Thousands of mostly Latin American soldiers fighting for the United States in Iraq will get more than just their pay: they will earn fast-track US citizenship, key to their "American dream."

Many of the nearly 15,000 military personnel of Latin American origin deployed in the Gulf area are US residents but not US citizens.

But thanks to a decree President George W. Bush signed in July, thousands of armed forces members on active-duty after September 11, 2001, as well as those who retired then or since then with honors, can apply for US citizenship immediately, Daniel Kane, spokesman for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, told AFP.

Normally, a non-US citizen who obtains residency must wait five years before beginning the paperwork for US citizenship. And in the armed forces that wait had been cut to three years.

But since Bush signed his order, a soldier with US residency can request US citizenship starting his first day on active duty, instead of waiting three years, Kane explained.

According to Pentagon data, 31,044 resident non-citizens were on active duty in the armed forces in April. Just over two percent of the total, most of them Latin American-born servicemen, are in the Marines and Navy.

Between July 2002 and February 2003, 5,441 foreign-born members of

the US military took up Bush on the offer granting fast-track US naturalization. Once US citizens, they can request residency, and later citizenship, for family members.

The INS did not offer a precise number of how many of those were from Latin American nations.

But the regional presence among US armed forces, just as in the rest of the US work force, is clear. Of the first US soldiers who died in combat, one was Guatemalan and two Mexican, and among the US prisioners of war in Iraq, one is Panamanian and the other a son of Mexican immigrants.

US armed forces allow foreigners into their ranks only when they hold US residency, which allows them to work legally in the United States.

When the war on Iraq began, the US embassy in Mexico received hundreds of calls from Mexicans who said they were willing to fight in Iraq in exchange for citizenship, and diplomats had to clear up the misunderstanding, stressing US residency was a prior requirement.

"It is absolutely false that the US Army and Navy are recruiting Mexican undocumented workers offering then US citizenship," the Mexican embassy here said in a statement March 10.

Many US military jobs, including work in such areas as electronics, intelligence, special forces and on war planes, require US citizenship.