Iraqi Guns Fire on 3 U.S. Jets in ‘No-Fly Zone’

Iraqi antiaircraft guns fired on three U.S. Navy warplanes operating in Iraq’s southern “no-fly zone” Saturday, the Pentagon said. It was the third incident in three days and the first firing on U.S. aircraft since President Clinton’s inauguration.

One of the planes responded by dropping a single laser-guided bomb on the Iraqi battery, officials said. The U.S. aircraft, an A-6 Intruder and two F/A-18 fighter planes, returned unharmed to the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk, Pentagon officials said. No immediate assessment of the damage to the Iraqi facility was available.

The episode occurred about 11 p.m. Baghdad time--noon PST--while the aircraft were on a routine night patrol south of the 32nd Parallel in Iraq.

Pentagon officials said Iraqi air-defense batteries first fired flares, apparently to illuminate the three planes in the night sky. The Iraqis then fired a burst of antiaircraft gunfire.

In earlier episodes Thursday and Friday in Iraq’s northern no-fly zone, no shots were fired from Iraqi antiaircraft weapons, but the Iraqis tracked U.S. aircraft with their radar. The U.S. planes attacked the air-defense sites under standing rules that permit them to fire on aircraft or ground weapons that menace them.

Saturday’s incident occurred despite Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s declaration of a cease-fire on the eve of Clinton’s inauguration.

Although Clinton has pledged to continue the hard-line policy against Iraq instituted by former President George Bush, Saturday’s action required no specific authorization by the new Administration.

Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers said the Clinton Administration had received reports on the incident but would withhold comment until it has all the details.

Saturday’s clash appeared to be part of Hussein’s latest strategy of challenging the no-fly zones while cooperating with some of the requirements of the U.N. resolutions that ended the Persian Gulf War.

A U.N. chemical weapons destruction unit returned to work Saturday at a stockpile of tens of thousands of warheads 80 miles northwest of Baghdad.

The team reported that it received cooperation from Iraqi officials at the plant, which once made mustard gas and nerve gas.

The destruction of the stockpile, begun last year, was interrupted when U.N. inspectors left for the holidays and then were blocked from returning by Iraq’s curbs on U.N. flights. Restrictions on the flights were lifted last week.

The Iraqi press has been urging Clinton to respond to Baghdad’s proclaimed cease-fire, and a newspaper published by Hussein’s eldest son hinted Saturday at slight Iraqi impatience.

“Was the assault a test by Washington to see how far Iraq was committed to its decision (to declare a cease-fire)?” Mudher Aref wrote in Uday Hussein’s newspaper, Babel.

Reflecting a sense within the Iraqi leadership that the Clinton Administration should have responded positively to what it considers a major effort to open direct talks with Washington, Aref added: “So far, there has been no response from the American side, three days after Iraq’s peaceful initiative.”

But in official commentary on the new U.S. Administration, the Iraqi regime appeared to be trying to give Clinton time to rethink U.S. policy toward Iraq.

Healy reported from Washington and Fineman from Baghdad. Times staff writer Norman Kempster in Washington contributed to this story.