Nov 4, 2:23 AM EST

U.S. Soldier Killed in Blast Near Tikrit

By CHARLES J. HANLEY
AP Special Correspondent

Collins says the U-S cannot leave Iraq at this point. (Audio)

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- A soldier with the 4th Infantry Division was killed and another wounded in an explosion of an makeshift bomb near Tikrit, the U.S. Central Command said Monday.

Also, witnesses reported that a blast near a Shiite Muslim shrine in the southern city of Karbala killed at least one person.

Meanwhile, American troops hunted for anti-aircraft missiles along Iraq's trucking routes, digging through heaps of manure, mounds of hay or piles of pomegranates Monday. Furthermore, the U.S. Army retrieved the wreckage of a downed transport helicopter, searching for clues about who knocked it from the sky the day before.

On Tuesday, a military spokesman said that a mortar round or a rocket had struck the so-called "Green Zone" - the heavily defended area in central Baghdad that houses the U.S.-led administration. He said the blast, one several heard late Tuesday in the capital, caused no damage or casualties.

One clue in Sunday's helicopter shootdown may lie in Ramadi, west of the crash site, where an anti-U.S. leaflet warned, just two days before the shootdown, that Iraq's insurgents would strike the Americans with "modern and advanced methods."The downing of the CH-47 Chinook, one of two carrying dozens of soldiers on their way to Baghdad airport and home leave, killed 16 Americans and wounded 20 others. It was the heaviest U.S. death toll in any single action since the invasion of Iraq last March 20.

One victim, Ernest Bucklew, 33, had been expected to stop at his Fort Carson, Colo., home before traveling to his mother's funeral. His wife, Barbara, wept as she spoke of breaking the news to the couple's two children, 8-year-old Joshua and 4-year-old Justin.

"My oldest one is just a little numb," she said at the Army post near Colorado Springs, Colo., shrouded in fog and a cold rain. "He understands his nana and father passed away, but he hasn't talked about it. The youngest one just doesn't understand. He doesn't understand the concept of death right now."

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.

"They are being evaluated and surgeries are planned throughout the day," she said.

Villagers who saw the helicopter downing south of Fallujah, 35 miles west of Baghdad, said it was struck from behind by one or two missiles apparently fired from a date palm grove in the area, deep in the Sunni Muslim heartland that has produced the most violent opposition to the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

CBS Evening News 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.

"Everybody was just laid out everywhere, and they were trying to search for most of the people that were left within the rubble. There was a lot of people screaming," Tennant told CBS. "I just remember waking up in the middle of the rubble, trying to escape, trying to get out of the burning metal."

Hundreds of portable, shoulder-fired missiles are unaccounted for in Iraq, potential threats to a U.S. occupation army that relies heavily on the slow, low-flying CH-47 Chinook craft for troop transport. 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.

In one search operation Monday, U.S. military police stretched out razor wire and set up checkpoints along the main artery running north from Baghdad, now dubbed "Highway 1," to look for weapons, including anti-aircraft missiles.

"We have had indication that more of stuff like this (missiles) are moving out there," said Lt. Col. Dave Poirier, commander of the 720th Military Police Battalion. "People know they are taking a big chance in transporting weapons ... and for some of these large weapons systems, you'd have to have a truck to transport it."

Spc. Andrew Fifield of San Antonio jumped on top of a truck transporting pomegranates and picked through the fruit carefully.

As he dug through dried manure atop a second truck, he motioned to Iraqi policemen to join him. None did.

"A lot of them were not police as we'd know police back home to be," Poirier said. "Some of them were never policemen before this."

Few details were available about the attack that killed the 4th Infantry Division solider. Central Command said in a news release that the attack happened at 2:40 p.m. Monday and that the soldier's name was being withheld upending family notification.

It said the wounded soldier was in stable condition.

The explosion in Karbala, 65 miles south of Baghdad, apparently was caused by a bomb planted in a parked car on a busy street less than 100 yards from the gold-domed Imam Hussein shrine, said Mohammed Abu Jaffar al-Assadi, a Shiite cleric. Other witnesses said it might have been concealed in a bag left outside a hotel.

In addition to at least one dead, it was believed 12 people were wounded, al-Assadi said. It was not immediately possible to get confirmation.

As a result of Sunday's shootdown, the U.S. command may have to re-evaluate the routes and flying tactics of its transport helicopters and planes over Iraq.

