November was deadliest combat month for 101st since Vietnam

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November was deadliest combat month for 101st since Vietnam



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By DARYL TABOR dtabor@kentuckynewera.com
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The deadliest month of combat for Fort Campbell's 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) since Vietnam has finally come to a close, much to the relief of the division's commander.
"I am happy to see the end of November," Maj. Gen. David H. Petraeus told The Associated Press on Thanksgiving. "We've taken some real blows during this time. We've had some terrible losses."

Twenty-seven Fort Campbell soldiers were killed during the month, just one shy of matching the total losses for the entire Iraq war prior to November. A total of 55 soldiers from units based at the Army post have been killed thus far in Iraq.

But Petraeus is not the only U.S. commander reeling from losses

incurred during the last 30 days. More Americans died in Iraq in November than in any other month of the war. Eighty-one of the 437 U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq since the war began on March 20 died in November, according to AP. The previous monthly high was in April, the first full month of the war, when 73 were killed.

Estimates on total American casualties since the U.S.-led invasion began vary, but according to The Orlando (Fla.) Sentinel, almost 10,000 soldiers have either been killed, wounded, injured in accidents or become ill enough to be evacuated. Pentagon numbers reported by the newspaper showed 9,675 casualties as of Nov. 28.

Since the war on terror began in October 2001 following the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, 71 Fort Campbell soldiers have been killed. In addition to those killed in Iraq, eight have died in Afghanistan and eight more in the Philippines, both theaters in Operation Enduring Freedom.

Meantime, the name of the latest 101st Airborne casualty was released Sunday.

Sgt. Ariel Rico, who was assigned to 3rd Battalion, 320th Field Artillery Regiment, died Friday from injuries sustained when four mortar shells pounded the division's base in Mosul, Iraq. He is survived by his wife, Jessica, and a 7-year-old daughter, Jadelyn.

The last time Rico communicated with his wife Jessica was by e-mail. She said she still can't believe her husband won't be coming home to pursue a career in law enforcement, as he had planned.

"I just pray for other people, that (the soldiers) all come home safely," Jessica Rico told the Clarksville, Tenn. Leaf-Chronicle in today's editions.

Rico, 25, was the third El Paso native known to have been killed in Iraq since the war began.

Another 101st Airborne soldier who died last Wednesday of a non-combat gunshot wound has yet to be identified.

Daryl K. Tabor can be reached by telephone at 887-3262 or by e-mail at dtabor@kentuckynewera.com.