Thousands of American troops searched today for three US soldiers missing in Iraq after an ambush in which al Qaeda said it seized "crusader" forces.
The self-styled Islamic State in Iraq, a group led by al Qaeda, said in an Internet posting it was holding soldiers who survived an attack south of Baghdad in which the US military said four US troops and an Iraqi army translator were killed.
Last June, al Qaeda abducted two U.S. soldiers in the same area where the patrol of seven U.S. soldiers and one Iraqi army interpreter were ambushed on Saturday. Their badly mutilated bodies were found days later.
