Defeated Iraqi soldiers may be melting back into the general population, coalition officers fear, only to re-emerge as combatants. Jack Fairweather reports
They made a bedraggled band dressed in a mixture of uniform and civilian clothes: eight Iraqi POWs being herded towards a British picket away from the frontline by a Scimitar tank.
As they approached troop transport vehicles to be taken away to one of a number of holding pens set up to hold deserting Iraqi soldiers in southern Iraq, they were made to lie down for a final frisk before departing.
"Saddam very bad," said one of the POWs vehemently, although his British captor appear nonplussed as he searched his jogging bottoms.
According to a senior army officer, over the past 48 hours "hundreds" of Iraqi POWs have so far been detained, although the numbers are still far less than the thousands expected. On Saturday the 51st Division surrendered, according to Coalition commanders, The 51st was a 10,000 strong mechanised division from which only a handful of POWs have been picked up with the majority of the 51st Division, many of whom are Shias, appearing to have dispersed among with the local population.
The area around Basra, scene of an intense bombardment over the past few days was an eerie graveyard of wrecked tanks and armoured personnel carriers from which their occupants appeared to have fled before an attack.
Near Shaibah airfield 15 km south of Basra the only corpse nearby was that of a mangy dog which appeared to have died of malnutrition. British officers were told before entering Iraq that enemy soldiers had been prevented from carrying civilian clothes or white material into battle by the Iraqi authorities to stop them deserting. But that has not stopped Iraqi soldiers, as the POWs on display at the picket showed, from acquiring items of civilian dress and going into hiding. It has created a worrying security situation in the 400 sq mile area so far secured by British forces in south-eastern Iraq.
The majority of British encounters around Basra yesterday have been from small units, suggesting that despite the 51st Divisions surrender, "rogue" soldiers are lying low before emerging to fight.
In the early hours of yesterday morning a brief gun battle developed near a refuelling depot several miles from the frontline in what had been thought to be cleared territory, as hidden Iraqi gunmen began firing.
Equally disturbing has been the security alert issued around the town of Az Zubayr, isolated by advancing forces on Friday on the push forwards to Basra.
Local townsmen were reported to be raiding the deserted arms dump in the town's barrack's leading to an intervention by Allied forces.
"The last thing we want is for the local population to begin arming itself, whilst there is an absence of authority," said a British officer.
That message did not appear to be getting across however, as looters began patrolling the roads of newly liberated Iraq, where the mood was altogether different from the one of quiet bewilderment in the opening hours following the invasion.
Pick-up trucks could be seen on the roads loaded with beds and swivel chairs taken from the now empty local police stations and military buildings.
"We're free," shouted one of the looters as he brandished a white flag out of a car door window. Iraqis who had gathered by the side of the road also appeared to be less cautious of approaching the long columns of advancing British troops.
One man leaned in through a jeep window, and tried to ask for a pair of shoes. "Saddam took my shoes," he said.
Another woman made begging signs from the roadside for food, although she appeared more opportunist than needy.
But for many Iraqis how exactly being "liberated" might change their lives has not yet sunk in.
An Iraqi woman said she had not seen her family in Kuwait for 12 years, but could not understand that she might soon be able to cross over the border to visit them.
"How can I go to Kuwait? I am Iraqi," she said simply.
It took a young boy standing beside her called Mohammed to explain to her.
"Now that Saddam goes we can go anywhere," said Mohammed, clutching a large white flag nearly as tall as himself.
Behind him in the vague evening light Iraq stretched down to the border with Kuwait, a collection of small hovels, and dry and broken fields where farmers tended their crops.
It was possible to imagine for a minute that when the war ends Mohammed might soon be able to cross over to the green farms of northern Kuwait and bring back with him the expertise to transform his own country.
"Iraq can become good now," he said.
Three Iraqi men trying to drive their jeep through a British armoured column were more prosaic in their expectations.
"Saddam goes, America comes, but we continue working. With us Iraqis we are always fighting."
A distant round of artillery fire seemed to back up his words.