WASHINGTON, Nov 22: Senior US military commanders in Iraq are demanding more troops to put down resistance in other parts of the country after capturing Fallujah, US officials told reporters in Washington on Monday.

While the commanders believe that the defeat in Fallujah has considerably weakened the Iraqi resistance, they also fear that hundreds of rebels have fled to other towns and in some of these places they are already well-entrenched.

The US military command in Iraq has devised a plan to flush out the rebels from their hideouts but do not have enough troops to carry out countrywide operations, officials said.

The Pentagon, according to these officials, realizes that additional troops will also be needed to maintain peace and security during the US-proposed elections in January. There's a feeling in Washington that the rebels would increase attacks on Iraqi government targets as the country moves closer to the elections.

The officials said the exact number of extra troops needed is still being reviewed but estimated it at the equivalent of several battalions. The number of US troops in Iraq fell to nearly 100,000 last spring before rising to the current strength of 138,000.

To boost the current level, US military commanders have considered extending the stay of more troops due to rotate out shortly, or accelerating the deployment of the 3rd Infantry Division, which is scheduled to start in January. A third option is to bring all or part of a brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division from the United States.

Hinting at this possibility at a Pentagon news conference on Friday, Gen Lance Smith, the deputy chief of United States Central Command, said that airborne forces were deployed to Afghanistan on a short-term basis to bolster military operations.

These forces may now take over policing and other functions in Baghdad's International Zone. That would free locally seasoned units of the 1st Cavalry Division for conducting operations against the Iraqi resistance, the commanders say.