US has deadliest month in Afghan war

August 2011 has become the deadliest month for US troops in the decade-long war in Afghanistan with 66 American soldiers killed in the month.


The figure, released by the Associated Press on Tuesday, eclipsed the earlier figure of 65 belonging to July 2010.

Most fatalities were those of an August 6 helicopter crash in which 30 US troops lost their lives. The victims were aboard a Chinook shot down by Taliban militants in Afghanistan's Wardak Province in the single deadliest incident of the Afghan war.

Twenty-three other American troops died this month in Kandahar and Helmand Provinces in southern Afghanistan. The remaining 13 were killed in eastern Afghanistan.

Besides the 66 Americans killed so far this month, the US-led NATO coalition also suffered the loss of two British, four French, one New Zealander, one Australian, one Polish and five other troops whose nationalities have not yet been disclosed.

So far this year, 403 US-led soldiers, including at least 299 Americans, have been killed in Afghanistan, according to the AP tally.

There are currently about 150,000 US-led foreign troops in Afghanistan, almost 100,000 of them American forces.

US President Barack Obama has ordered the withdrawal of the 33,000 extra troops he dispatched to the war, with 10,000 to be out this year and another 23,000 to be withdrawn by the summer of 2012, leaving about 68,000 US troops on the ground in Afghanistan.