Major-General Rick Lynch, commander of U.S. forces south of Baghdad, told Reuters on Wednesday that about 4,000 of his men would be involved in the operation and would use air strikes and air-mobile infantry units to attack insurgents in the Tigris River valley south of the Iraqi capital.

Pointing on a map to the palm groves south of Baghdad in an area known as Arab Jabour, he said his troops had already pushed out many Sunni Arab militants in the past month and now planned to strike those who escaped southwards.

Washington sent an additional 30,000 troops to Iraq this year and has pushed them from big bases into neighborhood outposts in an effort to reduce sectarian violence and defeat both Sunni Arab insurgents and hostile Shi'ite militia.

Operation Marne Husky involves sending infantry into territory where U.S. forces had not had a presence in the past, in an area south of Baghdad U.S. troops call the "Triangle of Death."

"Tonight it's going to be the first time in about a year they've seen coalition forces. They've had aircraft flying overhead. But they can't hide from infantry kicking down the doors," Lynch said.

The U.S. commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, is due to report to Congress next month on the success of his strategy.

This week U.S. forces announced the launch of a countrywide offensive, operation Phantom Strike.

On Tuesday they announced the first part of Phantom Strike, known as operation Lightning Hammer, which began with an airborne assault on the Diyala River valley north of the capital.

A spokesman for the unit said the soldiers were airlifted out before dawn having captured five suspected militants, destroyed homemade explosives and uncovered a cache of weapons.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Troops in Iraq to Reach Record Level

The Associated Press

Friday 17 August 2007

The number of U.S. troops in Iraq could jump to 171,000 this fall - a record high for the war - as military leaders expect stepped-up insurgent attacks timed to a progress report from American commanders in Baghdad.

Army Lt. Gen. Carter Ham, director for operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Thursday the planned rotations of five brigades moving out of Iraq and their replacements coming in will create the temporary increase in U.S. forces.

Once the transitions are complete, Ham said the troop level will drop back down to about 162,000, which is where it is today. He said current plans are to stay about at that number into early next year, unless commanders recommend in their report next month a reduction in forces.

Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, and Ambassador Ryan Crocker are expected to provide a progress report to President Bush and Congress before Sept. 15. They, as well as Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, are likely to testify before Congress on the report and any recommendations on troop levels.

Congress has pressed the administration to begin drawing troops out of Iraq.

"Clearly al-Qaida in Iraq and others are cognizant of the timing of recommendations and decisions," Ham told Pentagon reporters during a briefing. "So I think it is prudent to expect them to try to influence the decision-makers. And clearly, the commanders in the theater are cognizant of that as well."

Ham added that while Marine Gen. Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the other service chiefs are also doing their own review of progress in Iraq, he believes they will combine their effort with Petraeus, and that the president will be given one comprehensive report from the military.

In a sign that some people may sense a military turnabout in Iraq, a CNN-Opinion Research Corp. poll found that people were about evenly split when asked if the military is making progress in ending violence there. The survey found that 49 percent of the respondents said the military was not making progress, while 47 percent said it was. By 69 percent to 26 percent, most of those questioned said the Iraqi government is not making similar progress.

By 53 percent to 43 percent, most said they do not trust the top U.S. commander in Iraq to report what is truly happening there when he reports to Bush next month. Asked the impact of a positive report, 72 percent said it would not affect their view of the war while 28 percent said it would make them likelier to support it.

The survey, taken Aug. 6-8, involved telephone interviews with 1,029 adults. It had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Most polls show six in 10 Americans still oppose how Bush is handling the war, think the war is going badly and favor cutting troop strength there.

In other comments, Ham said the military has seen more incidents in recent months where explosives are placed in homes or building in Iraq and set to detonate when troops enter. While it is not a new technique, he said, it exploits a vulnerability that officials are working to counter.

The booby-traps, which he described as small roadside bombs, have "been probably more prevalent in the past weeks and months than we had seen previously."

---------

Associated Press Writer Alan Fram contributed to this report.

-------