War strategy shifts north of Baghdad

BAQUBAH, IRAQ —  Troops in armored vehicles swept through this city north of Baghdad on Tuesday as the U.S. military launched a major offensive as part of a significant shift of focus from inside the capital to surrounding areas.

American commanders say the offensive, which involves about 10,000 U.S. troops in Baqubah and other parts of Diyala province, is designed to stop the flow of bombs into Baghdad. The need to do so was illustrated once again Tuesday when a massive truck bomb struck one of the capital’s most revered Shiite Muslim mosques. The explosion killed at least 60 people and wounded scores more, the Interior Ministry said.

The mosque bombing was the worst attack during a deadly day in which 21 other bodies were found around the capital. Nine of those were discovered in neighborhoods near the mosque, an indication that they may have been Sunni Arab men killed in retaliatory violence.

The military announced the deaths of three U.S. soldiers, two in the Baghdad area and one in Diyala, bringing to 3,531 the total number of U.S. military deaths since the invasion in 2003, according to the icasualties.org website.

American military officials say their goal is to break the cycle of bombings by Sunni insurgents and revenge killings by Shiite militias. In February, the military began to build up the number of troops in Baghdad and concentrate them in the capital’s toughest neighborhoods -- even at the risk of neglecting outlying provinces. Now, however, American commanders believe the only way to stop the flow of bombs is to improve security to the northeast, south and west of Baghdad.

“You have to control the approaches to prevent these bombs from getting inside the city,” said Army Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, a military spokesman.

U.S. military officers reject the notion that the focus beyond Baghdad represents mission creep. Top generals have been talking about the importance of securing the “Baghdad belts” for months, they note. With the buildup having reached its full complement of 28,500 additional troops, U.S. commanders say they have a large enough force to mount more ambitious offensives.

“From the beginning we have talked about the fact that not only do you have to have troops in Baghdad, but you have to control the belts,” Garver said.

But there is no disputing that the offensive will siphon off troops who might otherwise be devoted to patrolling Baghdad. The change illustrates a persistent theme of the war: The U.S. military almost always has found a need to return forces to areas from which it has pulled troops.

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Deadly Diyala

Last month, the top American commander in northern Iraq, Army Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. “Randy” Mixon, said he needed more troops to deal with the escalating violence in Diyala. That unusually frank assessment -- along with a realization that Sunni insurgents controlled parts of Baqubah, the provincial capital -- helped set the stage for the current offensive.

Diyala, an area of rivers and rich farmland between Baghdad and the Iranian border, has recently overtaken Al Anbar province as the deadliest place outside Baghdad for U.S. forces in Iraq. Eighty-six American troops have died in Diyala this year.

Baqubah has been the center of much of the violence. This year, Iraqi and American soldiers established themselves in the eastern parts of the city, which has roughly 300,000 residents, but its western neighborhoods have been largely under the control of insurgent groups such as Al Qaeda in Iraq.

The U.S. attack on those neighborhoods began Monday night and continued Tuesday.

Attack helicopters and warplanes pounded three neighborhoods in west Baqubah with rockets, missiles and 500-pound bombs, targeting car bombs, weapons caches and suspected hide-outs. Insurgents popped up on the rooftops and in alleys, engaging the soldiers in crackling gunfights.

Through loudspeakers, Iraqi troops told residents that they and the Americans were “cleansing the neighborhoods of terrorists.” Iraqis were told to open the doors of their homes, but to stay inside as the Americans swept through.

“We ask the people to be committed to the security instructions and notify us about the whereabouts of the terrorists,” said Staff Col. Raghib Radhi Umaria, a spokesman for the Iraqi forces involved in the operation.

At least four Iraqis spotted moving equipment across a road after curfew were killed in the first hours of the offensive, the U.S. military announced. Soldiers recovered a pistol, grenade and walkie-talkie from the bodies. In a separate engagement, U.S. attack helicopters killed four other militants, the American command said. Some Baqubah residents said aerial attacks that began before the infantry’s movement into the city had killed civilians.

Six U.S. soldiers in a Bradley fighting vehicle were injured by a roadside bomb, the military said. There was no word on other U.S. casualties.

The 3rd Stryker Brigade of the U.S. Army’s 2nd Infantry Division led the attack, and the unit was supplemented by forces from two other infantry brigades.

Residents said insurgents planted hundreds of roadside bombs in the city in advance of the American offensive, but U.S. forces began detonating the improvised explosives before the attack began.

Shakir Ahmed, a 41-year-old hospital employee, said he was upset that Sunni militants had taken control of the area, but also apprehensive about the American offensive.

“Our neighborhood is completely surrounded by the American and the Iraqi troops. They were deployed everywhere,” Ahmed said. “People are resentful as the Americans started bombing our area several days ago. The situation is very bad.”

U.S. commanders say they will not know for weeks whether the offensives in Baqubah and other areas around Baghdad succeed in reducing the number of bombings in the capital.

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Trying to deter bombings

For much of the Iraq war, car bombs have proved difficult to deter. During the initial phases of the troop buildup, U.S. officials tried to stop such attacks by erecting large barriers around marketplaces to limit vehicle traffic and by stepping up patrols along roads into the capital. The operations in the Baghdad belts will form the next phase of the strategy.

Tuesday’s massive bomb went off near a crowded square in the parking lot of the Khulani mosque. The shrine is known for its large library of rare books and manuscripts. Although the mosque’s turquoise dome still stood after the blast, one side of the building was badly damaged by the bomb, which also destroyed a home and set shops and cars ablaze, witnesses said. U.S. military officials said the truck was laden with propane tanks.

Al Hussein Awda, a 58-year-old worshiper, said he had lingered inside the air-conditioned mosque after midday prayers, a decision that probably saved his life. The bomb exploded as Awda was walking toward the main gate to leave. Flying debris injured Awda, and he saw people fall dead in front of him from the explosion and shrapnel.

“I have been praying almost every day at this mosque. I started coming here 35 years ago,” he said.

Many of the victims were worshipers leaving the mosque, a prominent Shiite center of worship led by Mohammed Haidari, a member of parliament and a leader of the country’s largest Shiite political party, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council.

Ghaith Abdullah, the 37-year-old owner of a nearby paint shop, described the scene in a telephone interview. “It is a horrible sight in front of me,” he said, “a pillar of smoke, corpses, injured people and panic.”

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julian.barnes@latimes.com

zavis@latimes.com

Zavis reported from Baqubah and Barnes from Baghdad. Times staff writers Raheem Salman, Saif Hameed and Zeena Kareem and special correspondents in Baghdad contributed to this report.