15,000 troops mobilised as US seizes Iraq weapons cache
Meanwhile, two US soldiers were wounded yesterday in a bomb attack on their convoy south of Baghdad, a military spokesman said.
Sergeant Mark Ingham said the attack with an "improvised explosive device" occurred in the town of Iskandariya, 45 kilometres away from the capital.
After long insisting no more US soldiers were required to secure Iraq, the Pentagon said on Saturday that 10,000 troops were being mobilised in two national guard brigades and it put 5,000 more on standby as US calls for international troop contributions go unheeded.
The 30th Infantry Brigade from North Carolina and the 39th Infantry Brigade from Arkansas 10,000 soldiers in total will mobilise on October 1 and October 12 respectively, the Department of Defence said.
The United States is trying to persuade other powers notably war opponents France, Germany and Russia to contribute to a stabilisation force in Iraq where US troops come under daily attack.
But at a summit on Saturday with President George W Bush, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow's contribution to policing and rebuilding Iraq could only be decided after a new UN resolution is passed, setting out the UN role in the war-stricken country run by a US-led coalition.
"The degree and extent and level of Russia's participation in the restoration of Iraq will be determined when we know the parameters of the new resolution on Iraq," Putin told reporters after the meeting at Camp David, Maryland.
Back in Iraq, the US military hailed its 4th Infantry Division after a series of overnight raids north of Baghdad netted coalition. Lieutenant Colonel George Krivo said four caches were seized after information was handed to the 4th ID from local Iraqi sources.
The largest, found on the outskirts of Tikrit, 175 kilometres north of Baghdad, included 23 Russian-made surface-to-air missiles (SAMs).
He said the dump also included more than 1,000 pounds of C-4 explosives, 115 rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), about 430 hand grenades, 51 smoke pots, 1,300 blasting caps and 94 RPG motors.
RPG motors are often stripped down and used to make "improvised explosive devices" (IEDs).
A second discovery included a further eight SAMs, seven mortars, 196 rockets and a machine gun. A third cache contained RPGs and a plant for manufacturing IEDs. Two hundred mortars were found in the fourth cache.
In Baghdad, UN staff continued their exodus from Iraq to Jordan after a hotel housing US officials came under fire. A third of the United Nations' 86 international staff remaining in Iraq are being pulled out on orders handed down Thursday by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.
The United Nations kept about 650 international personnel in Iraq before an August 19 bombing killed 22 people, including Mr Annan's top envoy to Baghdad. A second bombing on September 22 killed an Iraqi security guard.
