U.S., U.N. Apparently Agree on Somali Command : Africa: Boutros-Ghali is expected to report to Security Council on details next week. U.S. foresees no surprises.

Despite the public bickering between the United States and the United Nations over Somalia policy in recent weeks, the two sides have evidently reached agreement on a blueprint for the U.N. takeover of military operations from American forces in the ravaged, chaotic East African country.

Details will be set down in a report that Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali is expected to deliver to the Security Council in a week. He has consulted with American officials extensively while preparing the report. As a result, they do not expect to be surprised or troubled in any way by his conclusions.

The plan, U.S. and U.N. sources said, does not envision a ceremonial moment when Lt. Gen. Robert B. Johnston, the American commander, hands over the reins to Turkish Gen. Cevik Bir, the new U.N. commander who flew into Mogadishu for the first time Monday.

Instead, planners hope for a smooth, seamless, gradual takeover. At present, there are 32,500 troops in Somalia--18,000 Americans and 14,500 from 22 other countries--all under Johnston’s command.

Under the plan, each American unit, as it departs a site, will be replaced by a unit from another country that has agreed to serve under Bir’s U.N. command. Although American officials hope to complete the process by the end of April or early May, military experts accustomed to the normal slow pace of U.N. operations predict that the changeover could last until June.

At full strength, the United Nations expects to have 25,000 troops under Bir, including 3,000 to 5,000 Americans assigned to logistics and support. Although not combat troops, they will represent the largest number of American troops ever serving under a foreign commander in a U.N. operation.

American military officers are reportedly not fretting about this because of four safeguards: they have a high regard for Bir and even championed his appointment; Bir’s deputy commander, according to U.S. diplomats, will be an American, Army Maj. Gen. Thomas M. Montgomery; Bir himself will report to a U.N. official who will probably be American, and a U.S. Rapid Deployment Force will be kept nearby in case it must serve as a Somalia rescue operation.

American officials have been complaining for weeks that Boutros-Ghali and other U.N. officials were dragging their feet on implementation of the plan. In a news conference in Mogadishu on Saturday, Ambassador Robert B. Oakley, the special U.S. envoy, derided the delays in the Boutros-Ghali report and in Bir’s arrival.

The United Nations has blamed the delay in issuing Boutros-Ghali’s report on his official visit to Japan last week.

But Oakley, who is departing his post at the end of the month, said, “In this age of electronic communications, he could still have faxed his report to the Security Council while in Asia to speed up things.”

As for Bir, Oakley said, “It is better that he is coming next week than not coming at all, but it would have been better if he had come earlier.”

The delays are obviously rooted in policy differences.

Although the Pentagon has clearly wanted to pull out its troops as soon as possible, Boutros-Ghali, in his interpretation of the Security Council resolution authorizing the military intervention, has insisted that the U.S.-led operation destroy the warlords’ heavy weapons before the United Nations takes over. While not accepting this as their prime mission, the Americans have engaged in a good deal of this in recent weeks.

U.S. officials have been clearly dissatisfied with the performance of the secretary general’s special representative on the scene, Ismat Kittani of Iraq, who is giving up the post now because of prolonged illness.

Oakley and other American officials have urged Boutros-Ghali to appoint an official of international stature as Kittani’s successor. According to U.S. sources, Boutros-Ghali is now considering three Americans for the post.

If one is appointed, this will mean that Bir, although in command of the U.N. military forces, will be subordinate to an American who will be in charge of all U.N. operations in Somalia.

Although the U.N. forces will be known as peacekeepers and will wear the traditional blue helmets and berets, the plan anticipates that the Security Council gives them the same authority as the U.S.-led troops to use force to make sure that relief supplies reach those in need without interference from the warlords and their armed bandits.

In the past, peacekeepers have usually acted as referees monitoring cease-fire lines between two warring parties. They have usually had no authority to use their weapons except in self-defense.

U.S. officials say they had difficulty persuading Undersecretary General Marrack Goulding, the British diplomat in charge of peacekeeping until recently, to approve a forceful role for the new U.N. peacekeeping operation in Somalia.

But Boutros-Ghali shifted Goulding to a new position a few weeks ago and appointed Kofi Annan, a Ghanaian diplomat, as the new undersecretary general in charge of peacekeeping. Annan, said an American diplomat, “is more flexible than Goulding about a new role for the peacekeepers.”