MAMUDIYAH, Iraq — U.S. soldiers and Iraqi police arrived at the sprawling three-family farmhouse just after 4 p.m. with orders for the 15 or so people still living there: Grab what you can in the next 30 minutes, and then leave. Your house is about to be bombed.

Two hours later on Monday, a pair of F-16 warplanes screamed overhead and dropped 1,000-pound laser-guided armaments on the boxy, concrete structure. The bombs left a deep crater strewn with smashed furniture, broken concrete and other debris. The lawn, shed and date trees around it remained intact.

U.S. military authorities said the bombing of the Najim family house was a prime example of a firm new response to those who plant roadside bombs, hide weapons or carry out ambushes that kill or harm American soldiers, and they want the people in these parts to know about it. It was the third fixed-wing bombing in a week across Iraq, pointing up a re-escalation of the war by the U.S. in response to heightened insurgency.

"The message is this: If you shoot at an American or a coalition force member, you are going to be killed or you are going to be captured, and if we trace somebody back to a specific safe house, we are going to destroy that facility," said Maj. Lou Zeisman, a paratroop officer of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division deployed here from Fayetteville, N.C. "We are not going to take these continuous attacks."