IRAQ: A roadside bomb killed 10 US marines and wounded 11 while they were on a foot patrol near Falluja, the Marine Corps said yesterday, in the deadliest attack on American troops in nearly four months.
Thursday's bomb, which was made from several large artillery shells, struck members of Regimental Combat Team 8 of the 2nd Marine Division near the city, some 30 miles west of Baghdad, the Marine Corps said.
In another statement, the marines reported that a US army soldier, also assigned to the 2nd Marine Division, died Thursday in a rocket attack near Ramadi. US command had earlier said four American service members were killed Wednesday, three of them from hostile action and the fourth in a traffic accident.
At least 2,121 members of the US military have died since the beginning of the war in 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
On August 3rd, 14 Marine Reserve troops from Ohio were killed when their amphibious assault vehicle was blown up near Haditha in western Iraq.
Of the 11 who were wounded, seven have returned to duty, the Marine Corps said.
Regimental Combat Team 8 is a part of the second Marine Expeditionary Force. The unit has been among the hardest hit in the war. In the nearly three years since the war began, 147 marines from the expeditionary force have died in combat, according to 2nd Marine Division spokesman Lieut Barry Edwards.
The attack came after US commanders reported a drop in suicide and car bombings as a result of increased US-Iraqi operations.
However, Maj Gen Rick Lynch, a coalition operations officer, warned that al-Qaeda in Iraq, led by Jordanian terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, will likely step up attacks in the next two weeks to try to disrupt parliamentary elections on December 15th.
Maj Gen Lynch said suicide bombings declined to 23 in November as US and Iraqi forces were overrunning insurgent strongholds in the Euphrates River valley, west of the capital.
Communities along the river are believed to be used by foreign fighters, who slip into the country from Syria and travel down the waterway to Baghdad and other cities.
"In the month of November: only 23 suicide attacks, the lowest we've seen in the last seven months, the direct result of the effectiveness of our operations," Maj Gen Lynch said.
Car bombings fell from 130 in February to 68 in November, he added. However, suicide attacks have not consistently fallen in the past year. After more than 70 such attacks in May, the number fell in August by nearly half and then climbed to more than 50 two months later.
The fatality toll for November was at least 85, which was down from the 96 American deaths suffered in October - the fourth deadliest month since the war began. But it was well above the 49 deaths in September. US monthly death tolls have hit 80 or above during 10 of the 33 months of the war.