WASHINGTON, May 30 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. military is to send some Kuwait-based troops to volatile western Iraq to help quell rising insurgency in the area, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.

    Although some soldiers from a 3,500-member brigade in Kuwait have already moved into Iraq in recent months, the military has decided to send in the remainder of the unit following consultations with Iraqi officials during the past few days, the report said, quoting U.S. military sources.

    The movement of the brigade comes as senior U.S. officials in Iraq begin to raise doubts about whether security conditions therewill permit significant troop reductions in the coming months, it said.

    The brigade comes from the U.S. Army First Armored Division, which has been deployed in Kuwait for months as a reserve in case conditions in Iraq deteriorated.

    U.S. officials said the additional troops would be deployed at multiple hotspots in Anbar Province, a Sunni insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad.

    Some of the troops are likely to be sent to the city of Ramadi,where a U.S. brigade has been trying to quell a surge in violence.

    Earlier this year, reports here said top U.S. commanders in Iraq were considering options for reducing troop levels during 2006 if ground conditions improved. Some reports have suggested that the number might drop to about 100,000 from the approximately133,000 currently stationed in the country. Enditem