Some 1,000 U.S. ground troops, along with tanks and Iraqi special forces, moved into camps and set up vehicle checkpoints. A U.S. military spokesperson in Baghdad told Reuters the deployment "is part of ongoing operations in Fallujah. It is not the beginning of a major offensive."
The deployment comes two days after Iraqi interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi warned city leaders in Al-Fallujah to hand over foreign fighters there or face a military operation to root them out.
Al-Fallujah is a base for insurgents including Jordanian-born Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi. Al-Zarqawi's group has claimed responsibility for yesterday's suicide bombings that killed at least five people inside Baghdad's Green Zone.
There are mixed reports today about the arrest of senior members of a Fallujah delegation that had been mediating a truce with the government.
In Baghdad, a suicide car bomber killed 10 civilians today near a police station in the southwest of the city.
(Reuters/AFP/AP/dpa)
The deployment comes two days after Iraqi interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi warned city leaders in Al-Fallujah to hand over foreign fighters there or face a military operation to root them out.
Al-Fallujah is a base for insurgents including Jordanian-born Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi. Al-Zarqawi's group has claimed responsibility for yesterday's suicide bombings that killed at least five people inside Baghdad's Green Zone.
There are mixed reports today about the arrest of senior members of a Fallujah delegation that had been mediating a truce with the government.
In Baghdad, a suicide car bomber killed 10 civilians today near a police station in the southwest of the city.
(Reuters/AFP/AP/dpa)
