"Canadian commander announces U.S. deaths in Afghanistan"

Further to this post on the pitiful way the Canadian media cover the (now very substantial with more to come) US Army forces fighting at Kandahar,

Afstan: Typical Canadian reporting--balderflippingdash, Part 2/Beyonder Uppestdate: "fair and balanced"--hurl

a good story by Matthew Fisher of Canwest News (disgraceful that almost none of the chain's major papers seem to have run it--and the rest of our major media essentially ignored a CP story on the event):

KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan – For the first time, a Canadian general has announced the deaths of U.S. troops under his command.

Brig.-Gen. Daniel Menard announced the deaths of four U.S. soldiers fighting in Panjwaii, a district which until recently had been patrolled by Canadians.

The first U.S. forces to be killed in action in Afghanistan in 2010 were Sgt. Joshua Lengstorf, Specialist Brian Bowman and Pte. Brian Dion of the 1st battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division and Senior Airman Bradley Smith of the U.S. air force, who was attached to a Fort Carson, Colo.- based unit to co-ordinate airstrikes and surveillance.

The men were killed on Jan. 3 by an improvised explosive device while on a foot patrol with Afghan army forces about 25 kilometres southwest of Kandahar City, Menard said. The U.S. Department of Defence had previously announced the men were hit by multiple IEDs and small arms fire.

“On behalf of all soldiers, airmen, sailors and special operators of Joint Task Force Afghanistan [see "U.S. Army units" here], I offer our condolences to family and friends of our fallen during this difficult time,” he said.

Menard commands about 3,000 U.S. troops as well as about 2,850 Canadians. The first U.S. battalion to be placed under Canadian command arrived in the summer of 2008. Additional U.S. forces were added to Canada’s brigade last summer with the arrival of the Kansas-based 97th Military Police Battalion of the 82 Airborne Division.

The North Carolina-based 2 battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd joined the Canadian command in late December [more details here on the US units under CF command] as part of a realignment of U.S. forces already in Afghanistan after President Barack Obama announced a troop surge of 30,000 additional U.S. forces...