We will be seeing alot more stories like this for many years to come, mores the pity. Marty, remind u of anything?

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US soldier killed in Iraq ambush

Agencies
Friday June 27, 2003

A US soldier was killed in an ambush in southern Iraq, and three Iraqis have been arrested in connection with the possible abduction of two US soldiers, the US military said today.
The soldier was killed yesterday while investigating a car theft in Najaf, 100 miles south-west of Baghdad, a statement from US central command said. He was attached to the 1st US Marine Expeditionary Force.

The death was the latest in a series of attacks on the US and British military presence in Iraq.

Six British soldiers were shot dead in a south-eastern Iraqi town on Tuesday, apparently by local people angered by aggressive weapons searches.

Today, the US military said that it had detained and was interrogating three suspects in connection with the disappearance of two soldiers. US forces kept up ground and aerial searches, but have so far failed to find the soldiers or their vehicle, Sgt Patrick Compton, a US military spokesman in Baghdad, said.

The men, in a Humvee vehicle, were guarding the perimeter of a rocket demolition site near the town of Balad, north of Baghdad, when they failed to answer a radio call. They were reported missing Wednesday night, Sgt Compton said.

"We don't know if they were abducted or they were just killed," he added.

The report of the soldier's death near Najaf came as attacks on US personnel continued today.

Just north-west of Baghdad, a US army truck struck an explosive device on a dirt road. A soldier and an eyewitness said that wounded Americans were evacuated by helicopter.

A US soldier, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the soldiers were driving to Baghdad to make telephone calls to their families when the explosion occurred.

Elsewhere in Iraq, ambushes and hostile fire killed at least two US soldiers, two Iraqi civilians and wounded at least eight other Americans yesterday.

Between Wednesday and Thursday, assailants blew up a US military vehicle with a roadside bomb, dropped grenades from an overpass, destroyed a civilian SUV travelling with US troops, demolished an oil pipeline and fired an apparent rocket-propelled grenade at a US army truck.

Officials played down the violence, but the surge in attacks is causing increasing concern that the British and US occupation of Iraq could be turning into a guerrilla war.