Posted on 03/28/2003 2:00:54 AM PST by LdSentinal
NEAR CHAMCHAMAL, Iraq (Reuters) - Hundreds of jubilant Kurdish 'peshmerga' fighters poured across what had, just hours before, been an Iraqi frontline on Friday, saying Iraqi forces had retreated toward the oil hub of Kirkuk.
Scouts returning from a night in the hills above Chamchamal, a town in the northern Iraqi enclave controlled by Kurds opposed to President Saddam Hussein, said they had met no resistance and believed government forces had fled.
U.S. warplanes last pounded the hilltops above Chamchamal on Wednesday, and Iraqis left behind mortars and machineguns in their bunker positions.
"We have sent around 300 peshmerga fighters across the front so far," said senior Kurdish commander Mam Rostam.
"It appears the Iraqis have gone back to Kirkuk. They have defense lines there, the so-called belt around Kirkuk," he added.
He could not confirm peshmerga accounts of five bodies found in one position near the frontline, which collapsed on Thursday.
Lieutenant Nauzad, a turbaned peshmerga clutching a rifle and sleeping bag, said he had seen no Iraqi troops during his night behind the lines.
Oil-rich Kirkuk, 20 miles west of Chamchamal, is of huge strategic importance in the U.S.-led assault to overthrow Saddam, launched nine days ago.
The breakthrough at Chamchamal was the first such development along the frontline separating government troops from Kurdish fighters protecting the northern enclave.
Reporters were allowed to drive around one mile across the frontline on to heights overlooking Chamchamal.
U.S. TROOP BUILD-UP
The advance followed increasing U.S. activity in the region in what is seen as the start of a new northern front.
U.S. paratroopers landed in northern Iraq overnight, with Washington putting the force at 1,000-strong from the 173rd Airborne Brigade.
Reuters reporters in the northern city of Sulaimaniya said on Friday they saw six U.S. Humvee off-road vehicles full of soldiers carrying heavy machineguns apparently heading toward Halabja, where a group of radical Islamic fighters are based.
The military significance of the collapse of the front facing Chamchamal is unclear. No clashes were involved and peshmerga commanders have vowed not to launch an assault of their own on Kirkuk and Mosul to the northwest.
Turkey opposes any Kurdish attack on Kirkuk and Mosul, fearing that a share of oil wealth and greater freedom within a post-Saddam Iraq would embolden its own restive Kurdish minority.
Rostam said there had been no offensive, but declared the retreat by Saddam's forces as a victory for his people.
"The regime has been killing us for more than 30 years, thousands have been attacked by chemical weapons, over 5,000 villages have been destroyed and hundreds have been imprisoned and executed," he said.
A group of young men rushed toward an old checkpoint shouting "God be praised!." Children joined them to cross into what was Saddam's soil.
Rostam said a few Kurdish villagers had already returned to their homes in the abandoned territory, though he warned of the risks involved, saying: "We've already found 200 anti-personnel and anti-tank mines."
Bummer, dudes.
Call your buddy Chiraq. I'm sure he'll be a big help.
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