The SA-7 Strela portable missiles known to have been in Iraqi hands, weapons that home in on the engine heat of an aircraft, can be fired to an altitude of 14,000 feet, easily covering the usual cruising altitude of a heavily laden Chinook.

Another shoulder-fired missile in the old Iraqi army's inventory, the advanced SA-18 Iglas, is equipped with special filters to defeat flares and other countermeasures deployed by U.S. aircraft.

The apparent successful use of such a weapon in Sunday's attack is a sign of the increasing sophistication of Iraq's elusive anti-U.S. resistance, whose attacks have intensified in recent weeks.

At the site Monday, a giant crane lifted pieces of wreckage onto a truck, as soldiers sealed off the immediate area. Villager Jamal Abed, 22, said U.S. troops came to his house Monday morning and told him, through an interpreter, that "if American forces were subjected to fire, they will open fire on every house in the area."

In other developments:

-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.

-In the southern city of Basra, some 1,500 members of a new Iraqi security guard force protested outside the mayor's office, seeking a higher bonus for Ramadan, the Muslim holy month.

---

Associated Press writers Katarina Kratovac in Tikrit, Bassem Mroue at the crash site, and Robert Weller in Fort Carson, Colo., contributed to this report.

Monday, November 03, 2003

FALLUJAH, Iraq -- Targeting Americans with new audacity, insurgents hiding in a date palm grove shot down a Chinook helicopter carrying dozens of soldiers heading for home leave yesterday, killing 16 and wounding 20 in the deadliest strike against U.S. forces since they invaded Iraq in March.

Witnesses said the attackers used missiles -- a sign of the increasing sophistication of Iraq's elusive anti-U.S. fighters.

Three other Americans were killed in separate attacks yesterday, including one 1st Armored Division soldier in Baghdad and two U.S. civilians working for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Fallujah. All three were victims of roadside bombs, the military said.

	Anja Niedringhaus/Associated Press
	A U.S. Army helicopter flies near the area after a U.S. Chinook helicopter, right, believed to be carrying dozens of soldiers to leaves abroad was struck by a missile yesterday and crashed west of Baghdad, near Fallujah.

Sunday's death toll was the highest for American troops since March 23 -- the first week of the invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein -- and the attack represented a major escalation in the campaign to drive the U.S.-led coalition out of the country.

The giant helicopter was ferrying the soldiers on their way for leave outside Iraq when two missiles streaked into the sky and slammed into the rear of the aircraft, witnesses told The Associated Press. It crashed in flames in farmers' fields west of Baghdad.

"It's clearly a tragic day for America," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said in Washington. "In a long, hard war, we're going to have tragic days. But they're necessary. They're part of a war that's difficult and complicated."

Like past attacks on U.S. forces and a string of suicide bombings that killed dozens in Baghdad the past week, U.S. coalition officials blamed either Saddam loyalists or foreign fighters for the strike outside Fallujah, a center of Sunni Muslim resistance to the U.S. occupation.

President Bush, who was at his Texas ranch yesterday, refused to personally comment on the attacks. He spent the day out of public view -- a "down" day between campaign appearances Saturday and today.

L. Paul Bremer, the head of the occupation in Iraq, repeated demands that Syria and Iran prevent fighters from crossing their borders into Iraq.

"They could do a much better job of helping us seal that border and keeping terrorist out of Iraq," he told CNN. The "enemies of freedom" in Iraq "are using more sophisticated techniques to attack our forces."

U.S. officials have been warning of the danger of shoulder-fired missiles, thousands of which are now scattered from Saddam's arsenals, and such missiles are believed to have downed two U.S. copters since May 1. Those two crashes -- of smaller helicopters -- wounded only one American.

The loaded-down Chinook was a dramatic new target. The insurgents have been steadily advancing in their weaponry, first using homemade roadside bombs, then rocket-fired grenades in ambushes on American patrols, and vehicles stuffed with explosives and detonated by suicide attackers.

In the fields south of Fallujah, some villagers proudly showed off blackened pieces of the Chinook's wreckage to arriving reporters.

Though a few villagers tried to help, many celebrated word of the helicopter downing, as well as a fresh attack on U.S. soldiers in Fallujah itself. Two American civilians working under contract for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers were killed and one was injured in the explosion of a roadside bomb, the military said.

