Rocket Strike In Iraq Kills 3 Soldiers
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
BAGHDAD — Three American soldiers were killed in a rocket attack in southern Iraq yesterday, bringing to 12 the number of Americans who have been killed in Iraq over the past three days.
With the overall American military death toll in Iraq nearing 4,000, the latest killings mark a significant rise in deadly attacks against Americans.
At least 3,987 members of the American military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes eight military civilians. Navy Lieutenant Patrick Evans, a military spokesman, told the Associated Press that three soldiers were killed yesterday in a rocket attack on Combat Outpost Adder near Nasiriyah, about 200 miles southeast of Baghdad. Two other soldiers were wounded.
The attack came a day after an American soldier died when a roadside bomb hit his patrol near Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad.
Eight soldiers were killed in a pair of bomb attacks on Monday, the heaviest single day of American casualties since September. Three of those soldiers died in a roadside bombing in Diyala, a violent province where Al Qaeda in Iraq has been active. The five others were killed while on foot patrol in central Baghdad.
