
TIKRIT, Iraq — With psalms and a 21-gun salute, soldiers hailed two fallen comrades from the 1st Battalion 22nd Infantry Regiment in a memorial service Thursday at one of Saddam Hussein’s palaces.
Spc. James Powell, 26, of Mark Center, Ohio, was killed Sunday when his Bradley fighting vehicle struck a land mine near Beiji, 30 miles north of Tikrit.
Spc. Donald L. Wheeler, 23, of Concord, Mich., was killed in an attack Monday in downtown Tikrit, when a rocket-propelled grenade hit his vehicle.
Tikrit, Saddam’s hometown 120 miles north of Baghdad, lies at the heart of the Sunni Triangle, a region stretching north and west of the Iraqi capital where most of...