U.S. military: Iraq bombing campaign a success

Little initial resistance has been reported, though at least nine U.S. soldiers have been killed since the offensive began — the deadliest days for American forces since last fall.

In the farming village of Zambaraniyah, on the outskirts of Arab Jabour about nine miles southeast of the capital, scenes of neglect and devastation were testimony to years of fighting between militants and U.S. and Iraqi troops.

Most of the land is torched or left fallow along small roads that were once laced with booby traps and bombs. Fields are strewn with trash and the blackened hulks of cars. Many buildings are pockmarked by gunfire, and most homes are abandoned.

Maj. Alayne Conway, a spokeswoman for troops in central Iraq, said the amount of ordnance dropped in 10 minutes nearly exceeded what had been used in that region in any month since last June.

Conway said the air attack "was one of the largest airstrikes since the onset of the war" in March 2003.

An AP reporter in Zambaraniyah observed that the bombing continued until Thursday evening.

Even before Thursday's massive attack, U.S. Army Lt. Col. Mark Solomon told a small group of reporters in Zambaraniyah that residents were returning to their homes and that stores and schools were reopening.

Campaign's impact unclear
Despite the apparent success to move quickly into suspected al-Qaida zones, the overall impact of the current campaign remains unclear.

Before the beginning of the offensive, many militants apparently fled U.S. and Iraqi forces massing north of Baghdad in Diyala province — another area around the capital where insurgents continue to hold sway. The retreat left open the possibility that al-Qaida and its backers will seek new staging grounds in northern Iraq, where U.S. troop levels are lower.

The military said Friday that coalition forces killed two insurgents and detained 11 suspects over the past two days in central and northern Iraq.

In northern Iraq, Turkish artillery shelled a Kurdish area near the Iraqi-Turkish border, said Jabar Yawer, a spokesman for the Kurdish Peshmerga militia. The shelling started Friday at dawn and lasted one hour in the Amadiya area of Dahuk province. Kurdish authorities were not able to confirm any possible damage because of the bad weather.

Separatist rebels of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK has waged a war for autonomy in parts of Turkey for more than two decades, a conflict that has cost tens of thousands of lives, and its fighters have bases in Kurdish sections of northern Iraq.

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