A Marine officer said the killers of four U.S. security contractors will be targeted.

A Marine officer said the killers of four U.S. security contractors will be targeted.
COMBINED DISPATCHES
FALLUJAH, Iraq -- Hundreds of U.S. and Iraqi troops in tanks, trucks and other vehicles surrounded the turbulent city of Fallujah ahead of a major operation against insurgents after the grisly slayings of four American security contractors last week.
U.S. commanders have been vowing a massive response to pacify Fallujah, one of the most violent cities in the Sunni Triangle, the heartland of the anti-U.S. insurgency north and west of Baghdad.
After the slayings of the Americans on Wednesday, residents dragged the four bodies through the streets, hanging two of their charred corpses from a bridge, in horrifying scenes that showed the depth of anti-U.S. sentiment in the city.
U.S. troops closed off entrances to Fallujah with earth barricades ahead of the planned operation, code named "Vigilant Resolve." Military patrols entered the city's outer suburbs on reconnaissance missions and to broadcast warnings on loud speakers to residents to stay indoors until Tuesday.
Explosions and gunfire could be heard coming from the center of the city.
Ready to enter city
Some 1,200 U.S. Marines and two battalions of Iraqi security forces were poised to enter the city to arrest suspected insurgents, said Lt. James Vanzant, 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. He would not say when the troops would enter the city.
"The city is surrounded," Vanzant said. "It's an extended operation. We want to make a very precise approach to this. ... We are looking for the bad guys in town."
Marine 1st Lt. Eric Knapp said the troops will target the killers of the four Americans as well as rebels who have attacked U.S. forces and Iraqi police in the past month. "Those people are specially targeted to be captured or killed," he said.
A Marine officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said U.S. forces had a list of targets for raids. He would not give details.
A witness reported that a U.S. helicopter struck a residential area in the city early today, killing five people. The bombing damaged five houses, said the witness, Mohammed Shawkat. There was no immediate U.S. comment on the report.
Another witness, resident Ali Jasim, said there was shooting near one of the U.S. barricades on a road out of Fallujah and some Iraqis who were trying to leave the city were hit. It was unclear whether they were killed or wounded. Roads to a hospital in Fallujah were blocked to all traffic except ambulances.
Expeditionary force
The California-based 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, under the leadership of Lt. Gen. James T. Conway, assumed responsibility for Fallujah, 30 miles west of Baghdad, from the Army's 82nd Airborne Division on March 24.
Conway is trying to subdue the region through a "no better friend, no worse enemy" approach and by as quickly as possible putting an "Iraqi face" on efforts to bring stability and security to Iraq. Marines have been instructed in the proper etiquette and to maintain a friendly, courteous approach, even when their comrades have been killed or wounded.
Meanwhile, the Marines are training and equipping the local Iraqi police, creating a new Iraqi militia and a new Iraqi Army to take over the tasks now being handled by Marines.
"The sooner you put an indigenous face on [solving the problems in the region], the sooner the people are going to gain their self-respect," Conway said during a one-hour interview a day before the killing of the four American civilians. "The sooner they're going to start putting their own situation back to normal, and the sooner [the Marines] can recede off that horizon and people can reach a level of normalcy."
But the Marines have quickly found themselves mired in violence. On March 26, Marines and insurgents fought a lengthy street battle in the city that killed one Marine and five Iraqis.
The same day as the killing of the four U.S. civilians, five Marines were killed when a bomb exploded under their vehicle in a village near Fallujah.