"This was a new lesson from the resistance, a lesson to the greedy aggressors," one Fallujah resident, who would not give his name, said of the helicopter downing. "They'll never be safe until they get out of our country," he said of the Americans.

The downed copter was one of two Chinooks flying out in formation from an air base in Habbaniyah, about 10 miles from the crash site, carrying troops to Baghdad on route for rest and recreation -- R&R.

The missiles semed to have been fired from a palm grove about 500 yards away, Thaer Ali, 21, said. At least one hit the Chinook, which came down in a field in the farming village of Hasai, a few miles south of Fallujah, witnesses said.

The missiles flashed toward the helicopter from the rear, as usual with heat-seeking ground-fired missiles. The most common model in the former Iraqi army inventory was the Russian-made SA-7, also known as Strelas.

Hours later, thick smoke rose from the blackened, smoldering hulk as U.S. soldiers swarmed over the crash site, evacuating the injured, retrieving evidence and cordoning off the area.

Yassin Mohamed said he heard the explosion and ran out of his house, a half-mile away.

"I saw the helicopter burning. I ran toward it because I wanted to help put out the fire, but couldn't get near because of American soldiers," he said.

The U.S. military would not confirm that the aircraft was struck by a missile, but a spokesman, Col. William Darley, said witnesses reported seeing "missile trails."

In Baghdad, Darley said the CH-47 helicopter belonged to the 12th Aviation Brigade, a Germany-based unit that supports the 82nd Airborne Division Task Force operating west of Baghdad.

The two Chinooks were carrying a total of more than 50 passengers to the U.S. base at Baghdad International Airport, from which they were to fly out on leave, U.S. officials said. Darley said some of the casualties were from medical units, but officials did not provide a breakdown of their units.

A spokesman at Fort Carson, Colo., said the Chinooks were carrying soldiers from Fort Carson; Fort Sill, Okla.; Fort Campbell, Ky.; and Fort Hood, Texas.

Lt. Col. Thomas Budzyna said some Fort Carson troops were among the injured but he did not know the units or bases of the other casualties.

"Many were looking forward to a break in the action," Budzyna said. "Unfortunately, they faced something else."

The Pentagon announced Friday it was expanding the rest and recreation leave program for troops in Iraq. As of yesterday, it said, the number of soldiers departing daily to the United States via a transit facility in neighboring Kuwait would be increased from 280 to 480.

Fallujah lies in the so-called "Sunni Triangle," a region north and west of Baghdad were most attacks on American forces have taken place. The downing and the soldier's death in Baghdad brought to at least 139 the number of American soldiers killed by hostile fire since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1.

Around 377 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq.

The death toll yesterday surpasses one of the deadliest single attacks during the Iraq war: the March 23 ambush of the 507th Maintenance Company, in which 11 soldiers were killed, nine were wounded and seven captured, including Pfc. Jessica Lynch. A total of 28 Americans around Iraq -- including the casualties from the ambush -- died on that day, the deadliest for U.S. troops during the Iraq war.

Meanwhile, in Abu Ghraib on Baghdad's western edge, U.S. troops clashed with townspeople yesterday. Local Iraqis said U.S. troops arrived in the morning and ordered people to disperse from the marketplace. Someone then tossed a grenade at the Americans, who opened fire, witnesses said.

The newest deaths capped a week of extraordinary carnage in and around Baghdad. On Oct. 26, a rocket slammed into a hotel housing hundreds of coalition staffers, killing one and injuring 15.

A day later, four coordinated suicide bombings in Baghdad killed three dozen people and wounded more than 200. Daily attacks against U.S. forces have increased in the last three weeks from an average of the mid-20s to 33.

Among 16 killed by missile attack on U.S. helicopter

Monday, November 03, 2003

Sgt. Ernest Bucklew, 33, was coming home from Iraq on an emergency leave to attend the funeral of his mother when his helicopter was shot from the sky.

In three days, Donald Bucklew, of Darlington Township, lost his wife and his son.

"His mother and dad prayed every night that he would come home safe," said Jack Smith, of Point Marion, Fayette County, Ernest Bucklew's uncle.

The family tragedy started Friday afternoon. Mary Ellen Bucklew, 57, was driving home from work at a warehouse when an aneurysm in one of the arteries leading to her heart burst. Her vehicle ran into the median of the road and she died.

