The Gulf Carnage in the Marshes

They lay as they had fallen, crumpled and now frozen in death, dust-covered mounds in the flat expanse of the gray-brown desert. There were hundreds of them, Iranian infantrymen who had fought and died. A column of Iraqi tanks, their spotlights flickering through billows of thick dust, churned past the bodies toward the east; the roar of their engines blended into a continuous hum. As outgoing rounds of 130-mm artillery shook the windows of his headquarters nearby, Iraqi Major General Sultan Hashem Ahmed told a group of reporters: "There are no Iranian soldiers on Iraqi territory--not even one."

Thus did a vaunted Iranian offensive come to an end last week, crushed by the weight of Iraqi firepower in the desert strip between the Tigris River and the Huwaiza marshes. Thousands of Iranian and Iraqi troops had been killed during the week-long assault; even so, there was no indication that the latest flare- up in the 4 1/2-year-old gulf war had brought the conflict any closer to a solution.

Nonetheless, Iraq began to celebrate as soon as War Communique 1774 announced that its forces "had achieved victory over the Iranian invaders in the Huwaiza marshes in a unique epic of warfare." Schools and offices closed, and city streets soon filled with dancing, chanting throngs. In smaller towns, crowds marched to government offices to hear local leaders deliver speeches. The festivities were filmed and televised late into the night, scenes of celebration alternating with views of the mangled Iranian dead.

The Iranian offensive, which had been expected for months, was remarkably successful in its first two days. The assault troops crossed the marshes and set up positions on the banks of the Tigris; a few units even crossed the river on pontoon bridges to the vicinity of the highway between Baghdad and Basra, Iraq's second city. When the Iraqis eventually counterattacked with heavy concentrations of armor and artillery, the Iranians dug in and fought back. That they had put up a valiant struggle was demonstrated by the burned- out hulks of Iraqi tanks and armored personnel carriers littering the battlefield. The Iranian infantry, although well armed, carried little more than automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades and had hardly any air or artillery support. After two days of stalemate, the Iraqis broke through and punched toward the east, forcing the remaining Iranians back to the shores of the marshes.

The second battle of the Huwaiza marshes ended much as had the first one a year ago, though the two encounters were otherwise dissimilar. In the first confrontation, the Iranians had attempted to prevail by sheer weight of numbers, throwing thousands of relatively untrained Revolutionary Guards into the fray. This year, by contrast, the assault troops were disciplined and well equipped; they wore boots and carried German-made gas masks. Their aim was to break through the Iraqi defense lines and then hold out against a counterattack, and for several days they did exactly that.