AMERICAN troops who narrowly escaped a rocket attack yesterday joined the growing number in the military who say that reinforcements are needed or they risk being overrun by the Iraqi resistance.

While President Bush and other political leaders continue to play down concerns that the peacekeeping force is struggling to cope, troops on the ground say that they must have more help.

One survivor from the attacked patrol sat with his head in his hands, saying: “We are being given the run-around. There just aren’t enough of us.” Three of his men were injured, one seriously, in the attack in Haifa Street in the heart of Baghdad when a rocket-propelled grenade was fired from a pick-up truck.

Senior officers scampered around ordering men not to express publicly such sentiments. Some disobeyed.

Staff Sergeant Bryan Harrington, 37, an explosives expert from Texas, picked through the smouldering wreckage in his sixth investigation of the morning. It was shortly after 10.30am.

He said: “We don’t have enough people to get after all the bad men we need to deal with. Armed gangs are now picking us off at will. We haven’t the manpower to search for weapons, do patrols, keep the peace and root out Saddam’s henchmen who are still around.”

The ambush of the threevehicle convoy in Haifa Street joined a catalogue of violence yesterday that showed ten Americans injured, two seriously, a similar number of Iraqis wounded, including a six-year-old boy, and three local men killed in at least eight separate attacks. This was described as “a pretty normal day” by one senior officer.

American commanders in Baghdad refused to comment on reports that Paul Bremer, the US administrator running Iraq, has asked Washington for more troops to bolster the 158,000-strong force.

Yesterday’s violence began with shots fired at a patrol in the Baghdad suburb of Kadamiyah. US troops say that they returned fire, killing the gunman and injuring his six-year-old son who was with him. A few hours later, two men on a motorcycle were seen firing a shoulder-held missile at a convoy in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad, injuring six Americans. US troops trying to disperse demonstrators after an explosion in Baquoba, 35 miles north of Baghdad, came under sniper fire. At least one bystander was killed in the subsequent exchange of fire.

In the Haifa Street attack, four men dressed in white, with their faces covered, launched their missile attack near a school. The gang must have known there was no chance of avoiding civilian casualties. One old man on a bench was killed by shrapnel.

As the soldiers from the convoy scrambled to find cover, witnesses say that some panicked and fired at passing motorists and at balconies of apartments.

The attacks came the day after President Bush appeared to dare Iraqi militants who have been killing American soldiers to launch fresh assaults. Asked about the mounting US casualties, Mr Bush declared “bring ’em on”, asserting that US forces in Iraq are “plenty tough” to deal with the threat.

The provocative language provoked indignation from Democrats, who claimed that Mr Bush was endangering the lives of US troops. “I am shaking my head in disbelief,” , the veteran Democrat senator, said. “I never heard any military commander invite enemies to attack US troops.”

Dick Gephardt, a presidential candidate, said he had heard “enough of the phoney, macho rhetoric” from Mr Bush.

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