Smith said Ernest Bucklew's wife, Barbara, went to the American Red Cross and put in a plea to get him home for the funeral. The couple lived in Fort Carson, Colo., with their two sons, Justin, 6, and Joshua, 4. Smith said the Army agreed to get him to Fort Carson, but that he would have to get to Pennsylvania on his own.

The plan was that Ernest Bucklew would pick up his family and they would all come to Pennsylvania to attend the funeral.

		RELATED STORY U.S. helicopter shot down in Iraq: 16 U.S. soldiers killed and 20 wounded

The CH-47 Chinook he was aboard was one of two helicopters flying out in formation from an air base in Habbaniyah, Iraq, yesterday carrying troops to Baghdad on route for rest and recreation leaves.

In flight, two missiles streaked into the sky from a ground position and slammed into the rear of the helicopter, witnesses told The Associated Press. It crashed in flames in farmers' fields west of Baghdad, killing 16 and wounding 20 in the deadliest strike against U.S. forces since they invaded Iraq in March.

"Two deaths in three days is hard. I'm scared to death for my brother-in-law," Smith said.

The family is close-knit, holding yearly reunions. One of Ernest Bucklew's cousins stayed with Barbara Bucklew last night. She and her children will return to Pennsylvania today.

Bucklew had recently e-mailed his uncle that the military was offering soldiers 10 days off in the States, but that he did not plan to come home because it would be harder for his children to see him for 10 days and then say goodbye again than to not see him at all, Smith said.

Ernest Bucklew grew up in Geneva, Fayette County, the son of a coal miner. Bucklew was about 13 when his family moved to Morgantown, W.Va., and he graduated from high school there.

After high school, Bucklew's family moved to Beaver County, where Donald Bucklew is an electrician for Duquesne Light Co.

Ernest Bucklew joined the National Guard after high school. About five years ago, his uncle said, he joined the Army. He and his wife moved to Georgia for two years, then to Colorado.

Yesterday afternoon Smith got the call from Bucklew's sister, Dawn Marie DeFelice, that his nephew had died when the helicopter was shot down.

"I can't find any reason for both of them going like this," he said.

Funeral arrangements were incomplete last night.

Families grieve loss of loved ones in crash

Monday, November 3, 2003 Posted: 6:50 PM EST (2350 GMT)
Monday, November 3, 2003 Posted: 6:50 PM EST (2350 GMT)

(AP) -- Karina Lau was hoping to surprise her family in California with a two-week furlough from Iraq. Ernest Bucklew was headed home for his mother's funeral in Pennsylvania.

Around the nation, families of the 16 U.S. soldiers killed in a weekend helicopter attack in Iraq had been looking forward to a few precious hours with their loved ones. Instead, the families were grieving Monday.

Many of the victims had been headed home for R&R or emergency leave when they were killed.

Bucklew, 33, had been expected to stop at his Fort Carson, Colorado, home before traveling to the funeral. His wife, Barbara, wept as she spoke of breaking the news to the couple's two children, 8-year-old Joshua and 4-year-old Justin.

"My oldest one is just a little numb," she said at the Army post near Colorado Springs, shrouded in fog and a cold rain. "He understands his nana and father passed away, but he hasn't talked about it. The youngest one just doesn't understand. He doesn't understand the concept of death right now."

The CH-47 Chinook helicopter was taking soldiers to the U.S. base at Baghdad International Airport on Sunday so they could fly out for two weeks' leave. The attack also left 20 soldiers wounded.

Among the dead was helicopter pilot, 30-year-old 1st Lt. Brian Slavenas of Genoa, Illinois. Military service was a natural fit for the 6-foot-5 former Army paratrooper who was serving in the Illinois National Guard.

"I just feel like the whole world was cheated because he was just the wrong person for the good of the world to be killed," said his brother Marcus Slavenas, who served in Operation Desert Storm.

Ronald Slavenas said his son was a "gentle giant" who did not like violence. He said Brian Slavenas loved checking out the sights as he flew dignitaries, soldiers, prisoners and equipment around Iraq.

"He described to me seeing all of those places from the air, pointing out archaeological sites like Babylon," Ronald Slavenas said. "From the air, for him, it was like sightseeing."

