U.S. Toll In Iraq Nears 1,000
U.S. forces battled insurgents loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in the Baghdad slum of Sadr City on Tuesday, in clashes that killed 36 people, including one American soldier, and wounded 193, U.S. and Iraqi authorities said. The latest casualties are rapidly bringing the number of American dead very close to the 1,000 mark.
Crossing that mark may not change tactics in Iraq, but as CBS News Correspondent Barry Petersen reports, it will be a milestone that could cause some Americans to wonder how high the death toll could climb.
In the past two days, 12 Americans have been killed, bringing to 995 the number of U.S. service members who have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq in March 2003, according to a count by The Associated Press based on Defense Department reports.
Despite the recent surge in casualties, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Tuesday said U.S. and Iraqi forces are winning the conflict.
"Our enemies have underestimated our country, our coalition ... certainly our commander in chief," Rumsfeld said Tuesday.
Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said, "The enemy is becoming more sophisticated." This, he said, has lead to the recent spike in casualties.
Rumsfeld blamed "a combination of terrorists, former regime elements, and criminals" for the continuing violence in Iraq.
In other recent developments:
U.S. tanks moved into Sadr City and armored personnel carriers and Bradley fighting vehicles were deployed at key intersections. Ambulances with sirens wailing rushed the wounded to hospitals as plumes of black smoke rose over the mainly Shiite neighborhood.
Warplanes flew over the sprawling neighborhood of more than 2 million, firing flares to avoid being hit by anti-aircraft missiles.
Four other soldiers were killed in separate incidents in and around Baghdad, including two members of the 13 Corps Support Command.
In another part of the capital, a roadside bomb targeted the Baghdad governor's convoy, killing two people but leaving him uninjured, the Interior Ministry said. Three of Gov. Ali al-Haidri's bodyguards were also hurt.
The Defense Department's most recent published count, as of Friday, shows 976 U.S. service members dead. Of those, 730 died as a result of hostile action and 246 died of non-hostile causes.
The AP count of 995 includes five additional names released by the Defense Department plus 14 fatalities since Friday who have not been identified.
The British military has reported 64 deaths; Italy, 18; Spain, 11; Poland, 10; Bulgaria, six; Ukraine, six; Slovakia, three; Thailand, two; and Denmark, El Salvador, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia and the Netherlands have reported one death each.
Since May 1, 2003, when President Bush declared that major combat operations in Iraq had ended, 838 U.S. soldiers have died — 621 as a result of hostile action and 217 of non-hostile causes, according to the military's numbers Friday.
The fighting in Sadr City erupted when militants attacked U.S. forces carrying out routine patrols, killing one American, said U.S. Army Capt. Brian O'Malley.
An al-Sadr spokesman in Baghdad, Sheik Raed al-Kadhimi, blamed what he called intrusive American incursions into Sadr City and attempts to arrest the cleric's followers.
The renewed fighting came after a period of calm in the impoverished neighborhood after al-Sadr called on his followers last week to observe a cease-fire and announced he was going into politics.
But al-Sadr aides later said peace talks in Sadr City between the cleric's representatives and interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's government had stalled, with the government refusing militants' demands for U.S. troops to keep out of the troubled district.
U.S. commanders have said they want to carry out an assault to clear al-Sadr's fighters from the disctrict, particularly its northern part where the militiamen are said to have dug in, setting explosives and boobytraps.
Al-Sadr led a three-week uprising in the holy city of Najaf that ended 10 days ago with a peace deal that allowed his Mahdi militia fighters to walk away with their guns. The combat in Najaf left thousands dead and devastated much of the city.
Many Mahdi militiamen are believed to have returned to their stronghold in Sadr City.
Tuesday's violence came a day after a suicide attack on a military convoy outside Fallujah killed seven U.S. Marines and three Iraqi soldiers, U.S. military officials said. It was the deadliest day for American forces in four months.
The bombing underscored the challenges U.S. commanders face in securing Fallujah and surrounding Anbar province, the heartland of a Sunni Muslim insurgency bent on driving coalition forces from the country.
U.S. forces have not patrolled in Fallujah since a three-week siege of the city in April that was aimed at rooting out militiaman. As a result, insurgents have strengthened their hold on the city, using it as a base to make car bombs and launch attacks on U.S. and Iraqi government forces.
Fallujah is increasingly being viewed as a high-profile litmus test of American power. A major assault is being planned to pacify the city in time for Iraq's elections early next year, reports Petersen.