JUST IN! 15 U.S. soldiers killed as US helicopter attacked in Iraq; Bush says: "bring'em on"!
msnbc.com
FALLUJAH, Iraq, Nov. 2 — A U.S. Chinook helicopter believed carrying dozens of soldiers to leaves at home was struck by a missile and crashed west of Baghdad on Sunday, killing 15 soldiers and wounding at least 21 wounded, the U.S. command and witnesses reported.
IT WAS the deadliest day for American troops in the six-month-old occupation of Iraq, and the second-deadliest since the U.S. invasion itself.
The Chinook shootdown was a major new blow in an Iraq insurgency that escalated in recent days — a “tough week,” in the words of U.S. occupation chief L. Paul Bremer. Other U.S. soldiers were reported killed Sunday in ground attacks here and elsewhere in central Iraq.
The U.S. military command in Baghdad raised the casualty figure from the helicopter downing to 15 killed and at least 21 wounded. It said a search was under way at the site for possible other survivors. Only the 28 Americans killed on March 23, third day of the war, surpassed that daily death toll.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld mourned the soldiers and declared, “We can win this war. We will win this war.”
“The work in Iraq is difficult. It is tough. It is going to take time. But progress is being made,” the defense secretary said.
Rumsfeld made the comments in an interview Sunday with NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“Your heart goes out to their families,” Rumsfeld said. “But what they are doing is important ... They are taking the war to the terrorists.”
“The president has said he will stay there (in Iraq) as long as it takes and not one day longer,” Rumsfeld said.
HEADED TO BAGHDAD AIRPORT
The helicopter was part of a formation of two Chinooks carrying more than 50 passengers to the U.S. base at the former Saddam International Airport, renamed Baghdad International.
“Our initial report is that they were being transported to BIA for R&R flights,” that is, rest and recreation leaves abroad, a U.S. command spokeswoman in Baghdad said. She said at least some were coming from Camp Ridgeway, believed to be an 82nd Airborne Division base in western Iraq.
Witnesses said the second copter hovered over the down craft for some minutes and then set down, apparently to try to help extinguish a fire, but the downed copter was destroyed.
At least a half-dozen Black Hawk helicopters later hovered over the area, and dozens of soldiers swarmed over the site. Injured were still being evacuated at least two hours later.
Local villagers displayed blackened pieces of wreckage to arriving reporters, and in nearby Fallujah townspeople celebrated on the streets.
“The Americans are pigs. We will hold a celebration because this helicopter went down — a big celebration,” said wheat farmer Saadoun Jaralla near the crash site. “The Americans are enemies of mankind.”
In Fallujah, residents said a roadside bomb had hit a convoy of U.S. personnel in civilian vehicles. At least one vehicle was ablaze at the scene, where gloating crowds shouted anti-U.S. slogans. Television pictures showed a gleeful youth wearing a U.S. Army helmet. Others danced on wreckage.
Townspeople claimed four soldiers died in that attack, but U.S. military sources said they couldn’t confirm the report.
BAGHDAD BLAST KILLS SOLDIER
In a separate incident, military sources said a soldier from the 1st Armored Division was killed just after midnight in an explosion in Baghdad.
In Abu Ghraib, local Iraqis said U.S. troops arrived Sunday morning and ordered people to disperse from the marketplace and remove what the Iraqis said were religious stickers from walls. Someone then tossed a grenade at the Americans, witnesses said, and the soldiers opened fire.
The U.S. command said it had no immediate information, but Iraqi witnesses said they believed three or four Americans were killed and six to seven Iraqis were wounded.
The presence of the portable anti-aircraft missiles has represented a significant threat for military aircraft and raised concerns over the security of the few commercial flights in and out of Baghdad International Airport. The U.S.-led coalition has offered rewards of $500 apiece to Iraqis who turn them in.
It was the third helicopter known to have been brought down by Iraq’s insurgents since President George W. Bush declared an end to major combat in Iraq on May 1.
A U.S. Army Blackhawk helicopter crash-landed Oct. 25 in Tikrit after being hit by an unknown weapon, injuring one crewmember. On June 12, a U.S. Army Apache attack helicopter was shot down by hostile fire in the western desert, and two crewmembers were rescued unhurt.
The Pentagon had announced Friday it was expanding the home leave program for troops in Iraq, to fly more soldiers out of the region each day and take them to more U.S. airports. As of Sunday, it said, the number of soldiers departing daily via a transit facility in neighboring Kuwait would be increased to 480, from 280.
The workhorse, 10-ton Chinook, which has a crew of four, is the military’s most versatile heavy-lift helicopter, used primarily for troop movements, transporting artillery and similar functions.
The shootdown of the Chinook came after what Bremer, the American administrator in Iraq, called on Saturday “a tough week” in Iraq, beginning with an insurgent rocket attack on Sunday against a Baghdad hotel housing hundreds of his Coalition Provisional Authority staff members. One was killed and 15 wounded in that attack.
A day later, four coordinated suicide bombings in Baghdad killed three dozen people and wounded more than 200, and that was followed by widespread rumors and leaflets threatening an escalation in the anti-U.S. resistance.
Attacks against U.S. forces had already stepped up in the previous week, to an average of 33 a day. |
