alienation news

US puts forces at Iraq's border

US forces deployed in the Gulf for a looming strike aimed at toppling Saddam Hussein have launched their biggest manoeuvres since the 1991 Gulf War, only kilometres from the Iraqi border, as British military sources said plans were well advanced for a massive seaborne invasion. Britain's Sunday Telegraph reported that the Royal Marines' elite 3 Commando Brigade would join US marines in a 40,000-strong force to seize the strategically vital southern Iraqi port of Basra.
Washington acted at the weekend on its promise to share with the UN sensitive intelligence on the locations of factories and stores of weapons of mass destruction that Baghdad denies exist. US intelligence, drawn primarily from spy satellites, includes locations of possible biological and chemical weapons sites and identifies Iraqi scientists for UN weapons inspectors to target, according to The Washington Post.