By Merle D. Kellerhals, Jr.
Washington File staff writer

U.S. paratroopers landed in a Kurdish-controlled area of northern Iraq during a nighttime airdrop March 26, establishing a secure airbase at Harir, and were followed by U.S. mechanized infantry forces arriving by air transport, a U.S. Central Command briefing officer said.

"An airborne combat team parachuted into northern Iraq yesterday evening.
The presence of a combat brigade in that area changes the dynamics considerably," Army Brigadier General Vincent Brooks, CENTCOM's deputy operations director, said at a March 27 media briefing.

Brooks said that as coalition forces are added to the battlefield -- based on the CENTCOM war plan -- it gives commanders additional options and increases the number of threats posed to the Iraqi regime.

"The capabilities of that force may be more than what meets the eye," he said. "They can be used offensively. And if we choose to use them that way, then that's indeed how they'll be used."

However, Brooks would not elaborate on how or when the northern forces would be used, to avoid giving Iraqi forces operational details. Harir is approximately 70 kilometers northeast of Arbil, which is in a Kurdish-controlled zone that includes the provinces of Arbil, Dohuk, and As Sulaymaniyah.

Brooks said U.S. and coalition special operations forces, now operating across Iraq, are conducting strategic reconnaissance to find weapons of mass destruction, ballistic missiles and regime leaders.

"Our direct attacks against the regime's structure and units continued in the last 24 hours," Brooks said. "And the cumulative effect we're seeing is degraded control. We're seeing locally controlled military and paramilitary actions, frequent survival moves by regime leaders, and uncontrolled firing of air defense missiles."

Brooks said coalition forces are reporting that the regime of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein is becoming increasingly desperate in its actions.

"Their repressive acts against Iraqi citizens showing any signs of tolerance of the coalition are growing harsher," he said. "Our field commanders report that in the vicinity of An Najaf, as one example, Iraqi regime forces are seizing children from their homes, telling their families that the males must fight for the regime or they will all face execution."

Brooks said the discovery by British forces of several thousand more chemical protective suits in the Ar Rumaylah oil fields in southern Iraq strongly indicate "a certain knowledge in the Iraqi forces that chemical weapons will be used." Since coalition forces do not have chemical weapons, Brooks said, there may already have been an Iraqi decision to use banned weapons at some point.

In other operations, Brooks said:

-- Elements of the U.S. Fifth Corps were attacked by vehicle-mounted irregular forces east of An Najaf, where there had been media reports of a massive convoy moving from Baghdad with a convoy approaching 1,000 vehicles. Brooks said the early reports were inaccurate on the size of the force, and the U.S. mechanized forces and Air Force bombers "soundly defeated the attack, destroying most of the force."

-- In An Nasiriyah, the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force defeated an attack by Iraqi irregular forces that were supported in the 90-minute battle by Iraqi armored personnel carriers, rocket launchers and anti-aircraft artillery systems, Brooks said.

-- A British supply ship, the HMS Sir Galahad, was scheduled to deliver approximately 650 tons of food, water and medical supplies to the Iraqi deep-water port at Umm Qasr, but the discovery of mines in the channel prevented the ship from arriving on schedule, Brooks and Pentagon officials said. Coalition naval forces are clearing the channel and expect the cargo ship to arrive March 28, Brooks said.