Iraqi forces clash with militants in northern city

BAGHDAD — Iraqi helicopter gunships struck suspected insurgent positions in Tikrit on yesterday as part of a government offensive to retake the predominantly Sunni hometown of former dictator Saddam Hussein from Sunni militants led by the al-Qaeda breakaway Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, residents and officials said.

The Iraqi military launched its push to wrest back Tikrit, a hotbed of antipathy toward Iraq's Shiite-led government, on Saturday with a multi-pronged assault spearheaded by ground troops backed by tanks and helicopters. Security officials said the army is coordinating its campaign with the United States.

Tikrit is one of two major urban centers that fell to insurgents earlier this month during their lightning offensive across the country's north and west.

The insurgents appeared to have repelled the military's initial push for Tikrit, and remained in control of the city on yesterday, but clashes were taking place in the northern neighborhood of Qadissiyah, two residents reached by telephone said.

Muhanad Saif al-Din, who lives in the city center, said he could see smoke rising from Qadissiyah, which borders the University of Tikrit, where troops brought by helicopter established a bridgehead two days ago. He said many of the militants in Tikrit had deployed to the city's outskirts, apparently to blunt the military attack.

Military spokesman Qassim al-Moussawi told reporters yesterday that the military was in full control of the university and had raised the Iraqi flag over the campus.

"The battle has several stages. The security forces have cleared most of the areas of the first stage and we have achieved results," al-Moussawi said. "It is a matter of time before we declare the total clearing" of Tikrit.

A provincial official reached by telephone reported clashes northwest of the city around an air base that previously served as a US military facility known as Camp Speicher. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.

Jawad al-Bolani, a security official in the provincial operation command, said the US was sharing intelligence with Iraq and has played an "essential" role in the Tikrit offensive.

"The Americans are with us and they are an important part in the success we are achieving in and around Tikrit," al-Bolani told The Associated Press.

Washington has sent 180 of 300 American troops President Barack Obama has promised to help Iraqi forces. The US is also flying manned and unmanned aircraft on reconnaissance missions over Iraq.

Meanwhile, a top Iranian military commander said Tehran was ready to send in any type of military assistance the Iraqi government forces need, including drones.

"Iran will never spare any help in any field that Iraq needs, even drones. ... We are waiting to help them, in case Iraqi officials ask," the deputy head of Iran's armed forces, Gen. Masoud Jazayeri, told the Iranian state-run Arabic-language station, Al Alam TV.

None-Arab and mostly Shiite, Iran has been playing the role of guarantor of Shiites in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. It has maintained close ties with successive Shiite-led governments since the 2003 ouster of Saddam Hussein, a Sunni who oppressed the Shiites.

US officials said Iran has been flying surveillance drones in Iraq, controlling them from an airfield in Baghdad. A top Iraqi intelligence official said Iran was secretly supplying the Iraqi security forces with weapons, including rockets, heavy machine guns and multiple rocket launchers.

Iraq's government is eager to make progress in Tikrit after weeks of demoralizing defeats at the hands of the Islamic State and its Sunni allies. The militants' surge across the vast Sunni-dominated areas that stretch from Baghdad north and west to the Syrian and Jordanian borders has thrown Iraq into its deepest crisis since US troops withdrew in December 2011.

More ominously, the insurgent blitz, which prompted Kurdish forces to assert long-held claims over disputed territory, has raised the prospect of Iraq being split in three, along sectarian and ethnic lines.

For embattled Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, success in Tikrit could help restore a degree of faith in his ability to stem the militant tide. Al-Maliki, a Shiite who has been widely accused of monopolizing power and alienating Iraq's Sunni and Kurdish minorities, is under growing pressure to step aside. But he appears set on a third consecutive term as prime minister after his bloc won the most seats in April elections.

The government received a boost in its battle with the militants with the arrival in Baghdad late Saturday of five Sukhoi 25 warplanes purchased secondhand from Russia. The aircraft is designed to provide close air support to ground forces and to destroy mobile targets.

Iraqi air force commander Lt. Gen. Anwar Hama Amin said the military is "in urgent need of this type of aircraft during this difficult time."

"These jets will enter service within a few days — the coming three or four days — in order to support the units and to fight the terrorist ISIL organization," he said, referring to the al-Qaeda breakaway group that has spearheaded the Sunni militant offensive.

The planes could be deployed in the fight for Tikrit, a city of more than 200,000 some 130 kilometers (80 miles) north of Baghdad, where anger toward Iraq's Shiite-led government runs deep.

The Islamic State, which already controls vast swaths in northern and eastern Syria amid the chaos of that nation's civil war, aims to erase the borders of the modern Middle East and impose its strict brand of Shariah law.

In Iraq, the group has formed an alliance of sorts with fellow Islamic militants, as well as former members of Saddam's Baath party, with all of them hoping to overthrow al-Maliki's Shiite-led government.

The militants have tapped into deep-seated discontent among Iraq's Sunnis, who largely dominated the country until the US-led overthrow of Saddam brought the Shiite majority to power. Since then, Sunnis have complained of discrimination and said they are unfairly targeted by the country's security forces.