BAGHDAD, Iraq — Unrelenting attacks in Baghdad and the western province of Anbar have made October the deadliest month of the Iraq war for U.S. troops since October 2005.

Among the casualties in the past 30 days are eight Hawai'i-based Marines, making it the deadliest such period for Hawai'i troops since October 2004, when nine Kane'ohe Bay Marines died, most of them in the bloody fight for Fallujah.

The military yesterday reported five more American troops killed, all of them in the insurgent stronghold of Anbar. That raised the U.S. death toll this month to 96, according to The Associated Press. That equals the number of U.S. troops killed for the whole of October 2005.

Two of those killed were assigned to Kane'ohe Bay. Pfc. Daniel B. Chaires, 20, of Tallahassee, Fla., and Pfc. Donald S. Brown, 19, of Succasunna, N.J., died Wednesday from wounds suffered in separate attacks.

Both were part of the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division, III Marine Expeditionary Force. They joined the Marine Corps at the same time — September 2005 — and reported to Hawai'i in March. Both deployed to Iraq last month.

Brown joined the Marine Corps last year, shortly after graduating from Roxbury High School in Roxbury, N.J., where he played football and ran track.

His older brother, Kenneth, 23, served in the Marines until last year.

Ed Hade, assistant superintendent of the Roxbury School District, said teachers recalled Brown dreaming of becoming a Marine and wearing Marine Corps T-shirts to school.

"The students and staff just remember him as an all-around good guy, just considerate to everyone," Hade told the Daily Record of Parsippany, N.J.

The school plans to honor Brown during a Veterans Day ceremony on Nov. 8, Hade said.

Brown's father, Philip, said his son was well aware when he signed up that he would likely have to go to Iraq.

"Kenneth told him that," Philip Brown said.

He told The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J., that his son eventually wanted to be a history teacher, "but he wanted to take part in history" first.

Marines who gathered at Kane'ohe Bay for a memorial service last week for Hawai'i Marines with the 3rd Battalion, 3rd Regiment reflected on the violence.

Staff Sgt. Jeremy Messerschmidt, 28, recently returned from Iraq with the 3rd Battalion, which handed off the mission to the 2nd Battalion Marines there now.

ALWAYS 'ON YOUR TOES'

The 3rd Battalion Marines lost 11 men.

"It's hard (to lose fellow Marines). It's always hard. They are friends. They are family," Messerschmidt said at the memorial service.

"We fight for the guys on our left and on our right, and when you lose them you kind of feel like you let them down," the Kentucky man said.

He said the area of western Iraq where the Marines operated was very hostile. After their arrival, "it began with the roadside bombs. Once in a while we'd walk into a small-arms fire attack."

Iraqis would toss grenades over walls at passing Marines. Messerschmidt was on a rooftop when a bullet creased the top of the Kevlar helmet of another Marine.

"You gotta be on your toes at all times," he said.

In a written statement issued yesterday, officials with Marine Corps Base Hawai'i said they are proud of the service of Kane'ohe Bay Marines in Iraq.

"They serve with tireless dedication under difficult circumstances, and they are making a crucial contribution to the future of Iraq and the United States," Maj. Christopher Perrine, the base director of public affairs, said in the statement. "We are also extremely grateful to the residents of Hawai'i for welcoming us into their 'ohana and for their continued support."

TAKING BACK RAMADI

Army Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, the U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad, attributed the resurgence in American deaths in Anbar province to "very conscious and deliberate operations" by U.S. and Iraqi forces in Ramadi, Anbar's capital.

"It's an aggressive, offensive approach to taking back the city of Ramadi, to return it back to Iraqi security forces," Caldwell said yesterday.

U.S. and Iraqi forces have been battling Sunni Arab insurgent groups in the heart of Ramadi daily since early this year, and Caldwell's words — "taking back" — reflected the degree to which guerrillas have asserted control over the city.

The insurgent groups include both foreign-led organizations, such as al-Qaida in Iraq, and Iraqi resistance groups. U.S. officers said this past summer that they could claim sure control only over a few blocks immediately around Ramadi's town hall, as well as forward operating bases and other American outposts in the lawless city. U.S. troops, especially since summer, have moved more aggressively out into the city, pushing back against insurgents but also putting themselves at greater risk.

CIRCUMSTANCES UNCLEAR

It was not clear whether Wednesday's killings were all in Ramadi, and the military gave no details about how they occurred. Local leaders in Ramadi reported that a series of planted bombs and suicide car bombs had targeted American forces around Anbar on Wednesday.

In 2004, thousands of American troops were involved in two concentrated offensives against Sunni Arab insurgents in Fallujah, and the toll in April of that year also included deaths in heavy fighting against forces of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in southern Iraq. The number of Americans killed in action that month was 126; in November 2004 it was 125.

In contrast, American deaths this month have come singly or in twos, threes or fours, mostly from roadside bombs and small-arms fire targeting patrols, checkpoints and other day-to-day operations.

AL-MASRI INFLUENCE

Sources within the two militaries, as well as Iraqi militiamen and foreign fighters, cite many of the same reasons for the current increase in violence in Anbar.

After American warplanes killed al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in June, his successor, Abu Ayyub al-Masri, called on followers to concentrate attacks on U.S. troops and Shiite militiamen, soldiers and police. In September, al-Masri urged every insurgent in Iraq to kill at least one American within 15 days.

The Egyptian-born al-Masri wanted redoubled attacks "to have a great effect on the American elections," said Abu Islam al-Arabi, a local al-Qaida leader reached by telephone yesterday in Anbar province.

Al-Arabi, an Iraqi, suggested other reasons for the surge in attacks: the desire of guerrillas to have their deaths come in the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, when some Muslims believe martyrdom will earn them special grace in paradise, and what he said was a new influx of foreign fighters, who he said had already made possible dozens of suicide attacks during Ramadan, which ended Sunday for Sunnis and Monday for Shiites.

Except for that last reason, American officers have given all the same possible causes.

Of Iraq's 18 provinces, Anbar is by far the deadliest for U.S. troops: About 1,022 service members, including some from allied foreign armies, have been killed there since the war began, compared with 733 in Baghdad and 281 in Salahuddin province north of the capital, according to the Web site iCas ualties.org.

IRAQI DEATHS

So far in October, not including the most recent American deaths, 35 U.S. troops have been killed in Anbar, 42 in Baghdad and seven in Salahuddin, accounting for 88 percent of the U.S. fatalities, according to the Web site.

American deaths in the war are dwarfed by those of Iraqi civilians and troops, however.

During the recently concluded month of Ramadan, about 300 Iraqi police officers, soldiers and other security forces were killed in attacks, Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the U.S. commander in Iraq, said this week.

Civilians have died in even larger numbers. Violence last month left more than 2,660 dead in Baghdad alone, reflecting a toll that has more than doubled since late spring. Before the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, the number of violent deaths recorded by the city morgue averaged 10 a month.

Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com.