Topic: U.S. Troops Kill 10 Insurgents In Iraq, Military Says

Los Angeles Times
November 3, 2007 Three American airmen are killed in a separate incident.
By a Times Staff Writer
BAGHDAD — U.S. forces killed 10 insurgents Friday when a raid targeting an Al Qaeda in Iraq network southeast of the capital turned into a shootout, the military said.
Three U.S. airmen were killed Thursday during combat operations near the American air base at Balad, 50 miles north of Baghdad, the military also announced.
The statement did not disclose how the three were killed.
The airmen were attached to the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, a counter-intelligence and criminal investigations unit. Their deaths brought to 3,848 the number of American military personnel killed in Iraq since U.S.-led forces invaded in March 2003, according to icasualties.org.
The fighting in Salman Pak, about 20 miles southeast of Baghdad, began as ground forces approached a building seeking an alleged foreign militant with ties to senior Al Qaeda in Iraq members operating in the Arab Jabour area.
The troops called for air support in response to small-arms fire, the U.S. statement said. The airstrike caused explosions from arms caches.
Two of the dead wore suicide bomb vests, and more vests were found in the house, the statement said.
Sectarian violence was unusually light around the country Friday. The Interior Ministry reported that the bodies of three unidentified homicide victims were recovered in the capital, fewer than the daily average for October, the lowest this year.