They've been reconnoitring Iraqi positions and oil fields, preparing air strips, encouraging defections, contacting Kurdish and Shiite militias, and establishing communications networks so the US army can quickly seize up to 75% of Iraqi territory, leaving only a small area from Baghdad north to Tikrit for a full-scale air and ground assault. Regular air strikes by US and British warplanes in the “no-fly” zones have already been well publicized.
The advance units are in now because, unlike the 1991 Gulf War, military planners don't want the ground assault to wait until after a prolonged air offensive; they want a swift ground occupation of most of the country to undercut antiwar sentiment, and to secure major oil fields.
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