The United States will move about 200 Marines to its base in Sigonella to bolster its ability to respond to any crises after its raid in Libya, officials said today.

The move comes after a US special operations forces captured a senior al Qaeda figure in Libya on Saturday and whisked him to a warship for questioning.

One US military official called the Marines' move to Naval Air Station Sigonella a "prudent, precautionary" measure after the Libya raid.

The Marines are part of the Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force-Crisis Response, which was created after last year's attack on the US diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya to bolster U.S. response capabilities in north and west Africa.

Libyan militant groups angered by Saturday's raid have taken to social networking sites to call for revenge attacks on strategic targets, including gas-export pipelines, planes and ships, as well as for the kidnapping of Americans.

In the operation, U. special forces seized Nazih al-Ragye, known by his alias Abu Anas al-Liby - a Libyan who is a suspect in the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 civilians.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.