Turkish Troops Leaving N. Iraq

"With only a matter of days, they would have some effect but obviously not complete annihilation of the PKK," said the senior U.S. military official. "I don't suspect they made a huge impact on the PKK."

On Friday, a senior PKK official said the guerrillas defended not only their fellow Kurds but Iraq and its government.

"We consider this withdrawal a political, military and strategic victory despite the casualties we suffered, and we were able to draw attention to the Kurdish case," said Ahmed Denize, a senior PKK spokesman.

The early morning withdrawal Friday, first reported by Kurdish forces that saw Turkish troops rolling back into Turkey, came without advance notice. Turkish analysts had predicted the operation would last for two more weeks.

Many Turks, especially in western cities such as Istanbul and the capital, Ankara, strongly supported the crackdown. During some months last year, the PKK guerrillas killed more Turkish troops than Americans lost in Iraq in the same period.

In the United States, "the more casualties you suffer, the less support" for an operation, retired Gen. Haldun Solmazturk said in Ankara. "It's the other way entirely in Turkey."

Gates and others have stressed that military options alone cannot quell the decades-old Kurdish guerrilla movement and that Turkey must address Kurdish grievances. Turkey has long sought to assimilate the Kurds of its southeast, repressing broadcasts and schooling in Kurdish. Turkey's current government has eased the language restrictions slightly. For its part, Turkey insists Iraq's Kurdish leaders must begin denying the PKK its havens.

Few expect the cross-border operations to have ended. "More to come," Solmazturk predicted.

The PKK has vowed to retaliate for the incursion. "The Turkish military forces withdrew, but we will not let this military campaign pass without punishment," said Denize, the PKK spokesman.

Meanwhile in Baghdad, reports surfaced that Iraq's three-member presidency council had approved the execution of Gen. Ali Hassan Majeed, or "Chemical Ali," one of Saddam Hussein's most ruthless henchmen. Last June, Majeed and two associates were sentenced to death for committing genocide and crimes against humanity during the Anfal operation in Iraq's Kurdish region in the late 1980s.

But the presidency council had blocked Majeed's execution because it would have meant also putting to death Sultan Hashim al-Taie, a highly respected former Sunni defense minister, whose execution was opposed by some top Iraqi leaders and U.S. military commanders. If Majeed's execution orders go through, it is unclear what would happen to Taie. "The only thing I can tell you is that it's not officially announced yet," said Naseer al-Ani, chairman for the presidency council.

Gunmen abducted a Chaldean Catholic archbishop soon after he left Mass in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, according to an Associated Press report, the latest in what church members called a series of attacks against Iraq's small Christian community. The gunmen killed three people who were with Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho, said Iraqi Brig. Gen. Khalid Abdul Sattar, a spokesman for the local police.

Knickmeyer reported from Istanbul. Correspondent Amit R. Paley and special correspondent Zaid Sabah in Baghdad contributed to this report.