UN arms inspectors are engaging in sheer intelligence activity: Saddam

BAGHDAD, January 6 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – The United States is plotting to occupy the oil-rich Gulf region, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein said on Monday, January 6, as U.S. military is assembling a ground force for a possible invasion of Iraq that could exceed 100,000 troops.

"Behind this uproar and self-defeating pandemonium, the enemy is pursuing several objectives and Iraq is not the only target," Saddam said in a televised speech marking Armed Forces Day.

"The objective is to fully and effectively occupy the Arab Gulf in order to achieve several goals ... secure control of its resources and fragment some countries, a dream he (the enemy) has nurtured since the 1970s," Saddam said.

Hussein also said that UN arms inspectors are engaging in sheer intelligence activity by questioning Iraqi scientists and inquiring about army camps.

"Instead of searching for so-called weapons of mass destruction in order to expose the lies of the liars (the United States and Britain), the inspection teams have been compiling lists of Iraqi scientists, asking questions with undeclared purposes, and inquiring about army camps and non-prohibited armament," Saddam said.

"All this, or at least most of it, is sheer intelligence activity," he said.

He also said that Iraq will emerge "victorious" from a showdown with the United States.

"You should know that you are victorious now, and that you will also be during the final confrontation, despite the fuss and hysteria kicked up by the enemy," he told the armed forces on the 82nd anniversary of their formation.

U.S. military buildup in the Gulf quickens

Saddam’s speech comes as the U.S. military buildup in the region is increasing. About 25,000 U.S. troops will be heading to the Gulf over the next few weeks, including the 1st Infantry Division, which already has an armored brigade in Kuwait, according to U.S. defense officials.

The Boston Globe reported Sunday, January 5, that about 100 U.S. special forces and more than 50 Central Intelligence Agency officers had already been infiltrated inside Iraq at least four months ago.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post reported Monday that the U.S. military is assembling a ground force for a possible invasion of Iraq that could exceed 100,000 troops.

U.S. ground forces would have enormous advantages in technology, firepower and mobility, with air supremacy, according to defense officials and analysts. But Pentagon officials are also putting an emphasis on achieving numerical supremacy.

"The goal of armed conflict is not to defeat your enemy," one senior defense official told the Post. "It's to take away your enemy's will to fight. And the best way to take away your enemy's will to fight is to bring overwhelming force to bear."

Numerically, a U.S. invasion force of about 100,000 soldiers would be roughly equivalent in size to Iraq's Republican Guard, with about 80,000 troops, and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's elite Special Republican Guard, with about 15,000 troops.

There are an additional 300,000 soldiers in Iraq's regular army, according to the Post.

The U.S. military buildup in the Persian Gulf has been underway for some time, but has accelerated as the January 27 deadline nears for the first major report by United Nations weapons inspectors to the UN Security Council.

The U.S. deployment is to include three to four heavy Army divisions, an airborne division, a Marine division and an assortment of Special Operations forces, the daily reported.

The U.S. Army has summoned commanders from four of its best-equipped and most capable divisions for an exercise to be held at the end of the month called Victory Scrimmage, in which computer simulations will run through Iraq war scenarios, defense officials told the Post.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld signed a major deployment order on December 24, and additional deployment orders are expected later this week, defense officials told the Post.