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BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 29 - One of Iraq's top leaders said today that Saddam Hussein's government was ready to meet the overwhelming military superiority of the United States by resorting to widespread suicide attacks against Americans, Britons and all who support them, both inside Iraq and across the Arab world. Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan, usually ranked No. 3 in the Iraqi hierarchy, told a news conference that the soldier who killed four Americans in a suicide attack earlier today outside the city of Najaf would be the first of a wave of Iraqis and other Arab volunteers ready...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 27 -- Iraq's defense minister said today that American forces could encircle "great parts of Baghdad" in as little as 5 to 10 days, but that the ensuing battle could last as long as two months, perhaps longer, with paramilitary groups loyal to Saddam Hussein joining regular troops to mount a street-by-street defense of this city of five million people. "For us, Baghdad will become the cemetery where the enemy will be buried," the defense minister, Gen. Sultan Hashim, said at a hotel news conference. "We will teach the United States and the British and their...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 25 - It was a grim day today in Baghdad, perhaps the grimmest yet since the war began, and with the darkening prospect of worse to come. Not long past noon, the Iraqi capital was nearly dark, its streets nearly deserted for miles on end. Since Saturday, the city has been shrouded by huge, roiling clouds of black smoke from oil trenches Saddam Hussein's forces have set afire around the outer districts to foil guidance systems on American aircraft and bombs. Then, overnight, a storm blew in from the desert, said to be the worst in...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 24 -- With their confidence visibly bolstered by five days of fighting that has shown Iraqi troops offering stiffer resistance than expected, Iraq's leaders resurfaced today in a contemptuous, even cocksure mood and challenged American forces to push on across the last 50 or 60 miles of desert toward a decisive showdown in Baghdad. President Saddam Hussein, silent since shortly after an American bombing raid in the first airstrikes last week, appeared on television in a 25-minute speech aimed at further stiffening Iraqi defenses. He said American and British forces were "in real trouble right now"...

March 24, 2003 As Allies Race North, Iraq Warns of a Fierce FightBy JOHN F. BURNS AGHDAD, Iraq, Monday, March 24 — Iraq's defense minister said on Sunday that American forces driving north toward Baghdad had engaged in a pattern of "stops and swerves" around Iraqi defenses in cities and towns along the way, but that they would eventually have to "pay a heavy price in blood" by fighting for Baghdad if they wanted to topple Saddam Hussein. The warning by Gen. Sultan Hashim, delivered at an evening news conference, came only hours before an intensification of American bombing and...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 22 -- Senior Iraqi officials struck a posture of defiance today in the face of advancing coalition troops and a night of punishing air attacks on Baghdad that reduced many of Saddam Hussein's most prized palaces and other crucial government buildings to hollowed-out, smoldering wrecks. By any measure, the attacks today appeared to find Mr. Hussein and his ruling elite in Baghdad in the tightest spot since the Iraqi leader took power in 1979. But far from acknowledging that Mr. Hussein's days as an absolute ruler might be numbered, the government went into a mode of...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 21 ? The American war on Saddam Hussein exploded tonight in a ferocious display of precision bombing and cruise missile strikes that blasted the heart of the Iraqi ruler's power with a spectacular opening bulls-eye on his most forbidding palace and continued with at least 100 more devastating volleys in the first two hours. Most of the strikes appeared aimed at the few square miles of central Baghdad that have been the monumental showcase for Mr. Hussein's brutal form of authoritarian rule. Perhaps 50 strikes came in a 10-minute volley of almost biblical power that followed...