Military: Troops Accounted for After Crash

AP-NAIROBI, Kenya - The 10 U.S. troops missing after two Marine Corps transport helicopters crashed into the sea have been accounted for, the military said Saturday, but it did not specify whether they had survived the mishap.

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Bomb kills janitor for US troops in Philippines

By Manny Mogato

MANILA (Reuters) - A janitor for U.S. troops was killed and 13 people wounded in an explosion near an army base on the southern Philippine island of Jolo, but no American soldiers were hurt, the Philippine military said on Saturday.

Some 250 U.S. soldiers are due on Jolo from Monday to conduct two weeks of humanitarian missions as part of a 5,000-strong U.S. force taking part in annual war games with Philippine units.

The dead man was a local resident hired to clean toilets used by U.S. troops, Brigadier-General Alexander Aleo, the army commander on Jolo, told reporters.

Six women, five men and two children were wounded.

The blast came from a makeshift karaoke stall about 10 meters (yards) from the gate of the camp, Aleo said, but U.S. soldiers were spared by not being allowed into town.

"We don't know who was behind the attack," he told reporters. "But there's only one group capable of doing this -- it's the Abu Sayyaf."

Jolo is the stronghold of Abu Sayyaf, a small but deadly Muslim rebel group that is blamed for the worst attack in the country -- the bombing of a ferry in February 2004 that killed more than 100 people.

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Sgt. 1st Class Chad A. Gonsalves
Staff Sgt. Edwin H. Dazachacon
Staff Sgt. Clinton T. Newman
Sgt. Alberto D. Montrond

2/17/06-DoD Identifies Army Casualties

The Department of Defense announced today the death of four soldiers who were supporting Operation Enduring Freedom. They died north of Deh Rawod, Afghanistan, on Feb. 13, when an improvised explosive device detonated near their HMMWV during combat operations.

Killed were:

Sgt. 1st Class Chad A. Gonsalves, 31, of Turlock, Calif. Gonsalves was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group, Fort Bragg, N.C.

Staff Sgt. Edwin H. Dazachacon, 38, of Belleville, Ill. Dazachacon was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group, Fort Bragg, N.C.

Staff Sgt. Clinton T. Newman, 26, of San Antonio, Texas. Newman was assigned to the 321st Civil Affairs Brigade, San Antonio, Texas.

Sgt. Alberto D. Montrond, 27, of Suffolk, Mass. Montrond was assigned to the Group Support Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group, Fort Bragg, N.C.

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Lance Cpl. Matthew R. Barnes Cpl. Rusty L. Washam

2/16/06-DoD Identifies Marine Casualties

The Department of Defense announced today the death of two Marines who were supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Killed were:

Lance Cpl. Matthew R. Barnes, 20, of West Monroe, La.

Cpl. Rusty L. Washam, 21, of Huntsville, Tenn.

Both Marines died Feb. 14, when a suicide car bomber attacked their vehicle near Al Qa’im, Iraq. They were assigned to 3rd Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division; II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C.

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Roadside Bombs Kill U.S. Soldier, 9 Iraqis

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A spate of roadside bombings killed a U.S. soldier and at least nine Iraqis in Baghdad and north of the capital Saturday, officials said. Two Macedonians were kidnapped in southern Iraq, while a search was underway for a private German plane missing in the north.

An Iraqi police major, meanwhile, was assassinated by drive-by gunmen in the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, in the latest attack targeting security forces that the United States hopes will eventually take control of Iraq.

The U.S. military said a roadside bomb struck an American vehicle at about 8 a.m. in eastern Baghdad, killing a soldier assigned to the Multi-National Division-Baghdad.

The death, the first reported by the command since Tuesday, took the number of U.S. personnel killed in Iraq to at least 2,273 since the Iraq war began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

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Donkey o.d.: Sign Byrd's petition for an independent commission to investigate Bush’s illegal wiretaps

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Two Saved, Rescuers Seek 10 More After Helos Crash Off Horn of Africa

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 17, 2006 - Two crewmembers have been rescued and the search continues for 10 others after two U.S. H-53 military helicopters crashed in waters off Djibouti in the Horn of Africa, a Defense Department spokeswoman reported today.

Though some initial reports say both were U.S. Marine Corps helicopters, the spokeswoman could confirm only that they were U.S. helicopters and that they were part of Combined Joint Task Force Horn of Africa.

The helicopters were on a night training mission over the Gulf of Aden when the crash occurred, the spokeswoman said, adding that an investigation will be conducted to determine why the helicopters went down.

The military flies various versions of the Sikorsky H-53.

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Mudslide Buries Philippine Village

My wife has family members in this area of the Philippines (Southern Leyte). They also have had mud slides. We have lost contact with my sister-in-law via cell phone.

By PAUL ALEXANDER, Associated Press Writer

MANILA, Philippines - A rain-soaked mountainside disintegrated into a torrent of mud in the eastern Philippines on Friday, swallowing hundreds of houses and an elementary school in sludge three stories high. At least 23 bodies were recovered, but 1,500 people remained missing.

The farming village of Guinsaugon on Leyte island, 420 miles southeast of Manila, was virtually wiped out, with only a few jumbles of corrugated steel sheeting left to show that the community of some 2,500 people ever existed.

