Cruise missiles fired from Med for first time

TOWARDS Baghdad, part of the 3rd Infantry Division had reached the area of the Shiite holy city of Najaf after a 230 mile, 40-hour sprint through the desert, killing 100 machine gun-toting militiamen along the way.

When more than 30 Iraqi armoured vehicles were spotted heading towards the 2nd Brigade’s positions, A-10 and B-52 war planes were called in to hammer the Iraqis. The Army did not have to fire a shot.

Through the night, skirmishes continued in the farmlands outside Najaf.

Small groups of Iraqi fighters approached US positions in pick-up trucks or on foot, but were driven back by tank and artillery fire.

When Iraqis fired rockets from Najaf at the Americans, the US troops responded with heavy fire into the city.

Mosques in the cities of An-Najaf and Karbala are the most sacred sites to Iraq’s majority Shiite Muslims after those in Saudi Arabia.

An-Najaf is the site of the tomb of Imam Ali, the son-in-law and cousin of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad. Shiites aspire to bury their dead in its cemetery, which stretches for miles and is the largest in the Muslim world.

US Navy warships deployed in the eastern Mediterranean fired dozens of Tomahawk cruise missiles at targets in Iraq yesterday for the first time since the start of the war.

In the early hours yesterday, Iraq fired a missile into northern Kuwait, but it was destroyed by a Patriot missile, the Kuwaiti military said.

In the north, air strikes were reported against strongholds of Ansar al-Islam, a militant Islamic group with alleged ties to al-Qaida and Baghdad.

In western Iraq, Abizaid said, the forces went after Iraqi logistical targets, command and control facilities and commando units.