US sends more combat troops to Iraq ahead of referendum

Around 2,000 paratroopers from the Airborne Division are preparing to be in position in time for October's constitutional referendum which will be followed by national elections. Other "warfighting" units have been put on alert for rapid deployment.

The Independent has learnt that the 1st Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division is also on its way to Iraq to replace a Louisiana National Guard unit. National Guardsmen are often referred to as "weekend warriors" because of their former slogan "one weekend a month, two weeks a year".

The extra forces will raise the number of US troops from around 138,000 to 160,000 and will be perceived as delaying America's exit strategy for Iraq which was due to begin with the new constitution.

President George Bush stressed in a speech at the Idaho Centre of National Guards yesterday that US troops would only be brought home when Iraq was ready for it. "An immediate withdrawal of our troops in Iraq or the broader Middle East, as some have called for, would only embolden the terrorists and create a staging-ground to launch more attacks against America and free nations," he said.

A senior US officer, Major-General Douglas E Lute, said during a visit to London that it was "very difficult" to deny the "perception of occupation" while there were 150,000-plus foreign troops in Iraq.

However constitutional talks remain bogged down in sectarian acrimony and violence continues unabated. Yesterday around 100 insurgents, armed with rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and assault rifles, carried out a series of synchronised raids on police posts in the western suburbs of the capital. At least eight people, three of them civilians, were killed in the daylight attacks and dozens of security force vehicles were burned.

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http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article307999.ece