"It sounded like the mountain exploded, and the whole thing crumbled," survivor Dario Libatan told Manila radio DZMM. "I could not see any house standing anymore."

Two other villages also were inundated, and about 3,000 evacuees were at a municipal hall.

"We did not find injured people," said Ricky Estela, a crewman on a helicopter that flew a politician to the scene. "Most of them are dead and beneath the mud."

Map

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Maj. Jack L. Barker
Capt. John F. Dugan
Sgt. William E. Dillender
Pfc. John J. Chubb

2/14/06-Army MIA Soldiers from Vietnam War Identified

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of four U.S. servicemen, missing in action since the Vietnam War, have been identified. They will be returned to their families for burial with full military honors.

They are: Maj. Jack L. Barker of Waycross, Ga.; Capt. John F. Dugan of Roselle, N.J.; Sgt. William E. Dillender of Naples, Fla.; and Pfc. John J. Chubb of Gardena, Calif. All were from the Army’s 101st Airborne Division. Chubb will be buried in Inglewood, Calif., on Feb. 18. Barker, Dugan and Dillender will be buried on April 12 in Arlington National Cemetery near Washington. D.C.

On March 20, 1971, Barker and Dugan were piloting a UH-1H Huey helicopter with Dillender and Chubb on board. The aircraft was participating in a troop extraction mission in the Savannakhet Province of Laos. As the helicopter approached the landing zone, it was hit by heavy enemy ground fire. It exploded in the air and there were no survivors. Continued enemy activity in the area prevented any recovery attempts.

A refugee in Nakhon Phanom, Thailand, showed an identification tag of Pfc. Chubb and a medallion to a U.S. interviewer in 1986. The medallion was reportedly recovered near the same general location from an F-105 crash site. However, the location and the aircraft type did not correlate with the missing aircraft and soldiers.

Between 1988 and 2001, joint U.S.-Lao People’s Democratic Republic teams, led by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), conducted four investigations and three excavations for these soldiers without positive results. An investigation team surveyed three crash sites in 2002 after interviewing local villagers from the province. The team recovered a fragment of human tooth and some crew-related artifacts from one of the crash sites.

In October and November 2004, another joint investigation team excavated the crash site and recovered additional human remains and crew-related evidence. The wreckage was of a UH-1H helicopter, and contained insignia worn by members of the 101st Airborne Division.

The remains included nine fragments of teeth that the forensic anthropologists at JPAC were able to match with detailed information from medical and dental records.

From the Vietnam War, 1,807 Americans are still unaccounted-for with 364 of those from Laos. Another 839 have been accounted-for in Southeast Asia with 208 of those from losses in Laos.

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Lance Cpl. Michael S. Probst

2/15/06-DoD Identifies Marine Casualty

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a Marine who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Lance Cpl. Michael S. Probst, 26, of Irvine, Calif., died Feb. 14 from an improvised explosive device while conducting combat operations near Abu Ghraib, Iraq. He was assigned to 1st Tank Battalion, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Twentynine Palms, Calif. During Operation Iraqi Freedom, his unit was attached to 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward).

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Spc. Felipe J. Garcia Villareal

2/15/06-DoD Identifies Army Casualty

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Spc. Felipe J. Garcia Villareal, 26, of Burke, Va., died at Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 12, of injuries sustained in Ramadi, Iraq on Feb. 9, when his tent caught fire. Garcia Villareal was assigned to the 54th Engineer Battalion, 130th Engineer Brigade, Warner Barracks, Bamberg, Germany.

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Cpl. Andrew J. Kemple

2/15/06-DoD Identifies Army Casualty

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Cpl. Andrew J. Kemple, 23, of Cambridge, Minn., died in Tikrit, Iraq on Feb. 12, when his HMMWV came under small arms fire during combat operations. Kemple was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, Fort Campbell, Ky.

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The Heretik: the Fuddgate Finale

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Petty Officer 3rd Class Nicholas Wilson

2/14/06-DoD Identifies Navy Casualty

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a sailor who was supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Petty Officer 3rd Class Nicholas Wilson, 25, of Newark Valley, N.Y., died Feb. 12 as a result of an improvised explosive device in Al Anbar Province, Iraq. He was assigned to Explosive Ordnance Disposal Mobile Unit Three, based in San Diego, Calif.

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Pfc. Javier Chavez Jr Cpl. Ross A. Smith

2/13/06-DoD Identifies Marine Casualties

The Department of Defense announced today the death of two Marines who were supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Pfc. Javier Chavez Jr., 19, of Cutler, Calif., died Feb. 9 from wounds received as a result of an improvised explosive device while conducting combat operations near Fallujah, Iraq.

Cpl. Ross A. Smith, 21, of Wyoming, Mich., died Feb. 9 from an improvised explosive device while conducting combat operations against enemy forces near Fallujah, Iraq.

Both Marines were assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif. During OIF their unit is attached to 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward).

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Pfc. Matthew L. Bertolino

2/10/06-DoD Identifies Marine Casualty

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a Marine who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.

Pfc. Matthew L. Bertolino, 20, of Hampstead, N.H., died Feb. 9, when the vehicle he was traveling in was involved in a rollover while operating as part of a combat patrol near Jalalabad, Afghanistan. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division, III Marine Expeditionary Force, Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii.

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