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U.S. in daylong battle in Sunni stronghold

A U.S. military helicopter releases anti-missile decoy flares while flying over central Baghdad where about 1,000 Iraqi and U.S. troops battled gunmen early Tuesday. (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)
Steven R. Hurst and Qassim Abdul-zahra Associated Press
A U.S. military helicopter releases anti-missile decoy flares while flying over central Baghdad where about 1,000 Iraqi and U.S. troops battled gunmen early Tuesday. (Associated Press / The Spokesman-Review)

BAGHDAD, Iraq – U.S. jets screamed low over the capital and helicopter gunships swooped in to pound a central Baghdad battleground Tuesday, supporting Iraqi and American troops in a daylong fight that officials said killed 50 insurgents in a militant Sunni Arab stronghold.

The battle raged on Haifa Street about 1 1/2 miles north of the heavily fortified Green Zone – home to the U.S. Embassy and other facilities – on the eve of President Bush’s expected announcement that he would send 20,000 more soldiers to Iraq.

It was the second major confrontation on Haifa Street in the four days since Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced a new drive to rid Baghdad of sectarian fighters.

The U.S. military said about 1,000 Iraqi and U.S. soldiers carried out “targeted raids to capture multiple targets, disrupt insurgent activity and restore Iraqi Security Forces control of North Haifa Street.”

“This area has been subject to insurgent activity which has repeatedly disrupted Iraqi Security Force operations in central Baghdad,” said a statement quoting Lt. Col. Scott Bleichwehl, spokesman for Multi-National Division Baghdad.

Bleichwehl said no American or Iraqi soldiers were killed. He did not address the number of militants killed, but the Iraqi Defense Ministry reported 50 deaths among insurgents.

At a Saturday ceremony marking the 85th anniversary of the founding of the Iraqi army, al-Maliki again vowed to strike at the Shiite Muslim and Sunni Arab extremists behind the sectarian warfare that has bloodied the country over the past year.

Al-Maliki issued the new plan after lengthy consultations with Bush, who has been preparing a new Iraq policy in recent weeks.

Al-Maliki – who draws major support from radical, anti-U.S. Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, the leader of the dangerous Mahdi Army militia – appeared to have ordered the stepped-up fighting with Sunni Arab fighters to put an Iraqi face on the latest bid to tame the capital.

Several al-Maliki aides and confidants have told the Associated Press that the prime minister plans to focus his troops, with American backing, on Sunni insurgents in western Baghdad at the outset of the drive. They spoke on condition of anonymity.

Al-Maliki, the associates said, then plans to challenge al-Sadr to disarm and disband his militia because there would no longer be a reason for them to roam the streets with Sunni Arab insurgent forces crippled.