annual reminder of The Beirut Barracks Bombing. (Pardon my being a day late)

The Beirut Barracks Bombing (October 23, 1983 in Beirut, Lebanon) occurred during the Lebanese Civil War,  when two truck bombs struck separate buildings housing United States and French military forces— killing 299 American and French servicemen.

I specifically single out this loss of USMC by hostile forces not of a military force of any nation, not in a declared war between their country and that of those they killed. Not of a people oppressed by an occupying force (US revolutionary forces vs British forces). It was the deadliest attack on U.S. Marines since the battle of Iwo Jima

The organization Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the bombing. Suicide bombers detonated each of the truck bombs.

In the attack on the American Marines barracks, the death toll was 241 American servicemen: 220 Marines, 18 Navy personnel and three Army soldiers, along with sixty Americans injured

In the attack on the French barracks, the eight-story 'Drakkar' building, 58 paratroopers from the 1st Parachute Chasseur Regiment were killed and 15 injured.

The wife and four children of a Lebanese janitor at the French building were also killed.

The blasts led to the withdrawal of the international peacekeeping force from Lebanon, where they had been stationed since the withdrawal of the Palestine Liberation Organization following the Israeli 1982 invasion of Lebanon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Beirut_barracks_bombing
http://abcnews.go.com/International/back-deadly-1983-marine-barracks-bombing-beirut/story?id=50663026