Lau, a 20-year-old Army private trained at Fort Hood, Texas, dreamed of returning to school and someday setting up her own music shop, relatives said. She was planning to visit family in Livingston, California.

"She had just e-mailed my wife just two hours before she got on the helicopter," said Noel Rivera, Lau's brother-in-law.

The attack was an especially tragic blow at Fort Carson, which has sent 12,000 troops to Iraqits largest deployment since World War II. In all, 25 soldiers from the post have died in Iraqfour of them in Sunday's crash.

Another of the hardest-hit posts was Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Six soldiers based there were killed and six were injured in Sunday's attack.

"When my husband gets here, I just want to hug and kiss him and never let him go," said Amy Leyenbecker, who is married to a soldier and was at the Bucklew home trying to provide comfort.

Bucklew's family was planning two funeralsone for him and another for his mother, who died Friday of a burst aneurysm at age 57.

"They say there's a reason for everything, but I just can't find a reason for this," said Bucklew's uncle, Jack Smith of Point Marion, Pennsylvania. "This country shouldn't be starting wars, we should be defending ourselves and others. I think all these boys should be sent home."

Bucklew, the son of a coal miner, grew up in Pennsylvania and West Virginia and joined the National Guard. He met his wife in 1991, when both were in the Army Reserves.

She said once she saw the 5-foot-3 Bucklew, with his brown eyes and brown hair, she knew she wanted to spend her life with him. "Even on your worst day, he knew how to make you laugh," she said. "That had to be his best quality."

Ernie, as he was known, had been in the Army since 1999. In one of the last e-mails sent to his wife, he reminisced about times with his mother, Mary, when he was a child.

"He said he couldn't sleep. He was thinking about her," Barbara Bucklew said. "He couldn't wait to be home

Chinook Attack

The Bloodiest Day in Iraq for Americans

By PATRICK COCKBURN

Fallujah.

In the deadliest single attack on the United States army since it invaded Iraq, guerrillas shot down a Chinook helicopter with a missile yesterday killing 15 and wounding 21 American servicemen. The US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, called the incident a national tragedy for Americans.

The Chinook, which came down in a field near Fallujah, west of Baghdad, was one of two 84-foot long transport helicopters attacked shortly after they took off from Habbaniyah air base at about 9am yesterday on a routine flight. They were ferrying more than 50 soldiers on a rest break from the 82nd Airborne Division to a military base at Baghdad International airport. As the helicopters passed over the village of Buisa, set in rich farmland filled with cattle and crops, guerrillas hidden in a date grove fired two shoulder-launched ground-to-air missiles, probably from a Russian heat-seeking SA-7 known as the Strella. There are many of them in Iraq and they were formerly used by the Iraqi army.

Daoud Suleiman, a farmer working among the date palms said: "I saw two helicopters pass overhead when two missiles were fired at them. One missed and the other hit a helicopter at the rear end and flames starting coming out of it before it crashed into a field. I saw the helicopter try to stay in the air after it was hit but then it got close to the ground and I saw some soldiers jump out."

He said the helicopter that was not hit fired a flare to divert the missile. Minutes after the attack, American Black Hawk helicopters swarmed over the scene to rush survivors to hospital while soldiers secured the site, ordering journalists to leave and confiscating film.

Villagers and local farmers showed their delight by waving pieces of the smoking wreckage. The bloodiest single incident for American forces since the beginning of the war, and the worst day of casualties since the official end of the combat phase of the war as declared by President George Bush six months ago, eclipsed efforts by the White House to counter the impression that Iraq is becoming a quagmire for America. "Clearly it is a tragic day," Mr Rumsfeld said.

Yesterday's attack capped an eight-day surge in violence in which 27 American soldiers have died. Fallujah, a market town on the road to Jordan, is in the Sunni Muslim heartland, an area in which there have been more attacks on troops than anywhere else in Iraq. "Fallujah will always be a cemetery for the Americans," reads a slogan on a wall in the main street not far from the mayor's office, part of which was set on fire over the weekend.

In a separate action by guerrillas in Fallujah yesterday, two American civilian contractors died. The remains of their truck, which had been blown up by a rocket or bomb, could be seen near a bridge over the Euphrates. Eye witnesses said that they saw four armed Americans inside being taken away on stretchers. And a soldier was also killed by a roadside bomb in Baghdad. Mr Rumsfeld said: "In a long hard war, we are going to have tragic days. But they are necessary. They are part of a war that is difficult and complicated." He insisted that the US would not be deterred and would win the war in Iraq.

