Many Tikrit townspeople have family or tribal ties to the government and the Republican Guard.
Lieutenant Colonel Todd Wood of Richmond Hill, Georgia, is training Iraqi forces in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit.
Saddam Hussein, the former Iraqi leader toppled by the United States in 2003, was from the Tikrit region.
Raymond Odierno, the 4th Infantry's top general in Tikrit, could have rejected the recommendation and ordered a court martial.
The Marine unit was sent to Samarra to keep traffic from interfering with an armored column approaching Tikrit, Brig.
The task force typically operates in the Tikrit area, north of Baghdad.
U.S. special forces have also blocked the roads between Baghdad and Tikrit, hoping to cut off any Iraqi retreats from Baghdad.
But in Saddam's hometown of Tikrit and other Sunni cities, including the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi, angry demonstrators denounced the sentence.
The U.S. Central Command also said Iraqi forces appeared to be regrouping in Tikrit, northwest of Baghdad, and reinforcing their positions.
Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hatsuhisa Takashima said a body matching the description of Koda was found by U.S. forces between Baghdad and Tikrit.
Ray Odierno of the 4th Infantry Division said the raid took place Thursday at a house south of Tikrit, the deposed Iraqi president's hometown.
TIKRIT, Iraq (CNN) -- The commanding general of the 4th Infantry Division on Friday accepted a U.S. military investigator's recommendation and ordered administrative action against Lt.
Nevertheless, three mortars exploded near a polling station in central Tikrit, about 100 miles north of Baghdad, Saturday morning, an official with the Interior Ministry said.
In another incident in Tikrit, police detained four people wearing Iraqi police uniforms who they said had thrown stun grenades at voters outside a polling center.
Paul Funk, began in 2007 after a Marine unit moved to the west side of the brigade's sector, cutting off al Qaeda's roads south to Fallujah and north to Tamariyah, Samarra, and Tikrit.
Aside from the night of March 21st, the bombardment of Baghdad and of other cities such as Kirkuk, Mosul and Tikrit by aircraft and cruise missiles has been less destructive than was widely expected.
The mother of Sergeant Carlos Escobales, a Miami postman who was sent to Iraq in February and is now in Tikrit, had hoped he would be home in October, but had not made a fuss.
Major Tom Bryant, a spokesman for the 101st Airborne Division's 3rd Brigade in nearby Tikrit, says the informants said as many as 100 insurgents, at least some of them foreign fighters, were operating in the region.
TIKRIT, Iraq (CNN) -- U.S. Marines rescued seven American soldiers held by Iraqis north of Baghdad on Sunday before rushing off to join in the battle for Tikrit, according to a Canadian reporter embedded with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force.
"We had somebody come into Tikrit, the 1st Brigade, and give us ... a tip to conduct a raid on a house south of Tikrit, which we conducted last night, " Odierno said in a video teleconference from Baghdad with reporters in Washington.
If there were heavy forces, such as the 4th Infantry Division, on the ground in the north and advancing south towards Tikrit and Baghdad, Iraqi resistance would be divided, enabling allied units moving up from the south to do so more quickly.
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