"From a military standpoint, we will have three divisions of Iraqi military stood up in a period of two years, so at an absolute minimum we'll be here for that long, probably longer to be sure they're capable," Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez told reporters in Baghdad.

On July 10, newly-retired General Tommy Franks, the former head of US Central Command who led US and British forces into Iraq, told the House Armed Services Committee: "I anticipate we'll be involved in Iraq in the future. Whether that means two years or four years, I don't know."

Sanchez's remarks were believed to be his strongest public assertion to date on a timeframe for the US military presence in war-ravaged Iraq.

Paul Bremer, the US civilian administrator in Iraq, disbanded the massive Iraqi army built up during the 24-year rule of Saddam Hussein, and vowed to create a new force that could serve in a defensive capacity within two years.

The new army aims to have a nucleus of 12,000 men within a year and a full 40,000 in three motorized divisions in two years' time, ready to man Iraq's borders and ensure internal stability as well as working side by side with US forces.

Training of the first 1,000-man Iraqi battalion was starting this week, Sanchez said, with the ultimate aim of an Iraqi force able to "protect its own sovereignty over time".

Serving as a backdrop for Sanchez's comments Thursday was a massive car bomb outside the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad which hospital officials say killed 11 people and left 57 wounded.

Sanchez said there were eight confirmed killed, including a number of Iraqi police, but that a final toll had yet to be announced.

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