type: Amphibious assault ship
Displacement: 18,000 tons, full load
Length: 600 feet
Crew: 686 Sauro®: Jane's
Commissioned: Aug. 6,1966 Fighting ships
“The cowards continued to send
their aircraft to strike from a dis
tance,” the communique said. The
Defense Ministry newspaper, Al
Qadissiya, added that die Iraqi army
is ready to make Kuwait “a killing
zone and a graveyard for all the in
vaders.”
Last Friday, Iraq’s five-man rul
ing Revolutionary Command Coun
cil announced a Kuwait pullout plan
with conditions attached, including a
U.S. military withdrawal from the
region, forgiveness of Iraqi foreign
debts and an Israeli pullout from
occupied territories.
That proposal was rejected by
Washington and its allies, which
demand an Iraqi withdrawal without
preconditions. The Soviets also dis
missed Iraq’s counter-demands, but
pursued continued diplomatic con
tacts.
After Monday’s Moscow meeting,
the Soviet president’s spokesman,
Vitaly Ignatenko, said Gorbachev had
presented Aziz with “a concrete plan
for settlement in the Persian Gulf
through political means.”
Assaults from land and sky
best hope, government says
WASHINGTON - The Bush
administration said Monday a Soviet
peace proposal will not slow down
the Persian Gulf war, declaring the
best hopes for driving Iraq out of
Kuwait “are in the conflict in the
air and on the ground.”
White House press secretary
Marlin Fitzwater said, “We are on
course. We have heard nothing to
change our course.”
President Bush said, “A lot of
interesting things (are) happening.
I don’t want to talk about them.”
The president wrapped up a four
day vacation at his seaside home
and relumed to the White House to
meet with his war advisers. Fitzwa
ter said Bush wanted “an update, a
status report from everybody on
where we are.”
He said Soviet Foreign Ministei
Alexander Bessmertnykh called
Secretary of State James Bakei
but did not reveal the content*
of Moscow’s peace plan. “The
foreign minister said he’d prcfei
not to discuss it over the phone anc
he would send us a cable.” Askec
why Bessmertnykh would not tall
about the plan on the phone, Fitzwa
ter said simply, “It’s the way ht
chose to do it.”
The president, during a brisl
walk earlier on the beach in Maine
brushed aside questions about
Moscow’s proposal.
“I have nothing to say about the
Soviet matter. I’m not going to
discuss that at all . . . so pul your
notebooks away,” the president said,
striding briskly on the sand under a
bright, sunny sky.
Fitzwater refused to say if Bush
had decided on the timing of ad
vancing the war from air strikes to
a potentially bloody ground con
flict. “It happens when it happens,”
he said, adding that no one should
assume a ground war would be
held off while Moscow’s peace
initiative was pending.
The administration has fueled
expectations that a ground war will
begin soon. On Sunday, Bush said
he expected the war to end “very,
very soon.” Ihc administration does
not expect a protracted ground
conflict, expressing confidence that
it will be “very violent, very quick.”
Asked if Bush had decided when
to begin a major ground battle,
Fitzwater said, “I can’t say and 1
won’t say. We won’t be announc
ing decisions made or not made...
i . Suffice it to say we’ve had exten
sive discussions. They have a spe
: cific plan that they’ve been work
, ing on from the beginning.”
Netiraskan
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ALL MATERIAL COPVRIOHT 1991 DAILY NEBRASKAN
Working for peace
Gorbachev proposes plan to Iraq
MOSCOW - President Mikhail
Gorbachev presented a secret peace
plan to Iraq’s foreign minister on
Monday, and the Iraqi envoy imme
diately left for Baghdad to present it
to Saddam Hussein.
Soviet officials, who are racing
against the clock in what appears to
be the final days before a major ground
offensive in the gulf war, say they
expected a quick response from the
Iraqi president.
The Gorbachev plan “envisages
political measures which we believe
were accepted with interest and un
derstanding by the Iraqi side,” ac
cording to Vitaly Ignatenko, a spokes
man for the Soviet president.
Ignatenko said Gorbachev planned
to contact U.S., British, Italian, French
and Iranian leaders to fill them in on
his plan.
Gorbachev’s peacemaking efforts
followed a week of Soviet contacts
with nearly every major player in the
month-old war. The Soviet Union has
supported U.N. efforts to oust Iraq
from Kuwait, but has grown appre
hensive about the extent of destruc
tion to Iraq, a former Soviet client.
Both Iraq and the United States
have warned that fighting will con
tinue and possibly escalate if nothing
comes of the contacts. U .S .-led forces
were threatening to launch a ground
war within days, possibly hours.
President Bush’s spokesman said
the Soviets gave no advance notice
about the plan and hadn't disclosed
its contents yet.
“We intend to continue to prose
cute the war,” Marlin Fitzwater said
at Bush’s vacation home in Maine.
Aziz told reporters before depart
ing Moscow for Tehran cn route to
Iraq that his 3 1/2-hour meeting with
Gorbachev was “important,” “cordial”
and “objective.”
“We decided to follow up those
talks,” he added.
Azi/. will return to Moscow “very
soon” after discussing the plan with
Saddam and his Revolutionary Com
mand Council, Ignatenko said.
He called the proposal “a concrete
plan for settlement in the Persian Gulf
through political means.” He added
that it was “fully in line with the
Soviet position that there should be
an unconditional withdrawal from
Kuwait.”
Ignatenko refused to divulge con
tents of the plan and it was not clear
what he meant by “political means.”
But the German newspaper Bild,
citing unidentified sources in Moscow,
said the Soviet peace plan demands
Iraq’s unconditional withdrawal from
Kuwait and would bar any punitive
actions against Saddam. The plan also
calls for negotiations on the Palestin
ian problem, and declares that Iraq’s
government and borders would not be
tampered with, the newspaper said.
Bomb blasts London train station
LONDON - A bomb exploded at
Victoria station during morning rush
hour Monday, 45 minutes after a caller
claiming to represent the IRA warned
of bombs at all of London’s train
J stations, police said. One man was
_ killed and 40 people were wounded.
The explosion at 7:46 a.m. sent
screaming commuters running from
the train terminal, some trailing blood
across the concourse. Rush-hour rail
traffic was halted for hours as police
searched on their hands and knees for
clues.
No group immediately claimed
responsibility for the blast at Victo
ria, one of London’s two main train
stations.
The warning was delivered by a
man with an Irish accent who said:
“We are the Irish Republican Army.
Bombs to go off at all mainline
stations in 45 minutes,” said Scotland
Yard’s anti-terrorist chief, Commander
George Churchill-Colcman.
_ It came less than three hours after
a bomb exploded at Paddington sta-i
tion, the city’s other main station. I
Only a dozen employees were on"
duty, and no one was injured.
Churchill-Coleman said the call
was only one of a number of threats
following the Paddington explosion,
and that the others “transpired cither
to be false or malicious.” Iain McGre
gor, deputy chief constable of the
British Transport Police, said his
department gets half a dozen bomb
threats a day.
C’hurchill£olcman said the warn
ing was passed to the British Trans
port Police, who already were search
ing all the main railway terminals
when the blast at Victoria occurred.
The bomb, which was hidden in a
trash can on thcconcoursc, “was quite
deliberately intended to maim and
kill,” he said.
British Rail Chairman Robert Reid
said the caller’s liming may have
been a deliberate attempt to make his
warning appear to be a hoax.
London
AP