PEKING, June 3, Reuter - Thousands of Chinese troops made a lightning push towards Peking's Tiananmen Square in the early hours of Saturday but residents barred their way in dozens of spots and sent them retreating in disarray, witnesses said.

The troops approached from four directions but got no nearer than some 200 metres (yards) from the ragtag tent city set up by pro-democracy student demonstrators three weeks ago.

In scene after scene, passionate Peking residents abused and at times assaulted the hapless troops, interrogating individuals and heaping shame on busloads of soldiers.

"We came here to restore order, we were obeying orders. People of Peking do not understand us," one soldier pleaded to a crowd east of Tiananmen.

"We do understand you. We do not need you here," answered a young woman crouching nearby.

By daybreak, central Peking was a remarkable sight, with some troops still straggling off in small groups, while others waited helplessly around army buses with flat tyres and smashed windows. In lively clusters and large groups, students, workers and soldiers talked, smoked and exchanged opinions.

During the early morning push, four cyclists were struck by a police jeep leading a convoy of military buses about four km (three miles) west of Tiananmen, witnesses said. Doctors and ambulance drivers said two were killed and two injured.

Several soldiers were injured during the night and at least one was seen being carried away by his comrades.

The soldiers' strategy was not clear but witnesses said the approach was made at a high speed in buses and on foot.

One Western diplomat said some 10,000 troops were believed involved in the aborted strike. These figures could not be independently confirmed.

Witnesses saw long columns of soldiers and large numbers of buses in several approaches to Tiananmen.

Most did not appear to be armed but angry citizens produced several guns, bayonets and truncheons they said had been taken from assorted support vehicles that were stopped.

Near the venerable Beijing Hotel, a few hundred metres (yards) from the square, students displayed daggers and a noose they said were taken from the soldiers.

A Western diplomat quoted a Chinese military source as saying the plan was for troops to encircle Tiananmen to allow armed police to enter the square to remove students.

Most of the soldiers refused to talk about their mission but they were defensive about their jobs.

"If the trouble-makers continue, how can China complete her reforms?" one of them asked a crowd.

In one neighbourhood west of the square, frightened soldiers huddled in a bus, pushing against windows which furious residents were trying to open.

"Are you human? Are you Chinese? Do you have a conscience?" the civilians shouted.

In another spot, residents stripped the soldiers of their knapsacks and rooted through them searching for noodles.

But many other witnesses reported more gentle citizens sharing cigarettes and ideas with the soldiers.

Wang Dan, a prominent leader of the pro-democracy students, said on Saturday: "The awareness of the public was very high. That was the reason why they couldn't get us."

But he said China's leaders were stubborn and predicted more of the same.

As lines of soldiers ambled away, some residents shouted "Don't come back tonight."

Peking's communist leaders have condemned the student occupation of Tiananmen since it began.

The authorities have grown increasingly shrill in recent days, orchestrating their own pro-government rallies and accusing the pro-democracy movement of fomenting chaos.

The use of soldiers to clear the square of the students, whose numbers range between a few thousand overnght to tens of thousands during evening hours, was widely predicted when the occupation began.

Loss of control over Tiananmen, the symbolic centre of Chinese communism, has embarrassed the country's leaders and their humiliation reached a peak this week when the students unveiled a 10-metre replica of New York's Statue of Liberty.

But the nation's leaders appear to be locked in their own power struggle, with supreme leader Deng Xiaoping and hardline Premier Li Peng on one side and Communist Party chairman Zhao Ziyang, whom they have reportedly blamed for the present unrest, on the other.

Martial law, declared in parts of Peking on May 20, has had little apparent affect, and martial law media regulations issued on Thursday ordering a virtual news blackout have been largely ignored.