U.S. Warns of New Iraqi Offensive Against Shiites

Bush Administration officials warned Thursday that the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein appears poised to launch a new offensive against Shiite Muslim civilians and insurgent forces in southern Iraq and said Washington may take military steps to stop the internal repression.

Officials at the State and Defense departments Thursday reported a steep rise in Iraqi air activity in the south and a steady increase in the concentration of tanks, troops and weapons near Shiite population centers.

“They could potentially start in the next few days,” said a senior Bush Administration official. “They have the capability to start a major portion at any time now. They’ve got all the assets in place.”

Any U.S. military action would come under authority of U.N. Security Council Resolution 687, which permits members of the allied coalition that launched Operation Desert Storm in 1991 to enforce the cease-fire accords signed with Iraq. U.N. Resolution 688 prohibits Iraq from engaging in “repression” of its civilian population.

Hussein’s moves in the south--and the Bush Administration’s escalating rhetoric against his regime--come against the backdrop of persistent Iraqi harassment of international efforts to aid Iraq’s Kurds in the north. Before the Security Council earlier this week, a Dutch diplomat detailed Baghdad’s “cruel treatment” of the Kurds in the north and said that in the south, Iraqi commanders have been ordered to destroy Shiite villages and kill their occupants.

Since late June, U.S. officials added, Iraqi helicopter gunships have been strafing villagers as they flee into the marshes near the border with Iran, and combat aircraft are conducting maneuvers “virtually every day.”

Baghdad’s resumed repression in the south has revived consideration of a U.S. military response. A senior Bush Administration official said a significant Iraqi misstep “might be useful” for the United States to launch a sharp response.

Bush Administration officials have warned that Washington could use warplanes to shoot down Iraqi aircraft involved in the attacks on the south. The United States has maintained more than a hundred combat aircraft at bases throughout Saudi Arabia, and the aircraft carrier Independence, with several dozen strike planes on its decks, is currently steaming inside the Persian Gulf.

At the same time, 2,400 U.S. Army troops are preparing to land in Kuwait for exercises over the next week, joining 2,760 Marines already on maneuvers there. The exercises would bring American combat troops to within 120 miles of the Shiite populations centers being attacked by Iraqi forces.

State Department officials said the United States could act alone to punish the Iraqi repressions and added that Washington believes that no further U.N. resolutions are needed to authorize the action. Officials observed that Washington’s allies have expressed particular outrage at the latest pattern of Iraqi defiance and would probably back a limited U.S. military move against Iraq.

Britain and France, along with other North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies, most likely would join in any air strikes, U.S. officials said.

On Tuesday, Russia’s representative to the Security Council reportedly warned that Iraq “should be prepared for grave consequences” if it continues its defiance of U.N. cease-fire terms.

Bush Administration officials said Hussein’s regime appears to be under increasing pressure at home. In recent weeks, Hussein has ordered the execution of many merchants accused of price-gouging--including fellow members of the Sunni Muslim sect, who have supported his regime.

The executions have prompted what one official called a “shutdown” by those merchants, whose activities were keeping the Iraqi economy moving. Such moves, said one State Department expert, are a measure of the Iraqi leader’s increasing political troubles as continued economic sanctions intensify the pain and frustration of the Iraqi population.

“I don’t think this is good economics, and it’s pretty desperate politics,” said the official.

Several knowledgeable Bush Administration officials said Hussein’s flagging support among his traditional Sunni constituency may be fueling his increasingly defiant stance against the United Nations and his harsh actions against Shiite insurgents. But they added that Hussein’s apparent desperation--and especially the erosion of support among longtime allies--has encouraged hopes within the Administration that he may finally be ousted.

A Bush Administration official said American policy toward Iraq continues to be aimed at enforcing full compliance with U.N. resolutions, as well as encouraging “a government (in Baghdad) that is at peace, not only with its neighbors but with its people.”

Asked whether such a goal could be realized with Hussein in power, the official repeated longstanding calls for his ouster. “He’d have to change an awful lot,” the official said.

“Repression and police state methods have been very much his stock-in-trade, and I personally have serious doubts he’s going to change at this time and that he’ll ever tolerate implementation of the resolutions.”

Times staff writer Art Pine contributed to this article.

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