Iran Begins New Drive on Iraqi Port of Basra

Iran announced Tuesday that its forces have launched a new offensive aimed at the city of Basra in southern Iraq. Iraq said it has repulsed the attack, the first major flare-up in more than a month on the southern front.

Military analysts said it was not clear whether the attack signaled the start of Iran’s long-heralded “final offensive” in the 6 1/2-year-old war. But Iran, by describing the attack as retaliatory, was believed to be indicating that the offensive is limited.

The Iranians said the attack was in retaliation for a series of Iraqi air raids against Iranian economic targets, including oil installations and tankers in the Persian Gulf.

Conflicting Claims

The port city of Basra, Iraq’s second-largest city, has long been a target of Iran’s revolutionary government, which has announced plans to establish an Iranian-style Islamic republic in the city.

A communique issued by the official Iranian news agency said Iranian forces advanced more than a mile into Iraqi positions east of a man-made barrier known as Fish Lake. It said that more than 2,600 Iraqi soldiers were killed or wounded in the offensive, code-named Karbala 8 after an Iraqi city regarded as sacred by Shia Muslims, who are the majority in Iran.

Iraq confirmed that Iranian troops have begun an offensive but said Iraqi forces in the area east of Basra encircled and destroyed the attacking troops “in record time.”

Party Anniversary

On Tuesday, Iraqi bombers raided Sirri Island in the Persian Gulf, about 500 miles southeast of Baghdad, the Iraqi capital. Sirri and another island, Larak, which is farther away, have become the center of Iran’s oil export activities after months of Iraqi strikes against Iran’s Kharg Island oil terminal.

Tuesday was the 40th anniversary of the founding of the Arab Baath Socialist Party, which rules Iraq, and the Iranians have called for the overthrow of the Baath government as a condition for ending the war.

Iran last launched a major offensive in the area east of Basra on Jan. 9, and the fighting raged for six weeks amid the canals and defensive positions on the southern front.

According to political and military analysts, the indecisive outcome appeared to give Iraq a perceptible edge because its army managed to repel wave after wave of Iranian attacks without sacrificing much territory.

Victories Exaggerated

Both sides have greatly exaggerated their victories and enemy casualties throughout the conflict. Reporters are seldom allowed at the front, and there is no independent means of verifying the claims.

Losses from the January battle have been put at 30,000 dead, with perhaps 20,000 Iranians and 10,000 Iraqis killed. The estimated number of Iraqi deaths, higher than in previous battles of a similar scale, led many analysts to conclude that Iraqi troops were refusing to yield ground and that the fighting was at close quarters.

People Return to Homes

The fighting caused much of Basra’s civilian population to flee, but reports from the city suggest that despite heavy damage to buildings, most of these people have returned to their homes.

The United States has denied charges that American weapons are still flowing into Iran in the wake of revelations that Washington provided 2,000 anti-tank missiles to Iran in hopes of bringing about the release of American hostages in Lebanon. Most of Iran’s weapons are now thought to be supplied on a commercial basis by China.