BAGHDAD — Six U.S. soldiers were killed in a roadside bombing attack and two more in a helicopter crash in Diyala, the U.S. military announced Tuesday, as the eastern Iraqi province supplanted the notorious Al Anbar region as the most dangerous area outside the capital.
Those fatalities and two others announced Tuesday brought the U.S. troop death toll in May to 117, making it the deadliest month for American forces this year, and the bloodiest since the battles for Fallouja in April and November 2004, according to icasualties.org, a website that tracks casualties in Iraq.
Violence in Diyala has been on the rise even before the Feb. 13 launch of the U.S. troop buildup in Baghdad. U.S. forces have found themselves battling multiple factions, including members of former dictator Saddam Hussein's Baath Party, foreign-led Al Qaeda forces, and Shiite Muslim militias, which the U.S. military says use armor-piercing bombs.
After three years of single-digit fatalities in Diyala, the U.S. military death toll there climbed to 16 in January and rose to 22 this month.
Army Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, a U.S. military spokesman, said the rising toll resulted from the doubling of U.S. forces in Diyala, where they have battled Al Qaeda and insurgent groups that have moved there from Al Anbar province in western Iraq. He also linked the fatalities to the Baghdad offensive, which has seen an additional 28,000 troops deployed to the capital and its outlying areas.
"We knew that one of the outcomes of the increased pressure in Baghdad was you press them in the center, they ooze out the sides," Garver said.
"There is also pressure being put on Al Qaeda in Al Anbar as well, so we are seeing Diyala become the new hotspot," he added.
The farming province famous for its date and orange groves borders Iran and is home to Sunni and Shiite Muslims, thousands of whom have been uprooted by sectarian violence. The U.S. Army's Task Force Lightning deployed an additional 3,000-member brigade there in May, bringing its force to about 6,000, according to the military.
U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Benjamin Mixon, the commander in charge of northern Iraq, said in mid-May that he needed more soldiers. "I do not have enough soldiers in Diyala province to keep that security situation moving," he told reporters.
Among the reinforcements brought to Diyala was a Stryker battalion, but even these armored vehicles have proved vulnerable to bombs. Six U.S. soldiers and a Russian photographer were killed May 6 when an explosion ripped through a Stryker vehicle.
