Countdown To War: Home Front: 6O HRS TO CONFLICT

WAR with Iraq could now be as close as 60 hours away. Military sources believe that the first wave of attack aircraft and cruise missiles will be launched against Saddam overnight on Tuesday.

The stakes were raised dramatically when the mighty American B-1 bomber was used for the first time in the southern Iraq no-fly zone, pounding mobile radar installations with unheard-of firepower. The attack was only 230 miles west of Baghdad.

On the front line in Northern Kuwait, the urgency quickened noticeably yesterday. In an around the clock operation, troops in Camp Coyote, the British camp closest to the Iraq border, are being supplied with everything they need to fight the first hours and days of war - the priorities being ammunition and water.

Soldiers of the supply regiment attached to Camp Coyote - home of the Desert Rats - have been pushing themselves close to exhaustion to make sure the front line troops have no shortages.

Corporal Andy Phillips from Falkirk, Scotland, has been on countless night time runs to supply bullets and tank munitions as part of his work for the 2 Close Support Regiment of the Royal Logistic Corps.

The 30-year-old father of two said: "We are working 24 hours a day keeping the supply chain going to the guys in the front. If we can't get this stuff to them, they are going to suffer. We have got guys out all the way through the night and day."

His commanding officer, Lt-Col Alistair Deas, said the build-up has been very quick. "The British Army as a whole is deploying at a very fast rate, far quicker than the last time we were here in the Gulf War. I think we have doubled the numbers that we have in half the time. The majority of soldiers are working 20-hours a day, catching some sleep and then continuing to work."

Col Deas, 40, who served in the Gulf War, stressed that there was as yet no time limit, but it's obvious to the serving soldiers at Camp Coyote that the speed of the operation has been drastically stepped up.

"We were ready to go the day we arrived and we are even more ready now," he asserted, adding the ominous word, "Whenever."

That "whenever" seems very close now. As the clock ticked nearer to war, signs of an imminent attack were everywhere yesterday.

In Britain, hospitals with special burns and plastic surgery units have been alerted to receive casualties from the front line. Hospitals close to Britain's major airports have also been warned to be ready to receive injured troops.

The Department of Health said the aim was to be "as well prepared as possible for any forthcoming conflict".

The Ministry Defence yesterday contacted civil airlines - understood to be Britannia and Air 2000 - to arrange the chartering of commercial planes to bring casualties home from the Gulf.

"We have approached airlines with a view to chartering aircraft for medical evacuation if necessary," a spokesman said. "But this is purely a contingency measure."

Medical measures were also being taken in the Kuwait desert, only a few miles from the Iraq border.

Front line troops - who have been ordered to carry respirators at all times - have now also been issued with drugs to combat chemical and biological attacks.

British warships in the northern Gulf are stepping up their precautions against suicide attacks from terrorists in small boats stacked with explosives.

Lt Cdr John Childs, gunnery officer on HMS Liverpool, said the threat was "very real and very serious".

Yesterday afternoon, in blazing desert heat, the Desert Rats completed their final "dress rehearsal" before the likely call to war.

Tank squadrons from the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards and armoured personnel carriers carrying infantrymen from the Irish Guards staged a live fire exercise which would have sent shivers down the spines of Saddam's front line conscripts just across the border a few miles away. They would have undoubtedly heard the thump and rumble of shellfire piercing the clear desert air.

If they hear that chilling sound again it will be for real.

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