Fourteen US Marines were killed early Wednesday when their troop carrier struck a gigantic roadside bomb in the western town of Haditha, one of the single deadliest bomb attacks on US troops since the invasion here in March 2003. An Iraqi civilian interpreter working with the Marines was also killed in the blast.
The US command here provided few details of the attack, but said the Marines had been riding in an amphibious troop carrier "during combat operations" on the southern end of the city when it struck the bomb. Even though they operate in the desert, the Marines often use large amphibious vehicles to conduct patrols and transport men and material. The vehicles are lightly armored.
There were indications that the roadside bomb used in the attack was quite large; the Marines said that only one of the soldiers had been wounded, while 14 had been killed. US commanders say that in recent months the insurgents have been exploding bigger and more sophisticated bombs, some of which focus the blast in a single direction.
PHOTO: AP
The attack brought the number of dead Marines in Haditha to 20 in less than two days. On Monday, guerrillas ambushed and killed a group of six Marine snipers who were moving through the town on foot. The insurgent group, Ansar al-Sunna, claimed responsibility for that attack, and also claimed that it had beheaded one of the Marines.
There was no way to verify the claim, but the Americans acknowledged that one of the snipers became separated from the group, after possibly being dragged away by the insurgents. Later in the day, masked men appeared in Haditha's main central market carrying US helmets, flak jackets and rifles.
Another Marine was killed Monday in the nearby city of Hit when a suicide bomber drove his car into a military convoy and blew himself up.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Wednesday's attack.
Haditha is one of a string of cities that runs along the Euphrates River from the Syrian border, and which US commanders believe forms the network that shuttles insurgents from their sanctuaries outside the country into Baghdad and other parts of the Iraqi heartland.
The attack Wednesday in Haditha follows at least half a dozen US military offensives in Haditha and other parts of Anbar Province to shut down that network. But most of those operations have been met with little resistance; the guerrillas have seemed to melt away.
Part of the aim of the recent Marine offensives has been to allow the Iraqi government and police to reassert their authority. So far, that hasn't happened. The police in the area are often threatened with death and killed for cooperating with the Americans; what Iraqi soldiers there are in the area appear to be mostly Shiites and Kurds from other parts of Iraq.
Wednesday's attack was among the worst on US troops since the 2003 invasion. Last December, a suicide bomber struck a mess hall at an US base near Mosul and killed 22 people, including 14 US servicemen and four US contractors. In April 2004, up to 12 Marines were killed when they were attacked in the city of Ramadi.
The Marines killed Wednesday were part of the II Regimental Combat Team of the II Marine Division, which is part of the II Marine Expeditionary Force.
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