But yesterday's attack presents the American forces with an immediate security crisis. They are heavily dependent on road transport and helicopters. If Strellas start to be used regularly by guerrillas--and American officials have warned that there are plenty unaccounted for--this will force helicopters to fly higher and thus become less effective. American vehicles have already proved vulnerable to roadside bombs, which have accounted for many of the soldiers killed and wounded. A military helicopter was also brought down by an rocket-propelled grenade near Tikrit last week.

Mr Rumsfeld said that he saw no need to raise the number of troops, now at about 130,000, which has come down from 150,000. But the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Richard Lugar, and Senator Joseph Biden, the panel's top Democrat, said the number might have to be increased.

(CNN) -- Families of some of the 15 U.S. soldiers killed in this week's helicopter crash in Iraq expressed their grief Tuesday as well as concern over the U.S. mission in the country.

The soldiers were killed and 27 others wounded when the CH-47 Chinook transport helicopter went down Sunday near Fallujah, a hotbed of U.S. resistance, in a suspected missile strike. Initial reports indicated 16 had died. (Gallery: Chinook fatalities)

The crash fatalities along with the deaths of another soldier and two civilians made Sunday the deadliest day for Americans in Iraq since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1.

"I'm saddened because I know a family hurts, and there's a deep pain in somebody's heart," Bush said Tuesday as he inspected damage from wildfires in Southern California.

"But I do want to remind the loved ones that their sons and daughters, or the sons in this case, died for a cause greater than themselves and a noble cause, which is the security of the United States."

While some family members said the United States must stay the course in Iraq, others cited misgivings about the U.S. presence as casualties mount.

"If we pull out without stabilizing the situation, we'll have pandemonium. It would be a revolution," said Ronald Slavenas, whose son Brian, 30, of Genoa, Illinois, was piloting the chopper.

"We have to keep a stabilizing cap over it and hopefully get more help from other nations and other sources."

Marcus Slavenas, one of Brian's brothers, was more critical: "I don't believe we need to be there. I wish the Iraqis well and I hope they can figure out their problems, but I don't want this to happen at the expense of our boys."

The widow of Staff Sgt. Daniel Bader, 28, of York, Nebraska, said she was crushed that her husband would not see their daughter grow up.

"Now he's not going to know what she's going to look like, what she's going to be or anything because she was just barely 6 months old when he left," Tiffany Bader said.

"I just want the world to know that my husband was a great man. I just want everybody to know that he fought for his country. He was my world. I loved him with all of my heart."

Harriet Johnson lost her son, Spc. Darius T. Jennings, 22, of Cordova, South Carolina.

"He kept saying, 'Mama, I'm ready to come home. You don't see the stuff I see over here,' " Johnson recalled. "What he kept telling me was he was tired, he was ready to come home."

Johnson said she wants to see an end to the U.S. occupation.

"The people over there are telling our American leaders that they don't want us over there and they will continue to kill our American soldiers," she said.

"They're telling our leaders this, so why aren't our leaders listening and bringing our babies home?"

But Johnson said she's proud her son died defending his country. "I want him to be known as Darius the hero because he is my hero. He's 22 years old. He's an Army veteran, but he's a fallen soldier."

The family of Sgt. Steven D. Conover, 21, of Wilmington, Ohio, said he also expressed misgivings before his death, especially after his best friend was killed in a roadside explosion.

Lt. Brian Slavenas, pilot of the Chinook, is recalled by his brother Marcus and father, Ronald.

"He said, 'I put him in a body bag and sent him home to his wife and kids,' " recalled Mike Earley, Conover's stepfather. "He said, 'Mom, I've seen far too much. I want to come home.' "

The helicopter was ferrying troops away for rest and recuperation at the time it went down. That timing -- the sudden swing from excitement to grief -- was agonizing for some families.

"You think he wouldn't leave you trying to come home, and that's the part that hurts so bad -- the way he went," said Rose Wilson, grandmother of Staff Sgt. Joe N. Wilson, 30, of Crystal Springs, Mississippi.

The parents of Pfc. Karina S. Lau, 20, said they felt the same way.

"When you have hope that she was coming home on leave, and this happens, it's a double shock," said Augustin Lau, Karina's father.