"It's great to have them off," Lieutenant Colonel Fred Padilla, commander of the 1st marines battalion, said after his troops stripped down to lighter camouflage garb.

Padilla said an order to take off the cumbersome protection suits had come down from his superiors. "They made an assessment and they determined there was not a serious threat right now," he said.

The marines were pushing towards Baghdad from the southeast in a bid to complete the encirclement of the capital after US army troops fought their way around the western edge to the north on Sunday.

SPACE.WIRE