By DAVID CRARY
Associated Press Writer
U.S. forces surged across deserts and rivers Sunday to within 100 miles of Baghdad, but the battlefield success was tempered by news that a U.S. Patriot missile may have downed a British plane and an American soldier was suspected in a deadly grenade attack on his comrades.
In perhaps the most dramatic advance, the 3rd Infantry Division's 2nd Brigade covered roughly 230 miles in 40 hours to take positions about 100 miles from Baghdad _ less than a day's march.
In more than 70 tanks and 60 Bradley fighting vehicles, the brigade raced day and night across the desert, at one point killing 100 Iraqi militiamen who confronted the Americans in machinegun-mounted vehicles.
In other areas, however, Iraqi forces resisted vigorously. And American officials were forced to confront the prospect that one of their own soldiers had killed a comrade and wounded 13 others.
The grenade attack occurred early Sunday at a 101st Airborne Division command center in Kuwait, where an assailant threw grenades into three tents.
The suspect, found hiding in a bunker, is an engineer from an engineering platoon. The motive "most likely was resentment," said Max Blumenfeld, an Army spokesman. He did not elaborate.
The name of the soldier who died was withheld pending notification of relatives, said George Heath, spokesman for Fort Campbell, Ky., the 101st Airborne's home base.
"Death is a tragic incident regardless of how it comes," Heath said. "But when it comes from a fellow comrade, it does even more to hurt morale."
Three of the wounded were seriously injured; 10 had superficial wounds from grenade fragments, Heath said.
In the other unsettling incident, Group Capt. Al Lockwood, a spokesman for British forces, said a Tornado aircraft may have been shot down Sunday by U.S. missile near the Kuwaiti-Iraq border while returning from a mission. The aircraft's crew was missing; details about those on board were not disclosed.
A U.S. official confirmed that a Patriot missile battery "may have engaged" the aircraft.
"This is a tragedy and we are taking rapid steps to ensure there is no repetition," Lockwood said.
It was the third aerial accident involving British personnel since the war began. Six British troops and a U.S. Navy officer died when two British helicopters collided, while eight British and four U.S. Marines were killed when their helicopter crashed near the Kuwait-Iraqi border.
In Baghdad, a series of explosions were heard on the outskirts of the city at midmorning Sunday. A cloud of smoke hung over the capital; residents believed it was created in part by fires set to conceal targets from bombardment.
Iraqi officials said more than 500 Iraqis in four cities were injured in allied airstrikes Saturday; they said 77 civilians were killed in Basra, the main city in southern Iraq.
Iraqi television reported that Saddam Hussein's home town, Tikrit, had been bombed several times. Al-Arabiya, an Arab satellite TV news channel, reported that four people were killed in those attacks.
On the battlefront, U.S. and British forces captured territory, towns and military installations _ often with little or no opposition. But in some locations, Iraqi forces fought back with artillery fire or guerrilla-style counterattacks.
Iraqi state television reported fighting between Iraqi ruling Baath party militias and U.S.-British forces near the Shiite holy city of Najaf, 95 miles south of Baghdad. It said the top Baath party official in Najaf was killed.
U.S. Army infantry battled Iraqi troops at As-Samawah, downriver from Najaf and 150 miles south of Baghdad, as the Americans seized two bridges across a canal near the Euphrates' southern bank.
The U.S. Army took Nasiriyah, another major crossing point over the Euphrates northwest of Basra, Central Command said.
Near the Persian Gulf, Marines seized an Iraqi naval base Sunday morning at Az Zubayr. In the command center, Marines found half-eaten bowls of rice and other still-warm food.
Coalition troops were still trying to mop up resistance at the main Gulf port of Umm Qasr so it could be used for humanitarian shipments. They faced street-to-street fighting against guerrillas, including members of Saddam Hussein's Fedayeen, the Baath Party paramilitary organization.
Telecasts of the Umm Qasr fighting were seen by Iraqi officials in Baghdad, as well as around the world.
"The heroic units are fighting the mercenaries and showing them certain death," said Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf. "We have made them enter the quagmire and they will not be able to get out of it."
Lt. Col. Chris Vernon, a British spokesman, said some of the Iraqi fighters in the area had changed into civilian clothing to blend in with the population.
Near Basra in the south, Marines saw hundreds of Iraqi men _ apparently soldiers who had taken off their uniforms _ walking along a highway with bundles on their back past burned-out Iraqi tanks.
Allied forces have captured Basra's airport and a key bridge. But commanders say they are in no rush to storm the city, hoping instead that Iraqi defense forces decide to give up.
In the United States, and in cities across the world, hundreds of thousands of people joined anti-war protests Saturday. There were occasional angry confrontations with war supporters who also rallied, waving American flags and chanting of "USA!"
In London, there was frustration among some of the estimated 200,000 anti-war marchers who turned out _ only one-third of the turnout at a mass protest last month.
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