Australian forces may have destroyed Iraqi weapons of mass destruction control center

AP ^ | March 21, 2003

[Shermy]

By PETER O'CONNOR, Associated Press Writer

CANBERRA, Australia - Elite Australian commandoes have penetrated deep into Iraq, fought with Iraqi forces and may have destroyed weapons of mass destruction control centers, the commander of Australian forces in Iraq said Friday.

His comments come as a new opinion poll Saturday suggests a big rise in the number of Australians supporting the war now that hostilities have started.

Speaking to Australian reporters Friday at coalition headquarters in Qatar, Brig. Maurie McNarn said Australian Special Air Service commandos had been moving deep inside Iraq for several days.

"Their primary role is strategic reconnaissance, although in some cases where there are command and control nodes which are used for communications for controlling WMD (weapons of mass destruction), we will in some cases have taken direct action against those," said McNarn, whose comments were broadcast on Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.

Defense officials in Canberra were not immediately available Saturday to clarify if McNarn's comments meant control centers for mass destruction weapons had actually been destroyed.

"They are probably in as far or more so than anyone else at the moment doing that strategic reconnaissance role," he said.

Australia, a longtime and staunch U.S. ally, has 2,000 military personnel involved in the coalition to disarm Iraq. Of those 150 are SAS commandos who work in small teams roving deep into enemy territory. The Australian operation is code-named "Operation Falconer."

McNarn said at least one team had fought with Iraqi troops.

"They had a contact going in, they wounded a number. The rest either dropped their weapons or ran away. They stopped. Their medics treated the wounded Iraqis. We moved on," he said.

The start of hostilities in Iraq has begun to shift public opinion from overwhelming opposition to a fairly even divide according to the latest poll taken on Wednesday and Thursday.

The Newspoll of 800 people found 47 percent of respondents were against the military action and 45 percent were in favor, while the remaining 8 percent were uncommitted.

That compares with an earlier Newspoll last weekend using the pollster's usual larger sample of about 1,100 people which showed opposition to the war at 70 percent, consistent with previous surveys. The error margin on last weekend's poll was about plus or minus 3 percentage points. No error margin was published for Saturday's poll.

Australia's involvement in the conflict has sparked mass demonstrations by peace activists across the nation.

Just hours after Prime Minister John Howard on announced Australia's role in the first strikes on Iraq on Thursday, tens of thousands of people flooded downtown Sydney and Melbourne to register their disgust. More protests were expected Friday and a mass rally was expected Sunday in the capital Canberra.

On Friday the streets of Melbourne were again choked with 5,000 protesters demanding an end to the conflict as mock air raid sirens wailed

[blackie]

I heard that too.

Let's Roll!