Two soldiers from the US 101st Airborne Division have been killed and another injured when their convoy came under attack in northern Iraq.
All three were rushed to a hospital, where two of them died, said a spokesman for the military in Baghdad.
The attack occurred near Tal Afar, just west of the northern city of Mosul and about 240 miles north-west of Baghdad, Pruden said. There were no reported enemy casualties and no arrests were made.
US soldiers have come under increasing attacks in recent weeks. The deaths bring to 151 the number of American soldiers killed in action since the start of the war on March 20th, four more than the total killed in the 1991 Gulf war.
Most of the recent violence has occurred in an area north and west of Baghdad called the Sunni triangle, where some support for Saddam Hussein remains. Mosul is north of the Sunni triangle and has not been the site of much previous violence.
As casualties mounted, the commander of coalition troops in Iraq yesterday his forces were studying each attack carefully.
"We learn from every engagement in order to learn to beat the enemy. Clearly, we are fighting and we expect that this will continue for a while," Lieut Gen Ricardo Sanchez said.
AP