Marine commanders agreed today to a tentative plan to deploy a new Iraqi force led by former Iraqi army officers in the rebellious city and to ease their three-week seige by pulling back from some positions inside the city. The Iraqi force, to be called the Falluja Protective Army, was negotiated at a meeting this morning that included the commander of the First Marine Expeditionary Force, Lt. Gen. James T. Conway. The tentative plan replaced one to deploy joint patrols of the marines and the American-recruited security force known as the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps. The change was so swift that some company commanders were still glumly working over maps to plan the joint patrols when word reached the combat units of the new plans. News of the tentative agreement emerged on a particularly bloody day for the American-led coalition, which is trying to subdue a tenacious and protean resistance. Ten American soldiers were killed in attacks in and around Baghdad today, the military reported. Eight soldiers died when a car bomb exploded near Mahmudia, south of the capital; one died in a rocket-propelled grenade attack in eastern Baghdad; and a roadside bomb killed another soldier in the town of Baquba, about 40 miles north of Baghdad, the military said. Full Story
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