BAGHDAD, May 20: US troops launched night raids on private homes on Tuesday and mounted patrols and roadblocks across the Iraqi capital as they tried to stem the lawlessness that has left many of its five million residents too scared to venture out.

A first raid by a new military police task force established to “aggressively reduce crime” resulted in 15 arrests and the confiscation of eight Kalashnikhovs, 30,000 dollars in Iraqi dinars, and some fake passports, US Central Command said.

Another noctural swoop by the 141st Field Artillery on two homes suspected of harbouring gunmen loyal to Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party netted almost three kilos of Semtex high explosive, Kalashnikhovs and pistols, and resulted in eight suspects being detained.

The 2am raid came just hours after two US troops were seriously injured by snipers in an adjacent district of the city.

Some two dozen troops in Humvees filed through the darkened streets of Baghdad, which remains under curfew from 11.30pm to 4.30am as US forces struggle to control the carjackings, burglaries and violent crime which have terrorised the city.

The soldiers launched simultaneous swoops on the two houses a few doors apart in a middle-class street of Al-Adhamiya district.

“According to our intelligence, these people are suspected Baath members who are trying to get organized to launch significant attacks on coalition forces,” said Sergeant Christian Wamsley.

Three men detained in one house were bound and gagged after a huge stash of ammunition was found in their vehicle.

A sister explained that the helmet and pistols were mementoes of her pilot husband who had been shot down by the Americans in the 1991 Gulf War, prompting a US officer to express his condolences.

But when she then insisted the Semtex was for fishing in the Tigris, one soldier shouted back: “You could blow up a bridge with that.”

Down the street, the five women were terrified as they huddled on the porch with their cuffed menfolk, six children and a baby, while the US troops rifled through the ornament-filled cabinets of their well-to-do home.

“Tell me what good reason you have to attack an Iraqi family in the middle of the night,” one of the women pleaded, clearly uncomfortable in her nightgown in front of the all-male artillerymen.

Her husband explained that he had only bought the Kalashnikhovs a few days earlier, after burglars stole two cars belonging to his family.

The women said they feared being raped if the US troops removed their weapons and menfolk in such an overt way.

But brigade commander Lieutenant Colonel James E. Lackey, who had accompanied the raid, ordered that the five be brought in for questioning with the other suspects.

The 141st had been hoping for a bigger haul from its double-headed raid, which was the culmination of two weeks of painstaking intelligence and surveillance work to check the accuracy of the original tip-off.

“It’s always 50-50 on this type of operation — some of our best results are pure luck,” said Lackey.

A night patrol from the 141st chanced on a huge haul of weapons just an hour earlier after spotting two gunmen on the roof of a house on the banks of the Tigris.

Twenty-four Iraqi men were detained, Captain Don Martin told AFP, before showing off the cache of 18 firearms, a home-made mortar, grenades and two dozen satellite phones, as well as photographs believed to be of the suspects with senior officials of the ousted Baath regime.

A further three Kalashnikovs were recovered in car searches at a roadblock right outside the brigade’s headquarters in one of Saddam’s many palaces in the city.—AFP