Suicide bomber wounds 41 troops at US military base in Irak

WITNESSES AT the scene near Fallujah said it appeared a rocket-propelled grenade had downed the helicopter.
       The U.S. military later said an observation helicopter with two crewmen on board had made a “controlled, hard landing.”
       “There were no casualties or fatalities,” added Marine Maj. Pete Mitchell. “We don’t know what the cause was.”
       In past weeks there have been two other deadly attacks on U.S. helicopters.
       On Nov. 2, 16 soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division died when insurgents shot down a Chinook transport helicopter near Fallujah.
       In the deadliest single incident so far for U.S. soldiers, two Black Hawk helicopters collided and crashed in the northern city of Mosul on Nov. 17, killing 17 soldiers. U.S. commanders said the crash was caused by ground fire.
       Fallujah, a hotbed of resistance to the U.S. occupation, sits in the heart of the dangerous Sunni Triangle where the majority of attacks on American forces have occurred.
       In the Army base attack, a car was shot at when its driver tried to crash the gate of the base in the town of Talafar, 30 miles west of Mosul, early Tuesday.
       Guards at the gate and in a watchtower opened fire on the vehicle and moments later it blew up. The bomb left a large crater at the gate’s entryway.
       Col. Michael Linnington, commander of the 3rd Brigade which controls the area west of Mosul and all the way to the Syrian border, said the attack was a suicide mission.
       “Right now we have four soldiers that were evacuated and are being treated for blast injuries. In addition, 37 soldiers have nicks, cuts, bruises and some broken bones,” he said. A base translator also was injured in the blast, which damaged nearby homes.
       Meanwhile, in Baghdad, three people were reported killed and two injured early Tuesday when a missile exploded in the courtyard of a mosque in the capital’s western Hurriyah district.

GI SHOT AND KILLED IN MOSUL
       Tuesday’s attack near Mosul came less than a day after insurgents shot and killed a soldier from the Army’s 101st Airborne Division as he guarded a gas station in the northern city, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said in Baghdad.
       “Four Iraqi males traveling in vehicles stopped approximately 50 yards from a gas station in Mosul and opened fire on coalition soldiers guarding the station,” Kimmitt said of the attack Monday. “One coalition soldier died of gunshot wounds in that attack.”

Three other U.S. soldiers were wounded in Mosul on Monday when a bomb exploded as their patrol passed, a U.S. military spokesperson told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
       Meanwhile, north of Baghdad, three U.S. soldiers died and one was injured in an accident on when an embankment collapsed beneath their armored personnel carriers on Monday, the military said Tuesday. The soldiers belonged to the 2nd Infantry Division’s 3rd Brigade.
       Kimmitt said Monday that there were 18 engagements between Iraqi guerrillas and U.S.-led coalition forces in the past week, a marked decline over previous weeks.
       “These numbers are significantly lower than recent norms, although we anticipate and are fully prepared for any upturn in attacks in the days and weeks ahead,” he said.
       The deaths bring to 448 the number of U.S. soldiers who have died in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion on March 20. Of those, 308 have died as a result of hostile action

Top of Page

For all inquiries
Email kwabs.com

        Copyright © kwabs.com(TM) All Rights