When US troops sealed off this ramshackle town, there was widespread speculation that they hoped to capture Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, a senior Baathist official whom some believe is responsible for directing much of the anticoalition insurgency. But an intensive 24-hour search apparently failed to yield Mr. Douri. Instead, the troops departed early Wednesday morning with captured weapons and several dozen detainees, leaving behind a legacy of bitterness, frustration, and anger among the local population.

From the chief of police, incensed at being kept out of his town for the day by American troops, to the Rawi family contemplating the ruins of their partially demolished home, residents say that the search mission has only strengthened popular support for what they call the resistance.

US officers met with town officials Wednesday in an attempt to smooth frayed tempers, underlining the pitfalls of adopting robust counterinsurgency measures while trying to win the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people.

Some coalition officials have identified Douri as the main organizer of the insurgency. Last week, a $10 million bounty was placed on his head.

Douri was thought to have been put out of commission on Tuesday, when a member of the Iraqi Governing Council announced that he had been "killed or captured." US officials later denied the capture in ambiguous terms that left open the possibility that Douri had been killed or captured by a non-US force. By the reckoning of many analysts, his capture or death could mark a turning point in what is becoming an increasingly bloody guerrilla conflict.

But many Iraqis say that the guerrillas are motivated by resentment toward the continued US-led occupation of Iraq. They say it would make no difference if Douri was captured or killed, citing the deaths in July of Qusay and Uday Hussein as having failed to quell the insurgency.

"The Americans put all their efforts into Hawijah to catch Douri. But the truth is that the Baathists are not behind the resistance. It's lots of different people now," says Lt. Col. Awad al-Jabouri, the chief of police here. "What has made the resistance stronger is the attitude of the Americans and all their illegal acts."

Douri was once vice president of the Baath Party's Revolutionary Command Council and was one of Saddam Hussein's closest aides.

Not all coalition officials seem to believe that he is as prominent a figure in the insurgency as is often implied. Anthony Cordesman, a respected military analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, was told by Paul Bremer, the US administrator in Iraq, that Douri's role in the insurgency was deemed insignificant and that the former Baathist official was "probably dying." According to a report compiled by Mr. Cordesman based on consultations last month with key military and civilian personnel in Iraq, most of the insurgents are former loyalists of Saddam Hussein with "loose local coordination, possibly some regional coordination. No national coordination."

Despite the media speculation, Lt. Col. William Schafer said that Douri was not the target of the raid in Hawijah.

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