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Ambush kills marine outside baghdad { June 26 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34215-2003Jun26.html?nav=hptop_tshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34215-2003Jun26.html?nav=hptop_ts
Ambush Kills U.S. Marine Outside Baghdad
Another Soldier Dies When Vehicle Rolls Over
By NADIA ABOU EL-MAGD
The Associated Press
Thursday, June 26, 2003; 5:36 AM
BAGHDAD, Iraq - An ambush on a U.S. military vehicle killed one U.S. solider and injured another on the road leading to Baghdad's airport Thursday, and a U.S. Marine was killed and two others injured when their vehicle rolled over as they sped to the scene of another attack.
Also Thursday, two Iraqi employees of the national electricity authority were killed when their U.S.-led convoy came under a grenade attack in west Baghdad, U.S. soldiers and Iraqi police said.
The morning attack on the road leading to Baghdad International Airport apparently involved an explosive device placed on the road, said U.S. soldiers at the scene, who asked not to be named. It appeared the device was detonated either by remote control or a trip wire.
The soldier who died suffered a major wound in the face, the soldiers said. At least one U.S. soldier was wounded, they said.
In Baghdad Wednesday afternoon, ambushers dropped grenades from an overpass onto a convoy of Army Humvees as they passed underneath, said Marine Corps Maj. Sean Gibson. There were no serious injuries.
The ambushes were the latest in a spiraling series of attacks against U.S.-led occupation forces in Iraq.
The airport road, heavily used by U.S. forces, has been the scene of a series of ambushes using trip wires dangling from overpasses or grenades tossed from bridges. Last month, two U.S. soldiers were killed and two injured when a Humvee detonated an anti-tank mine hidden under debris on the highway.
Three Marines were wounded Wednesday in an ambush in Hilla, 45 miles south of Baghdad, a U.S. military statement said. One Marine was killed and two were injured when their vehicle - part of a quick reaction force dispatched in response to the ambush - rolled over on the soft shoulder on the way to the scene.
None of the names of the injured or killed Americans were available.
At least 19 U.S. soldiers have died in hostile fire since major combat was officially declared over in May.
Also Thursday, a four-vehicle convoy in the al-Khadrah district of western Baghdad came under a grenade attack, killing the two Iraqi electricity authority employees.
The convoy included U.S. Humvees at the front and the back and two Iraqi civilian vehicles in the middle. The soldiers and Iraqi police said the two Iraqis who were killed were traveling in the same car.
U.S. troops evacuated the two bodies from the badly damaged vehicle, which was covered with blood and broken glass.
On Tuesday, six British soldiers were killed in southern Iraq during a shooting rampage by townspeople furious over the killing of four neighbors during a demonstration, apparently at the hands of British troops.
That attack, in the town of Majar al-Kabir, 180 miles southeast of Baghdad, had shattered the peace that had reigned in Shiite-dominated southern Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein - and spurred British authorities to consider requiring troops to wear body armor and helmets.
On Thursday, 11 pickup trucks filled with armed men from the local security force patrolled the city on their own, with no British troops in the town center.
Recent attacks on U.S. forces near Baghdad have been blamed on remnants of Saddam's regime or his Sunni followers, but the Majar al-Kabir attack came in the mostly Shiite south, where resentment toward Saddam Hussein's government had been strong.
The Shiite gunmen were enraged by the death of their neighbors - allegedly at the hands of British troops during a demonstration earlier in the day - and over weapons searches in homes with women.
On Tuesday, about 100 residents protested the British weapons sweeps in a four-hour demonstration outside the mayor's office, where a dozen British troops were posted, witnesses said. Protesters threw rocks, and British troops fired back with rubber bullets before switching to live ammunition, the witnesses said.
Local police said four Iraqis were killed, and that armed residents then killed two British military policemen. Then, witnesses said, some Iraqis went to their homes to get weapons. At least 20 armed Iraqis stormed the police station, where four British military police were located along with Iraqi policemen.
British forces in Iraq have been reduced from 45,000 during the war to 15,500 now, two-thirds of them ground forces. The United States has brought home some 130,000 troops from the region; 146,000 American forces remain in Iraq.
© 2003 The Associated Press
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