BAGHDAD — A massive roadside bomb ripped through a lightly armored Marine personnel carrier Wednesday in western Iraq, killing 14 troops and a civilian interpreter in one of the deadliest single attacks on U.S. forces since the war began.
The blast near the town of Haditha brought to 21 the number of Marines killed in three days in western Iraq. Fighting escalated in the area recently after Army Gen. George W. Casey, the top American commander in the country, ordered U.S. forces to gain control of Iraq's border with Syria by November. Last month, 1,800 troops were sent to set up the first long-term U.S. base in the region.
Military officials have complained that insurgents smuggle foreign fighters and weapons into Iraq from Syria, and have called on the Syrian government to clamp down. Now American forces are trying to stem the flow on the Iraqi side of the border, and their increased presence in the region is being met with fierce resistance from insurgents who had considered the region a safe haven, U.S. commanders said.
On Monday, gunmen outside Haditha ambushed and killed six Marines, members of a sniper team who were on a mission to search for insurgents laying makeshift bombs. Also that day, a car bomb claimed another Marine in nearby Hit. The 14 troops and the interpreter killed Wednesday near Haditha were on a mission to clear guerrillas from the desert. Many of the Marines slain this week were with the same reservist company from Brook Park, Ohio.
Wednesday's blast overturned the Marines' amphibious assault vehicle. Because the escape hatches are on top, it would have been difficult for the Marines to get out of the burning vehicle, a senior defense official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. One Marine was reportedly rescued.
The makeshift bomb was the largest such device U.S. forces have encountered in western Iraq, said a Marine official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the operations.
Increasing the toll of the bomb is the fact the Marines' larger vehicles can carry more people than those of the Army, which would divide a crew of about the same size into two Bradley fighting vehicles or Stryker personnel carriers.
Although the amphibious vehicles were designed to storm beachheads, the Marines use the lightly armored personnel carriers to ferry troops in the Iraqi desert.
