U.S. blames Iran for Iraqi arms surge
American helicopter crashes, killing 7
International Herald Tribune, The Associated Press
Published: February 7, 2007

BAGHDAD: U.S. officials say they believe that Iran is supplying Shiite militias with new weapons, including more powerful roadside bombs, some of which they say could have found their way into the hands of Sunni insurgents who operate around Taji, north of Baghdad.

A Sunni group linked to Al Qaeda on Wednesday claimed responsibility for the downing of a Sea Knight helicopter that crashed in the Taji area, killing all seven people on board. It was the fifth chopper lost in Iraq in just over two weeks.

A senior U.S. defense official said the helicopter did not appear to have been hit by hostile fire, but an Iraqi Air Force officer said that it was downed by an anti-aircraft missile.

In Baghdad, meanwhile, a U.S. military spokesman, Major General William Caldwell, said Wednesday that the long-awaited security operation in the Iraqi capital was under way, a day after Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki acknowledged that the plan to pacify Baghdad had been slow to start and had allowed insurgents time to step up attacks that have killed hundreds of Iraqis in recent weeks.

U.S. military officials have said the operation began to be put in place when President George W. Bush announced it Jan. 10, and Caldwell said Wednesday that it was "ongoing as we speak." Officials have said there would be no announced start of the security sweep but that it would instead build gradually.
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General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Tuesday that the number of improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, that had been placed alongside roads or in public places in Iraq had "doubled over the course of the last year," and he blamed Iran for supplying the most deadly of them.

The use of "explosively formed projectiles, which are a much more deadly form, that are coming into Iraq from Iran," had become much more prevalent, Pace said.

At the same time, greatly improved equipment, like electronic jammers, as well as new tactics and techniques for finding and defusing the explosive devices, meant that the average roadside bomb was taking a lower toll, Pace told the Senate Armed Services Committee. The result was that, despite the increase in such devices, the casualty toll attributed to them had stayed roughly even.

"The basic material for an IED is ammunition," Pace said. "So far we have cleared 430,000 tons of ammunition from over 15,000 sites in Iraq. The amount of ammunition available is incredible."

The helicopter that went down Wednesday was a Marine twin-rotor CH-46. It crashed in an insurgent stronghold about 30 kilometers, or 20 miles, northwest of the capital, Caldwell said.

"A quick reaction force is on site and the investigation is going on as we speak," he said.

The military said later that the helicopter went down in the volatile Anbar Province while conducting routine operations and that all seven crew members and passengers were killed.

U.S. forces sealed off the area and helicopters buzzed overhead as flames and a huge plume of black smoke billowed from the wreckage in an open field.

A U.S. defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation was still under way, said the crash appeared to have been related to mechanical problems.

But an Iraqi Air Force officer, who was familiar with the investigation but declined to be identified because he was disclosing confidential information, said the helicopter went down after it was hit by an anti-aircraft missile.

Witnesses also said the helicopter had been shot down in a field in the Sheik Amir area northwest of Baghdad in a Sunni-dominated area between the Taji Air Base and Karmah.

The claim of responsibility came in an Internet statement signed by the Islamic State in Iraq, an umbrella group of several Sunni insurgent groups, including Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. The same group claimed responsibility for downing two other helicopters recently.

The authenticity of the statement, posted on a Web forum where the group often issues statements, could not be independently confirmed.

The military has said the four other helicopters that have crashed since Jan. 20 were believed to have been shot down, raising new questions about whether Iraqi insurgents are using more sophisticated weapons or whether U.S. tactics need changing.

Iraqi insurgents have used heavy machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and shouldered-fired SA-7 anti-aircraft missiles throughout the conflict.

Bush is increasing the number of U.S. troops in Iraq by 21,500, including 17,500 for Baghdad, as part of the new security plan. But the series of helicopter crashes underscores the dangers facing American troops as they step up their presence.

The U.S. military relies heavily on helicopters to avoid roadside bombs and insurgent ambushes. Any new threat to helicopters would be a serious challenge.

At least 15 Iraqis died in attacks throughout the country on Wednesday. Two employees of the government-funded Iraqi Media Network in Baghdad were killed and a female government official was shot and killed while she was riding to work with her husband in the northern city of Mosul. $@

Italian orders GI to face trial

An Italian judge on Wednesday ordered a U.S. soldier to stand trial in the fatal shooting of an Italian intelligence agent at a checkpoint in Baghdad, a prosecutor said, according to The Associated Press in Rome.

Specialist Mario Lozano is indicted on a murder charge in the death of Nicola Calipari, who was shot March 4, 2005, on his way to the airport in Baghdad shortly after securing the release of an Italian journalist who had been kidnapped in the Iraqi capital, said the prosecutor, Pietro Saviotti.

But in Washington, a Pentagon spokesman, Bryan Whitman, said there were no plans to make the U.S. soldier available for the trial.

The Pentagon had "conducted a very thorough investigation" that involved the Italians and had "made available all the information," Whitman said.

"As far as the Defense Department is concerned," he said, "we and the Ministry of Defense in Italy consider this a closed matter."

Lozano was also charged with attempted murder in connection with the wounding of two others: an agent who was driving the car and the journalist, Giuliana Sgrena.

Judge Sante Spinaci set Lozano's trial date for April 17. Lozano's court-appointed lawyer, Fabrizio Cardinali, said he did not know the soldier's whereabouts.