U.S., Iraqi Forces Tighten Grip on Samarra

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SAMARRA, Iraq (Oct. 3) - U.S. and Iraqi forces on Sunday declared victory in Samarra where they battled hundreds of guerrillas in the first step of a drive to take back all of Iraq's rebel-held areas by year's end.

Around 3,000 U.S. troops, backed by a 2,000-strong Iraqi force, and supported by fighter jets and artillery, stormed Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, on Friday, determined to rid the city of an estimated 1,000 insurgents.

"This has been a successful operation ... We're very confident that the future of Samarra is good," Major-General John Batiste, the commander of the U.S. 1st Infantry Division, which led the assault on Samarra, told CNN.

"It is over in Samarra," Iraqi Defence Minister Hazem Shaalan told Al Arabiya television.

While the city was calm on Sunday, a Reuters photographer saw the skeletons of several burnt out cars and pools of dried blood on street corners.

About 70 percent of the city was under U.S.-Iraq control, but operations were still going on, said a spokesman for the U.S. 1st Infantry Division.

In 36 hours of fighting, often street-to-street, the U.S. military said it killed 125 guerrillas and seized 88. Residents said many bodies were left lying in the roads, hospital workers too overburdened or fearful to collect them.

A dusk-to-dawn curfew was imposed, but many residents ventured outdoors on Sunday, in contrast to Saturday, when most stayed inside, fearing U.S. snipers positioned on high buildings and some insurgents still roaming the streets.

The U.S. military had estimated that about 1,000 guerrillas were hiding out in Samarra, but after the 36-hour onslaught, it was not clear what happened to most of those fighters

In previous attacks on rebel strongholds, insurgents have melted back into the population, giving up the ground to U.S. troops, only to return days later and resume fighting. It was not clear if a similar scenario could play out in Samarra.

FALLUJA LIES AHEAD