US death toll in Iraq reaches grim milestone

1.00pm - By WILL DUNHAM

WASHINGTON - The American death toll in Iraq topped 1000 on Tuesday nearly 18 months after President George W Bush launched the war that has become a central issue in the November US presidential elections.

US casualties in Iraq have surged in recent weeks, particularly among Marines, as Washington fights a guerrilla war that has no quick end in sight.

Bush's Democratic rival John Kerry -- a decorated Vietnam War veteran -- called it "a tragic milestone."

"Their sacrifice we feel on a very personal level, and our thoughts and our prayers are with the families that most recently have learned of the loss of a loved one," he told reporters in Kentucky.

The Pentagon said 998 US troops had been killed in Iraq along with three civilian employees of the Defence Department. In addition, 6916 US troops have been wounded in the war, according to the latest Pentagon tally.

Bush, speaking before news of the 1000th death was released, told a campaign rally in Missouri that Americans would support the families of the dead in their prayers.

"My promise to them is that we will complete the mission so that their child or their husband or wife has not died in vain," Bush said. "We will be there until the mission is finished, and then we're coming home."

US-led forces invaded Iraq in March 2003 in a war that Bush said at the time was to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. No such weapons have been discovered in Iraq.

Bush has since focused on the benefits of ousting Saddam Hussein and has sought to link Saddam's regime with al Qaeda, the group that carried out the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Bush, who declared major combat operations over on May 1, 2003, acknowledged for the first time last month that he had made "miscalculations" about the course of the war.

The vast majority of US military deaths have come in the relatively low-intensity guerrilla war that developed in the weeks after the collapse of Saddam's government and military. Much of the country has become a battlefield.

The pace of US military deaths has not diminished since the transfer of sovereignty to the interim government headed by Prime Minister Iyad Allawi on June 28.

In June, 42 US troops were killed, in July 54 were killed and in August the death toll was 66.

Bush administration officials sought to put the 1000 deaths in Iraq in the context of the war against terrorism.

"When combined with US losses in other theatres in the global war on terror, we have lost well more than a thousand already," Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told a Pentagon briefing.

He said US and Iraqi troops had killed up to 2500 insurgents in the past month. The Pentagon has been reluctant since the Vietnam War to announce enemy casualties as it was criticised then for using the data to exaggerate military successes. The US military has, however, increasingly estimated Iraqi insurgent casualties in recent months.

Air Force Gen Richard Myers, chairman of the US military's Joint Chiefs of Staff, acknowledged "a recent spike in the number of casualties" and attributed it to "both suicide attackers and indirect fire attacks."

"The enemy is becoming more sophisticated in its efforts to destabilize the country," Myers said.

Kerry, who is trailing Bush in the polls, said Americans felt the deaths of troops in Iraq deeply.

"And their sacrifice will not be in vain. We are committed to making the right decisions in Iraq and the right decisions for them here at home and that is the way that we will honour their sacrifice," Kerry said.

Kerry has in recent days described Iraq as "the wrong war, in the wrong place, at the wrong time", drawing fresh accusations from Bush that he was "flip-flopping" on the issue.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq