By SLOBODAN LEKIC, Associated Press Writer BAGHDAD, Iraq - Guerrillas mounted fresh attacks on occupation forces, firing mortars in the heart of the Iraqi capital and killing an American soldier near Tikrit, the U.S. military said Tuesday.
At least three mortars exploded at about 9:15 p.m. Monday in central Baghdad,
but caused no casualties or damage, U.S. officials said. One hit a U.S. Army
camp of the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, they said.
The American soldier who died near Tikrit was killed Monday when his vehicle
hit a land mine, U.S. officials said. Another soldier was wounded. The death
brought the U.S. death toll in the first three days of November to 22, most in
the weekend crash of a transport helicopter shot down west of Baghdad.
Elsewhere, a police station in the northern city of Mosul was struck
overnight by a rocket-propelled grenade, the military said Tuesday. There were
no casualties.
U.S. troops raided the village of Karasia near Tikrit late Monday, seizing
two suspects, Kalashnikov rifles, 14 mortar rounds, a mortar tube, and
rocket-propelled grenades and launchers, the military said.
The dramatic increase in American hostile fire deaths this month was due to
Sunday's downing of a CH-47 Chinook helicopter, which was carrying dozens of
American soldiers on leave. Sixteen Americans died and another 20 were wounded.
It was the largest U.S. death toll in any single action since the invasion of
Iraq (news
- web
sites) began March 20.
"Everybody was just laid out everywhere, and they were trying to search for
most of the people that were left within the rubble," survivor Cpl. David
Tennant told CBS. "There was a lot of people screaming. I just remember waking
up in the middle of the rubble, trying to escape, trying to get out of the
burning metal."
Sixteen of the injured were flown by U.S. Air Force C-17 transport Monday to
Ramstein Air Base in Germany and treated at the U.S. military's Landstuhl
Regional Medical Center. Nine were admitted to the intensive care unit,
including five in serious condition, said hospital spokeswoman Marie Shaw.
On Monday, Congress gave final approval for $87.5 billion for U.S. military
operations and aid in Iraq and Afghanistan (news
- web
sites). President Bush (news
- web
sites) was expected to sign the legislation soon.
The recent, bold attacks represent a major escalation in the campaign by a
shadowy group of insurgents fighting to drive occupation forces out of Iraq.
They also illustrated the vulnerability of American lines of communication to
guerrilla ambushes and roadside bombings.
Until now, the U.S. military has believed that helicopters and transport
planes provided a relatively safe mode of transport for ferrying troops and
supplies around the country. That has been called into question by Sunday's
attack on the Chinook.
Hundreds of SA-7 Strelas from the prewar Iraqi army are believed to have
ended up in guerrilla hands along with a number of the advanced SA-18 Iglas
equipped with special filters to defeat flares and other countermeasures
deployed by U.S. aircraft.
The U.S. command has offered Iraqis $500 apiece for each portable missile
turned in but has refused to say how many have been surrendered.
American troops hunted Monday for anti-aircraft missiles along Iraq's
trucking routes. In one search operation, U.S. military police stretched out
razor wire and set up checkpoints along the main artery running north from
Baghdad, now dubbed "Highway 1."
The U.S. network CBS television quoted one wounded survivor at a U.S.
military hospital in Baghdad shortly after the crash. Cpl. David Tennant said
the missile hit the back of the Chinook, and the helicopter caught fire before
it went down.
In other developments Monday:
_An explosion in Karbala, 65 miles south of Baghdad, killed at least one
person and injured 12. The blast occurred about 100 yards from the gold-domed
Imam Hussein shrine.
_The head of an Iraqi court who was investigating members of Saddam Hussein
(news
- web
sites)'s Baath Party, Muhan Jabr al-Shuweily, was abducted and murdered
Monday in Najaf, a colleague said.
_A neighborhood council chairman in west Baghdad, Mustafa Zaidan al-Khaleefa,
47, was fatally shot from a passing car late Sunday. Numerous Iraqi local and
national officials cooperating with the occupation have been targeted for
assassination. The
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