Abstract
Transition operators for the collision of two clusters composed of an arbitrary number of charged and neutral particles are represented as a sum of pure Coulomb and Coulomb-modified short-range operators. Sandwiching this relation between the corresponding channel states, correct two-fragment scattering amplitudes are obtained by adapting the conventional two-body screening and renormalization procedure. Furthermore, integral equations are derived for off-shell extensions of the full screened amplitudes and of the unscreened Coulomb-modified short-range amplitudes. For three particles, the final results coincide with those derived previously in a different approach. The proposed theory is valid for pure Coulomb scattering as well as for systems containing, in addition, two-body interactions of short range.