Bodies of missing U.S. soldiers recovered

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Bodies of missing U.S. soldiers recovered

By KIM GAMEL, Associated Press Writer

The bodies of two U.S. soldiers reported captured last week have been recovered, and an Iraqi official said Tuesday the men were "killed in a barbaric way." The U.S. military said the remains were believed to be those of Pfc. Kristian Menchaca, 23, of Houston, and Pfc. Thomas L. Tucker, 25, of Madras, Ore.

Al-Qaida in Iraq claimed responsibility for killing the soldiers, and said the successor to slain terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi had "slaughtered" them, according to a Web statement that could not be authenticated. The language in the statement suggested the men had been beheaded.

U.S. Maj. Gen. William Caldwell said the cause of death was "undeterminable at this point," and that DNA tests would be conducted to confirm the identities.

The two disappeared after a deadly insurgent attack Friday at a checkpoint by a Euphrates River canal south of Baghdad. Spc. David J. Babineau, 25, of Springfield, Mass., was killed. The checkpoint was in the Sunni Arab region known as the "Triangle of Death" because of frequent ambushes there of U.S. soldiers and Iraqi troops.

The three men were assigned to the 1st Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division from Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

The director of the Iraqi defense military's operation room, Maj. Gen. Abdul-Aziz Mohammed, said the bodies showed signs of having been tortured. "With great regret, they were killed in a barbaric way," he said.

Mohammed also said the two bodies were found on a street near the town Youssifiyah, close to the scene of the attack. The U.S. military could not confirm that account.

The claim of responsibility was made in the name of the Mujahedeen Shura Council, an umbrella organization of five insurgent groups led by al-Qaida in Iraq. The group had posted an Internet statement Monday claiming it was holding the two American soldiers captive.

"We give the good news ... to the Islamic nation that we have carried God's verdict by slaughtering the two captured crusaders," said the claim which appeared on an Islamic militant Web site where insurgent groups regularly issue statements.

"With God Almighty's blessing, Abu Hamza al-Muhajer carried out the verdict of the Islamic court" calling for the soldiers' slaying, the statement said.

The statement said the soldiers were "slaughtered," suggesting that al-Muhajer beheaded them. The Arabic word used in the statement, "nahr," is used for the slaughtering of sheep by cutting the throat and has been used in past statements to refer to beheadings.

The U.S. military has identified al-Muhajer as an Egyptian associate of al-Zarqawi who is also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri.

The killings would be the first acts of violence attributed to al-Muhajer since he was named al-Qaida in Iraq's new leader in a June 12 Web message by the group. He succeeded al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a U.S. airstrike on June 7.

Al-Zarqawi made al-Qaida in Iraq notorious for hostage beheadings and was believed to have killed two American captives himself — Nicholas Berg in April 2004 and Eugene Armstrong in September 2004.

Some 8,000 Iraqi and American troops were involved in the search for the two missing soldiers. During the search, troops killed three suspected insurgents and detained 34 in fighting that also left seven U.S. servicemen wounded, Caldwell said.

A farmer claiming to have witnessed the attack told The Associated Press on Sunday that insurgents swarmed the checkpoint, killing the driver of a Humvee before taking two of his comrades captive.

Ahmed Khalaf Falah said three Humvees were manning a checkpoint when they came under fire from many directions. Two Humvees went after the assailants but the third was ambushed before it could move.

He said seven masked gunmen, one carrying a heavy machine gun, killed the driver of the third vehicle and took the two other U.S. soldiers captive. His account could not be verified independently.

Kidnappings of U.S. service members have been rare since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, despite the presence of about 130,000 forces.

The last U.S. soldier to be captured was Sgt. Keith M. Maupin of Batavia, Ohio, who was taken on April 9, 2004 after insurgents ambushed his fuel convoy. Two months later, a tape on Al-Jazeera purported to show a captive U.S. soldier shot, but the Army ruled it was inconclusive and remains listed as missing.

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Associated Press writers Ryan Lenz in Balad, Iraq, and Nadia Abou el-Magd in Cairo, Egypt, contributed to this report.