An F/A-18 Hornet is launched off the deck of the USS Theodore Roosevelt in the eastern Mediteranean on Thursday March 27,2003. The squadrons of the carrier group have stepped up flight strikes in northern Iraq for ‘Operation Iraqi Freedom’. U.S. forces edged closer to Baghdad on several routes Thursday clashing with Iraqi troops and preparing for a possible confrontation with Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guard. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel)