WASHINGTON, June 15: The number of US military deaths in the Iraq war has reached 2,500, the Pentagon said on Thursday, showing that more than three years into a conflict the US and allied forces are still struggling to curb a resilient insurgency.
In addition, the Pentagon said 18,490 US troops have been wounded in the war, which began in March 2003 with a US-led invasion to topple military dictator Saddam Hussein.
Tens of thousands of Iraqis have also been killed in the war and the insurgency that followed the US invasion.
The news, coming less than a week after the elimination of Al Qaeda leader Abu Musa’ab al-Zarqawi, is likely to dampen the enthusiasm of the Bush team which sees Zarqawi’s death as the first good news from the front in many months.
The new statistics show a steady rise in US war tolls in Iraq and are likely to damage President Bush who is already being accused of leading America into an un-winnable war.
Last week, some US newspapers also published letters sent to the Pentagon by American military commanders in Iraq, some openly saying they believe “the war is lost.”
Others acknowledge that the US military is unable to stem the mounting violence killing 1,000 Iraqi civilians a month. Even worse, they reported the massacre of Iraqi civilians at Haditha was “just the tip of the iceberg” with overstressed, out-of-control Americans soldiers pushed beyond the breaking point both physically and mentally.
“We are in trouble in Iraq,” said retired army general Barry McCaffrey. “Our forces can’t sustain this pace, and I’m afraid the American people are walking away from this war.”
The Pentagon’s report to Congress, however, painted a mixed picture.
It offered a dim picture of economic progress, with few gains in improving basic services like electricity, and provided no promises of US troop reductions anytime soon.
On the other hand, it noted that the Iraqi army was gaining strength and taking lead responsibility for security in more areas. “MNF-I expects that rejectionist strength will likely remain steady throughout 2006, but that their appeal and motivation for continued violent action will begin to wane in early 2007,” the report said. The term MNF-I refers to the Multinational Force-Iraq, the top American military command in Baghdad.
An element of the insurgency that US officials describe as former loyalists of the Saddam Hussein regime remains an important enabler of the violence in Iraq.
But Saddam loyalists have “mostly splintered” into other groups. As a result, they are now “largely irrelevant” as a threat to the fledgling Iraqi government, said Lt Gen. Victor E. Renuart, the head of strategic plans and policy for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who helped prepare the report.
The report also noted that while security in much of Iraq has improved, total attacks against US and Iraqi forces have increased in recent months, following the Feb 22 bombing of shrines of Imam Ali Naqi and Imam Hassan Askari in Samarra.
