IRANIAN OFFENSIVE HAS BEEN CRUSHED, U.S. OFFICIALS SAY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000302630073-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 25, 2012
• Sequence Number: 73
• Publication Date: March 20, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/25 :CIA-RDP90-009658000302630073-1
~.j1t'.~?{~. ..,; NEW YORK TIMES
~ P~~_ 20 March , 1985
have ever allowed its nuclear weapons offensive turned into a suicide attack
~ENSIVE out of its control. ~ because the Iranians could not match
IRANIAN OFF American intelligence officials as- ~i a ~ by?the thousands; one off
sume that Libya sold the missiles to cial said.
HAS BEEN CRUSHED' I~' one official said. Another official said the battle "was
"The question we're all looking at," a classic example" of awell-trained
one senior official said, "is whether the and well-supplied army prevailing
Y size of the defeat will finally convince over thousands of infantry troops lack-
U.S. OFFICIALS SA Khomeini to end the war." He added ing artillery and air support. He said
that there had been no sign from Tehe- the Iraqi defense was patterned on
,~~ By BERNARD GWERTZMAN ran that the Iranian leader, Ayatollah Soviet tactics, calling for well-en-
~u ca ~ tiew Yore T;m~ Ruhollah Khomeini, was ready to seek trenched firepower.
s Iran Says It's Winning
WASHINGTON, March 19'- S~or a The Il~an~are sending diplomats ,I?he lranians have not acknowledged
Reagan Administration pfficials said to many countries to explain their posi- that they suffered any losses, and in
today that In;n apP~re to have suf-
fered acrushing defeat in a weeklong tion. Forei Minister Ali Akbar Ve- their communiques are still saynng
~ eria the are winning. Nether Iran nor IraQ
offensive aimed at ending its military layati went to Syria. Libya and Alg y
stalemate with Iraq. over the weekendandan~e United ~cArab % mil Lary per~atiot nso anadu-dePendent
In their assessment of the fighting in went to Turkey repot on the battles are not available.
southeastern Iraq, along the border Emirates to seek support.
with Iran, the officials said Iran sent The Iranians have been saying they Iranian forces remain in control of
30,000 to 50,000 soldiers and Poorly a? k PAP e a new agreement not to at- I Majnoon Island, which they seized in
trained'`volunteers" across the border lanest~av~ttacked Teheran, Febntary 1984. That area is close to the
;scene of the current fighting, but was
and that most of them were ki~~- IrfahanP and other Iranian cities, in' 'not involved in the latest battles, the .
wounded, or captured in an Iraq' flictin moderate casualties. Iran, with
g American analysts said.
terattack. a much weaker air force, made one at- The Iraqis, who tookforeign journal- ,
"I don't think the Tremens know how tack on Iraq that resulted m casualties fists to the scene of the latest fighting,
many people they have lost," one sen- ' .
m a Baghdad suburb, officials said. asserted that as many as 100,000 Ira-
for official said, "but it is in the tens of The Iraqis, in turn, have issued a nian soldiers were involved and that
thousands, we think" warning that commercial planes flying I about 30,000 were killed and the rest
~ Several Factors in Assessment - wounded. The American figures are
i to Teheran are -now in danger of being much more conservative.
Administration officials said th~ shot down, and this has led to the hur- Each side is believed to have
based their assessment on several ac tied departure of many foreigners 'amassed 500,000 soldiers on its side of
tors: irate i ence a e y astern working in Iran who feared the would the border. The American officials be- '
mu venous not be able to leave later on. Y j. ~ f " lieve the Iranians either were reluctant
countries resume t-
electronic means? reports from West American analysts say the Iranians, to commit more troops to this battle or ,
ern observers including lournahsts, who had been building up for the offer- lacked the equipment and logisticat
w o visited the battle area m recent slue for months, attacked through the capability to use them.
f the
da close' anal is of statements Huwaizah marshes, The thrust o
Irnade b Ira and Iran and informa- assault came from east of Al Amarah
b American and other and ~ Qumah, towns on the Tigris
ti leaned
Western diplomats in Baghdad and by ,giver north ?wa a mih'tariy signifi
,Western di lomats in Teheran where cat~dnort ~ uth~ road, also goes
'there is no United States mis io throu those towns..:
As recently as Monday, Ainencan of- Sh
ficials were saying that the fighting " Am ~~ ~ io tit the road and isa
was indecisive, but today, senior offi- Army
cials were firm in asserting that they ~ late Basra to the south. That would
had no doubt that the Iraqis had deci- have been a major victory for the Ira-
sively defeated the Iranians m the_ let- mans' who apparently hoped it would ',
break the Iraqi resolve and lead to the
est conflict. ~ . resignation of President Saddam Hus-
Soviet-Made Missile Used sein, whose ouster Iran has made a
In what Administration officials re- condition to ending the war.
ration move, the Ira- In the initial phase of the latest at-
gard as a despe tack, March 11 to 14, the Iranians were
mans also launched a few Soviet-made believed to have fought their way to the
I surface-to-surface missiles ag~t eastern banks of the Tigris, and in
Baghdad, the Iraqi capital, and at least some places actually crossed it and set
two are believed to have exploded in up positions at the road.
~ the city. The missiles, known as Scuds, Amencan analystsmsathe attack, had
date from the 1950's. They are cumber- who had been expect' g
some battlefield weapons fired from a ',built up awell-entrenched defense with
tractor-like vehicle and are very inac- ,artillery and tanks ahd amend fi meter
curate at the 150-mile distance from made helicopter guns ips ~
planes effectively.
ban's frontier to Baghdad. The Iraqi counterattack in the last
', The missile has been supplied to three days crushed the Iranians, the
Warsaw Pact nationsl ancati ~ ~th American officials said. "The Iranian
~I Syria, Libya and Iraq.
Binuclear and conventional waYheads,
but the Soviet Union is not known to
Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/25 :CIA-RDP90-009658000302630073-1