Nearly 3,000 American soldiers who arrived in Afghanistan to secure two violent provinces have begun operations and are already seeing combat.

Pakistan has told the US military that an Arab al-Qaida operative who masterminded the London jetliner terror plot is hiding in mountainous terrain in north-eastern Afghanistan, an intelligence official said today.

Rebels fired a rocket tonight at the headquarters of the US-led coalition after gunmen killed seven Iraqi policemen in attacks west of Baghdad.

US president George Bush answered a soldier’s shout of ‘‘Let’s get Saddam!’’ with a promise to defeat the ‘‘mounting danger’’ of terrorist regimes.

Rescuers recovered the bodies of seven Americans and nine Vietnamese who died in a helicopter crash while searching for the remains of US soldiers missing in action from the Vietnam War.