The Week in the Gulf

A summary of the third week of the Persian Gulf War, which began Jan. 17 (the afternoon of Jan. 16 in the United States). The day-by-day summary begins one week ago: MONDAY, JAN. 28

More than 80 fighter-bombers from Iraq’s air force found refuge next door in Iran, which said it will impound the Iraqi planes and pilots until the war ends.

The Iraqis reported that captured pilots have been injured in air attacks on “populated and civilian targets in Iraq.”

The U.S. command said its pinpoint air strike on Kuwaiti oil facilities may have turned off the source of the vast spill that is devastating the Persian Gulf.

Iraq fired more Scuds at Saudi Arabia and Israel. Patriot defense missiles knocked out an incoming Scud over the Saudi capital, Riyadh. Parts of another fell on the occupied West Bank.

Navy attack planes bombed two Iraqi naval vessels in the Bubiyan channel in northern Kuwait.

Broadcast reporter Peter Arnett interviewed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and said Hussein claimed his missiles have chemical, biological and nuclear capability.

TUESDAY, JAN. 29

Iraq claimed that allied prisoners of war were hit in coalition air raids and that at least one was killed in an attack on a government building. There was no independent confirmation.

Allied warplanes caught an Iraqi military convoy moving across the open desert in southern Iraq and destroyed 24 tanks, armored personnel carriers and supply vehicles.

The United States vowed to shoot down any Iraqi plane that tried to rejoin the war after taking refuge in Iran. The Pentagon said about 90 Iraqi planes have flown to Iran.

In Washington, Secretary of State James A. Baker III and Soviet Foreign Minister Alexander A. Bessmertnykh said a cease-fire could be called if Iraq took steps to withdraw from Kuwait.

President Bush, in his State of the Union address, assured Americans that the war will be won.

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 30

The first major ground battle of the war was fought in and around the frontier port of Khafji in the northeast corner of Saudi Arabia. Eleven U.S. Marines were killed and two wounded, the first U.S. ground troops to die in battle in the war.

Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf said that two weeks of bombing raids have given allied forces “air supremacy” over Iraq. Allied forces had destroyed all of Iraq’s nuclear reactors, half of its biological warfare plants and chemical storage and production sites.

The allied military commander threatened to bomb an Iraqi site reported to be the source of a new oil slick in the Persian Gulf.

THURSDAY, JAN. 31

Allied troops took back Khafji. However, Iraqis continued to shell Saudi, Qatari and American forces.

Israel said an Iraqi Scud-type missile struck the occupied West Bank, but there were no reports of injury or damage.

Two U.S. Army soldiers--a man and a woman--not directly involved in the fighting at Khafji were missing.

FRIDAY, FEB. 1

The U.S. military command confirmed reports that an AC-130H gunship crashed behind Iraqi lines and all 14 aboard were reported missing.

Saudi and Qatari troops ferreted out Iraqi units driven back to the northern fringes of Khafji. Baghdad, which first described the battle as an Iraqi victory, acknowledged in a military communique that Iraqi troops had withdrawn from Khafji. Iraqi border positions were hit in hundreds of allied bombing sorties.

SATURDAY, FEB. 2

An Army Reserve doctor who deserted her unit in protest of the war surrendered after a rally and was whisked away to a military post.

SUNDAY, FEB. 3

An Air Force B-52 bomber and a Marine Cobra helicopter gunship crashed in separate incidents, killing at least two U.S. airmen and leaving three missing, the U.S. military said.

Investigators found that seven Marines were killed by “friendly fire” from an American warplane during a fierce armored battle along the Kuwaiti border last week, the U.S. military said. Officials said four other Marines killed in the battle were hit by an Iraqi tank round, apparently the first U.S. ground fatalities from enemy fire.

The allied air war passed the 40,000-sortie mark--10,000 more missions than were flown against Japan in the final 14 months of World War II.

Defense Secretary Dick Cheney expressed confidence allied forces can liberate Kuwait without using nuclear weapons.

White House budget chief Richard Darman said the government has forecast that the war will add at least $15 billion to the soaring deficit in the 1992 federal budget.