Iraq Cuts Off Fuel Sales to Its People

Iraq’s economic and communications capability appeared all but gone Tuesday as the Iraqi leadership used Baghdad Radio to announce the suspension of all fuel sales to its people and to issue what military experts said were more coded instructions to Iraqi agents and terrorists outside the country.

Both of the orders issued on the state-run radio--which, after 20 days of allied air strikes, is now Iraq’s only reliable link with the outside world--contained elements of desperation, analysts said.

And both were indications of the extent to which the allies have dismantled Iraq’s basic infrastructure after nearly three weeks of massive bombardments that now, if anything, seem to be intensifying.

In its broadcast Tuesday evening, which reported “the most ferocious” allied bombardment of Iraq since the war began, Baghdad Radio said civilians will no longer be able to obtain any oil for heat, gasoline or cooking fuel.

The order, which comes at the peak of Iraq’s winter and after weeks of gasoline and fuel-oil rationing, was attributed to “technical damage to oil installations,” which have been targeted and largely destroyed in the air war.

All fuel supplies have been critically short throughout Iraq since the war began, with most private car owners allowed just four gallons every 14 days. But the suspension order was a clear indication that the Iraqi leadership now is forced to conserve all of its remaining fuel for the military, which is awaiting the expected allied ground assault.

Before fuel sales were cut off, reports from Baghdad described long lines in front of every gas station, with 300 or more cars waiting for fuel, many of them all day long. The gas had to be pumped manually, since there was no electricity available for the pumps.

The other orders issued Tuesday by the Baghdad station--which the government now calls Mother of Battles Radio and which on some nights can reach the United States--appeared to be of a more sinister nature.

Repeating a terrorist call to arms, the radio broadcast for the second day what Western military experts said were coded instructions to agents and possible infiltrators throughout the Middle East and beyond.

The arcane messages were addressed to four agents named as Kutayba, Mudar, Ayman and Muntaser, and all of them were attributed to “Maymoon” in “Central Command.”

Western analysts who have studied the Iraqi military for several years said they could not immediately decipher the code, but they said the messages appeared to be genuine orders to Iraq’s terrorist agents, rather than an intricate attempt at psychological warfare. The messages, they added, came as no surprise.

“I expected it,” one of the analysts said Tuesday. “It’s the same technique the Soviets used during the Cold War. The Soviets told the Iraqis about it, and I would say they are forced to go this route now because (Iraqi President) Saddam Hussein has no way to communicate with his agents outside the country any more.

“All of Saddam’s international communications have been cut, and now it looks like he has to forward additional information and instructions to these agents. Even Saddam couldn’t foresee everything. For sure, he didn’t foresee the situation as it is now. I think he got hit a little harder than he thought he would.”

Pentagon sources said Tuesday that it is extremely difficult to shut down Iraqi radio broadcasts permanently, the Associated Press reported from Washington.

“Transmitters are easy to relocate,” said one military source, speaking on condition of anonymity. “We can take out their antennas, but somebody can string up a network of wires someplace else. Transmitting is something you can do in a closet.”

The Iraqis are also likely to have more than one tower for shortwave transmissions that can be picked up outside the country, the source told the AP.

“It’s much more difficult than destroying a radar site or a dam,” he said.

Another military source said it is likely that the Iraqis are locating radio facilities on civilian buildings that would be off limits to air strikes. “You could hang laundry from the wires during the day” to camouflage equipment, he said.

Although the meaning of Tuesday’s messages remained a mystery, the Western analysts theorized that the coded broadcasts in themselves reflected a tone of desperation.

The message to “Mudar,” for example, was: “Do not hesitate to do anything. God be with you.” And the general message preceding the codes began, “To strugglers in all revolutionary cells: Fight them with all your force, in all their dens, wherever they are.

“Do not spare any interest of any of the countries taking part in the aggression against your brethren in Iraq, against an Arab and Islamic nation.”

Since the U.S.-led assault on Iraq began 20 days ago, there have been at least 70 terrorist attacks linked to the Persian Gulf War in more than a dozen nations worldwide. Several people have been injured, but there have been no deaths, and some analysts read Tuesday’s messages as an indication that the attacks will now be intensified.

In earlier military communiques, Iraq has justified the use of terrorist tactics by saying they are retaliation for what the government says is hundreds of Iraqi civilians killed in the bombing campaign.

On Tuesday, Iraqi Foreign Minister Tarik Aziz, in a letter to Baghdad’s state-run newspapers, said that an additional 108 civilians died and 249 more were injured during air raids between Jan. 26 and Sunday. Those figures bring Iraq’s official civilian death count to 428 and the number of civilians injured to more than 650 since the war began. Allied military spokesmen have said they cannot estimate Iraqi civilian casualties with any accuracy.

The coded radio broadcast reiterated that justification Tuesday, calling on Iraq’s agents throughout the world to “take revenge for every drop of blood spilled by an Iraqi child, for every hair that fell off the head of a little girl and for every grieving mother crying over her child--searching for her children beneath the rubble.”

SIGNAL FOR TERROR?

Baghdad Radio--Iraq’s only reliable link with the outside world--has issued orders that military experts call coded instructions to terrorists. Since the war began, there have been scores of terrorist attacks linked to the crisis. Among the recent suspicious broadcasts:

* Arcane messages addressed to Kutayba, Mudar, Ayman and Muntaser.

* All of the messages were attributed to “Maymoon” in “Central Command.”

* To Mudar, the message was: “Do not hesitate to do anything. God be with you.”

* To Kutayba: “Implement what’s on the table--and what’s outside it.”

* Preceding the suspected codes: “To strugglers in all revolutionary cells: Fight them with all your force, in all their dens, wherever they are. Do not spare any interest of any of the countries taking part in the aggression against your brethren in Iraq.”