- Reuters) -- The United States is considering an all-out
military attack in the coming weeks against the town of Tal Afar in northern
Iraq, which it sees as a stronghold of rebellion, a US general said on
Thursday.
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- US and Iraqi troops have been battling insurgents
in Tal Afar, west of the northern city of Mosul, for several days. A joint
US-Iraqi military statement said they killed seven insurgents on Wednesday.
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- Many families have evacuated the town in recent days
as violence increased.
-
- "In Tal Afar, coalition forces and members of
the Iraqi security forces are preparing a possible military operation to
rid that city of insurgents," Major General Rick Lynch told a news
briefing in Baghdad.
-
- "As we speak, operations are ongoing to evacuate
civilians from neighborhoods targeted by the insurgents."
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- The United States sees Tal Afar, near the Syrian
border, as a conduit for foreign fighters and military equipment coming
into Iraq to help insurgents fighting the occupying US forces and the Shi'ite
Muslim - and Kurdish - dominated Iraqi government.
-
- The insurgents are mainly drawn from Iraq's third
main community, Sunni Arabs, who account for some 20 percent of the population
and have dominated Iraqi politics for decades, under ousted leader Saddam
Hussein and before.
-
- "You will see, over the next several weeks -
we're not specifying any time - specific military operations to target
the insurgency in Tal Afar," Lynch said.
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- Foreign Fighters
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- He said US forces were encouraging the evacuation
so a possible military strike would avoid civilian deaths.
-
- "If indeed decisive military operations are
required, we want to ensure that the attacks take place to kill the insurgents
without collateral damage in killing innocent civilians."
-
- He said US forces had "indications" that
insurgents were living in Tal Afar, and intelligence reports suggested
some 20 percent of them were "foreign fighters." He did not say
where they came from.
-
- Lynch added that US and Iraqi forces had been trying
to wipe out the insurgency in a series of operations since May, culminating
in the operations of the last few days.
-
- They have so far failed to put down rebellions, but
Lynch said the growing number of US-trained Iraqi government troops - there
are now 190,000 of them - should mean the resources were in place to quell
future insurgencies.
-
- "We have now sufficient assets available between
the coalition forces and Iraqi security forces ... to leave behind a robust
security presence so the insurgents cannot return."
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- Lynch warned against seeing any attack on Tal Afar
as a re-run of an attack in November on the city of Fallujah.
-
- US troops surrounded that Sunni stronghold west of
Baghdad and effectively cut it off, but encountered fierce resistance and
bloodshed when they entered.
-
- "Every situation is different. Don't try to
equate Tal Afar with any previous operation," he said.
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