U.S. Pilots Fire on Iraq Jets in ‘No-Fly’ Zone Confrontation

Escalating its challenge to Washington’s new policy of “containment-plus,” Iraq sent more than a dozen warplanes Tuesday into the skies over its Western-imposed southern “no-fly” zone, where they tangled with patrolling U.S. jets.

Four U.S. fighter jets twice responded with missiles in the first air-to-air confrontations in six years over one of the two no-fly zones in Iraq, the Pentagon reported. But the missiles failed to hit any of the Iraqi warplanes.

In the wake of the third clash between the United States and Iraq in nine days, Clinton administration officials are now predicting that confrontations with Baghdad are likely to become a more regular and troublesome challenge to U.S. foreign policy in 1999 as each side tries to force the other’s hand.

Iraq’s immediate goal in the latest violations apparently was to lure U.S. planes patrolling the zone into missile traps. All U.S. aircraft, however, returned safely to their bases. But one Iraqi warplane crashed, possibly because it ran out of fuel, according to Pentagon officials. Baghdad limits fuel for its air force planes to prevent defections, U.S. officials said.

Up to 15 Iraqi planes may have been engaged in Tuesday’s eight violations, which all involved crossing over the 33rd parallel that demarcates the southern no-fly zone, Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said. The zones, in the north and south, were set up after the 1991 Persian Gulf War to protect ethnic minorities in the regions.

The two air-to-air altercations Tuesday, which pitted U.S. F-14s and F-15s against Iraq’s Russian-made MIG-25s, were 15 minutes apart. The American planes fired a total of six missiles.

The confrontations were the first in the skies over Iraq’s Shiite-dominated south since Dec. 27, 1992, when a U.S. F-16 shot down an Iraqi MIG-25.

The regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had a different version of Tuesday’s action. “The hawks of our brave air force confronted and clashed with the aggressive American and British planes, and the enemy planes withdrew. . . . All the planes of our air force returned to their bases safely,” said a military spokesman quoted by the official Iraqi News Agency.

But Baghdad’s intentions were reflected in a speech by Hussein, who escalated the war of words Tuesday by calling the zones illegal and pledging that Iraq will challenge intrusions of its airspace “with all its courage and bravery.”

He also called on Arabs to revolt and overthrow governments aligned with the United States.

“Revolt, sons of the great Arab nation. . . . Revolt and unseat those stooges, collaborators, throne dwarfs and cowards,” Hussein said in an address celebrating the Iraqi army. “The dwarfs on their thrones will be forced to hear you, or else they will step down to give way for the people to have their say.”

In a direct jab at Saudi Arabia, where U.S. planes patrolling the southern zone are based, the Iraqi leader also said that the sacred Muslim city of Medina has been “humiliated” and “wounded” by the presence of foreign armies.

“Revolt against foreign powers, their aggression and their armies and chase them. Kick out injustice and its perpetrators,” he said in a speech broadcast by a popular Arab world satellite channel in Qatar.

The Iraqi leader apparently is hoping to spark the kind of public street protests witnessed in the Arab world during Operation Desert Fox last month. The four-day missile and bombing attack by U.S. and British forces came in response to Iraq’s failure to cooperate with U.N. weapons inspectors.

Hussein’s speech provoked at least one immediate response. In the West Bank city of Hebron, about 700 protesters assembled to burn U.S. and Israeli flags. “Saddam, Saddam, hit Tel Aviv, hit Tel Aviv,” they chanted.

Both Baghdad and Washington now appear to be positioning themselves to push for an end game in their eight-year standoff.

In Iraq’s challenges in the skies, Hussein appears to want to create enough attention and controversy over the no-fly zones that the international community will question their legality and effectiveness.

In the toughening policy called “containment-plus,” the U.S. hopes to further damage Iraq’s military capabilities and destabilize Hussein’s regime, with the ultimate goal of toppling the Iraqi leader.

“We will continue to enforce the no-fly zones,” White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart said Tuesday. “It’s an important part of our containment policy.”

The White House said the recent spate of provocations reflects Hussein’s weakness, not his strength.

“We know that he’s frustrated, and we know from his own words that he’s isolated,” Lockhart said. “He’s very angry that he hasn’t received the support he believes he deserves.”

On another front where Baghdad is seeking to exert pressure, the United Nations on Tuesday rejected a move by Iraq to evict U.S. and British relief workers because it could not guarantee their safety after the December military attack.

The Security Council approved a U.N. Secretariat letter to the Iraqi government clarifying that it is up to the United Nations to decide who works for the world body’s humanitarian programs.

During the bombings in December, most of the aid workers who oversee the U.N. “oil-for-food” program in Iraq withdrew briefly from Baghdad.

This week, Iraq sent a letter to the United Nations claiming that Baghdad could not guarantee the safety of the relief workers because of the “sense of anger that besets 22 million Iraqis.”

The letter warned of a possible “unfriendly reaction” to the U.S. and British employees, particularly those working or traveling in Iraq’s larger cities.

Iraq gave the United Nations a list of 10 staff members--nine British citizens and one American--whose visas will not be renewed. Four British workers employed by companies that have contracts with the United Nations also were told that they should leave when their assignments are finished. At the same time, the Baghdad government said three Americans who work for U.N. offices can remain in the country.

The oil-for-food program, which allows the Baghdad government to sell $5.2 billion worth of oil every six months in order to buy food, medicine and other humanitarian items, has about 400 staff members in Iraq.

*

Times staff writer John J. Goldman at the United Nations contributed to this report.

* U.S. CASUALTY ESTIMATE

Last month’s strikes killed or wounded about 1,400 elite Iraqi troops, a Senate panel heard. A6

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‘No-Fly’ Zone Confrontation

U.S. fighter jets fired at Iraqi planes in the first such air-to-air confrontation in six years. The incident took place in the “no-fly” zone over southern Iraq.

U.S. AIRCRAFT: U.S. F-15 Eagle

* All-weather, extremely maneuverable tactical fighter

* Designed for aerial combat

U.S. F-14 Tomcat

* Carrier-based fighter

* Designed to fulfill both “dogfight” and air defense roles

THE CONFRONTATIONS

The U.S. struck in two incidents 15 minutes and 62 miles apart after numerous Iraqi aircraft dipped into the no-fly zone.

1. Two Air Force F-15s fired one Sparrow and three AIM-120 missiles at two Iraqi MIG-25s.

2. Two Navy F-14s fired on two other MIG-25s, using two AIM-54 Phoenix missiles.

THE NO-FLY ZONES

Set up after the Persian Gulf War in 1991 to protect Kurds in the north and Shiite Muslims in the south, the zones have become critical components of the U.S. strategy to squeeze Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s regime.

RECENT INCIDENTS

Dec. 28, 1998

U.S. warplanes fired on an Iraqi surface-to-air missile battery in the northern zone after being fired on from the ground.

Dec. 30, 1998

U.S. warplanes hit an antiaircraft battery in the southern zone.

Sources: Jane’s All the World’s Aircraft, Associated Press