skippy the bush kangaroo

Saturday, November 29, 2003

november is the cruelest month

at least in terms of the iraqi war it is. the sfchron reminds us that the american military death toll this month was the highest since the war began in march.

seventy-seven u.s. servicemen and women have died -- compared with 73 in the previous two months combined.

including six americans killed in afghanistan, november was the most costly month for the military since february 1991, when 162 u.s. troops were killed in the climax of the first gulf war.

and it's pretty bad for other countries, as well. today at least 6 spanish intelligence agents were killed in an ambush on their convoy south of baghdad (various reports differ on the number of fatalities...anywhere from two to seven, depending on the source).

add to that the attack on the italians in nasiriyah on the 12th, and the killing of a polish major on the 6th, and november turns out to be the lousiest month for non-u.s. casualties the war began.*

meanwhile, we like wired news' ironic headline: bush tries morale boost as more troops die in iraq.

good luck, awol!

*statistics courtesy of lunaville's iraq coalition casualties page [ed. note: please make a donation to this page; the lunaville gang assures us that all monies go directly to the maintenance of this specific page, and as far as we can find, it's the only place in the world keeping these statistics].

posted by skippy at 12:50 PM |