Reply #24: U.S. To Change Helicopter Tactics In Iraq

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/02/04/iraq/main2430500.shtml

U.S. To Change Helicopter Tactics In Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Feb. 4, 2007

(CBS/AP) The U.S. command has ordered changes in flight operations after four helicopters were shot down in the last two weeks, the chief military spokesman said Sunday, acknowledging for the first time that the aircraft were lost to hostile fire.

The crashes, which began Jan. 20, follow insurgent claims that they have received new stocks of anti-aircraft weapons — and a recent boast by Sunni militants that "God has granted new ways" to threaten U.S. aircraft.

All four helicopters were shot down during a recent increase in violence, which an Interior Ministry official said has claimed nearly 1,000 lives in the past week alone. At least 103 people were killed or found dead Sunday, most of them in Baghdad, police reported.

Maj. Gen. William Caldwell told reporters that the investigations into the crashes of three Army and one private helicopter were incomplete but "it does appear they were all the result of some kind of anti-Iraqi ground fire that did bring those helicopters down."

FULL story at link.