Forces will stay, Bush says

American forces won’t leave Iraq when a new interim government takes charge from the U.S. military occupation next year, President Bush said Monday.

Bush met in Washington with five women who hold positions of influence in Iraq. "I assured these five women that America wasn’t leaving. When they hear me say we’re staying, that means we’re staying," Bush said.

Bush declined to say whether the U.S.-pushed establishment of an interim Iraqi government was part of a U.S. exit strategy. "The politics will go forward," he said. "The political process is moving on. The Iraqi people are plenty capable of governing themselves."

Also on Monday, three more American soldiers in Iraq died in separate attacks north of Baghdad, one in an ambush on a patrol, the other by a roadside bomb. The third death was the result of nonhostile gunfire, according to the military.

In Iraq, U.S. forces attacked dozens of suspected guerrilla hideouts in Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit, killing six alleged insurgents as they pressed their search Monday for a former Hussein deputy believed to be orchestrating attacks on Americans.

Military spokesman Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said the U.S.-led coalition was intensifying its search for Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, No. 6 on the most-wanted list of 55 Iraqis.

"We are getting intelligence now that he is directly involved in the killing of coalition soldiers," Kimmitt said.

During Monday’s raids, U.S. forces fired a satellite-guided missile carrying a 500-pound warhead at a suspected insurgent sanctuary 10 miles south of Tikrit — the second use in as many days of the powerful weapon amid a U.S. drive to intimidate the resistance.

U.S. forces carried out dozens of attacks from Sunday night to early Monday, destroying 15 suspected safe houses, three training camps and 14 mortar firing points, said Lt. Col. William MacDonald, a spokesman of the 4th Infantry Division.

A U.S. patrol opened fire on a group of people in Baghdad’s gun market, killing three, after the soldiers apparently mistook the gunfire of customers testing weapons for an attack, a witness and an Iraqi police officer said. Four people were wounded.

Also Monday, an Iraqi militant group called Muhammad’s Army claimed responsibility for the downing of a U.S. helicopter on Nov. 2 that killed 17 soldiers. The group warned that U.S. forces would face more attacks if they did not leave Iraq in 15 days. There was no way to independently verify the claims.

In Baghdad, an Italian official in the U.S.-led coalition resigned, accusing Paul Bremer’s administration of inefficiency and failing to understand Iraq. The allegations were made by Marco Calamai, a special counselor of the Coalition Provisional Authority in the southern province of Dhi Qar.