Army chief General Yasar Buyukanit made it clear earlier this year that the army wants to launch cross-border operations against militants of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Iraq.

But he also recognised the need for a green light from the government.

"It would be very useful... I can't say that we would finish off the PKK but a raid would deal a great blow," Buyukanit said.

On Tuesday, after a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan with senior government and military officials, the general's goal appeared to be a step closer.

The government said it had given orders allowing for all measures, "including a cross-border operation if necessary," against a "terrorist organisation in a neighbouring country."

That was taken to refer to the PKK presence in Iraq.

Erdogan confirmed Wednesday the government was drafting a motion asking parliament to authorise the deployment of Turkish soldiers abroad -- a move required by the constitution.

"The preparations for a motion have started and are continuing," he said.

The draft could be submitted to parliament as early as next week, political sources said.

Ankara's move comes after PKK militants were blamed for attacks this weekend that killed 15 soldiers, most of them in Turkey's southeast Sirnak province near Iraq's northern border.

It was the worst death toll -- 13 soldiers in one attack alone -- since 1995.

"If the government had given its green light in April, when the army asked for it the first time, there would not have been so many deaths today," retired four-star general Necati Ozgen said Tuesday.

Ozgen stressed that even if no raid was imminent, "the threat of an incursion is going to make the Americans and the Iraqi Kurds think twice."

Erdogan had argued against any incursion, knowing that it would antagonise the United States.

Since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, Washington has considered the Iraqi Kurds their staunchest local allies and the US response to Ankara's warning of possible cross-border raids was swift.

"We have counseled them both in public and private for many, many months (on) the idea that it is important to work cooperatively to resolve this issue," said US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.

Turkey is convinced that the Iraqi Kurds, as well as sheltering PKK fighters inside their borders, have been supplying the rebels with arms and explosives used against Turkish security forces.

Another retired general, Edip Baser, said a parliamentary green light for an incursion was unlikely to result in immediate action, but would show that Turkey is "serious and determined".

While Washington and Baghdad try to dissuade Ankara from any unilateral incursion, the political current in Turkey seems to have turned against them.

In the three days since the weekend killings, demonstrators have taken to the streets in Turkey to denounce the PKK and what they see as the complacent line taken by Washington towards an organisation that figures on its list of terrorist groups.

"Turkey has been waiting in vain for months for action from the United States," Faruk Logoglu, the former Turkish ambassador to Washington, told journalists.

And any US reaction to a Turkish incursion would in any case be limited, he added.

Ankara, however, is still looking at other sanctions against the Iraqi Kurds, who enjoy cross-border trade worth millions of dollars and rely on Turkey for their electricity supplies.

The question of how best to deal with the PKK is likely to top the agenda when Erdogan visits the White House next month.