BAGHDAD, Iraq – U.S. military officials on Sunday announced the deaths of seven American soldiers, and at least five Iraqis were killed and 26 injured in a car bombing, as the fourth anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq neared.
Four soldiers died in a single incident in west Baghdad on Saturday, when a roadside bomb detonated during their patrol. During the ongoing security sweep in the capital and surrounding regions, the soldiers’ battalion had found eight weapons caches and two roadside bombs and helped rescue a kidnap victim, the military said.
Separately, a U.S. Marine was killed in combat in Anbar province Saturday, and another soldier was killed by a roadside bomb during a foot patrol in south Baghdad. The military said it was investigating the death of another soldier, who died Saturday in “noncombat” circumstances.
The deaths brought the total number of U.S. military casualties in Iraq to 3,217, according to an Associated Press count, since the U.S. launched its attack March 19, 2003; the date in Iraq was March 20.
In Shiite-controlled eastern Baghdad, a U.S. Bradley fighting vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb Saturday evening, set afire and destroyed, said spokesman Maj. Steven Lamb said. There were no casualties.
A U.S. official, meanwhile, blamed al-Qaida in Iraq for chlorine bomb attacks that struck villagers in Anbar province last week but said tight Iraqi security measures prevented a higher number of casualties.
Three suicide bombers driving trucks rigged with tanks of toxic chlorine gas struck targets in the insurgent stronghold including the office of a Sunni tribal leader opposed to al-Qaida. The attacks killed at least two people and sickened 350 Iraqi civilians and six U.S. troops, the U.S. military said Saturday.
U.S. military spokesman Rear Adm. Mark Fox said at least one of the attackers detonated his explosives after he was blocked by an Iraqi police checkpoint in Amiriyah, just south of Fallujah, killing only himself. Fox conceded that many Iraqis were exposed to the chemical fumes but insisted that steps Iraqi security forces were increasingly effective.
The latest identifications reported by the U.S. military of personnel recently killed in Iraq:
Army Spc. Forrest Waterbury, 25, Richmond, Texas; killed Wednesday near Ramadi of small-arms fire; assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 69th Armor Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, Fort Stewart, Ga.
Army Spc. Joshua Boyd, 30, Abilene, Texas; died Wednesday of wounds sustained when his vehicle struck an explosive March 5 in Samarra; assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, Fort Bragg, N.C.
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