U.S. Continutes Search for Troops In NE Afghan Mountains

The Chinook appeared to have been hit by a rocket-propelled grenade as it approached its intended landing site, causing it to smash into a mountainside, Lt. Gen. James T. Conway, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Thursday.

Military officials said it was unclear who had fired on the helicopter. In addition to al Qaeda fighters, insurgents linked to the Taliban militia and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a fugitive former Afghan official, are also reportedly operating in the area.

He said the troops on board -- eight members of a Navy SEAL team and eight Army airmen -- appeared to have died in the crash. On Thursday, U.S. forces were finally able to reach the site and recover the bodies, but the ground team was not found in the area.

The bodies of the 16 service members killed were flown from the U.S. airbase in Bagram, north of the capital Kabul, to Dover, Delaware for identification late Friday night, O'Hara said. In keeping with tradition, throngs of U.S. soldiers based at Bagram lined the long, main road running through the base and saluted as the vehicles carrying the slain service members in flag-draped containers rolled by en route to the airstrip.

"Generally when there's a departure ceremony everybody who is not actively involved in a mission comes out to show their respect," O'Hara said. "But this was much more emotional because you have many more that were lost in this incident."

The deaths in Konar came as U.S. and Afghan forces face growing violence from insurgent groups that appear to be numerous, well-equipped and intent on undermining Afghanistan's modicum of stability after two decades of civil strife, foreign military occupation and religious repression.

At the same time, an increase in street crime, gang violence, kidnappings of foreign aid workers, murders of Afghans who support the U.S.-backed government and continued high levels of drug crop cultivation and trafficking have added to a sense of insecurity in the country. Afghan officials have been struggling to rebuild their country since the Taliban militia was ousted by a U.S.-led military campaign at the end of 2001.

International aid organizations have pulled out of large swathes of the country, and in the capital, many foreign workers are largely confined to their compounds and offices. The chill deepened after Clementina Cantoni, 32, an Italian working for the United Nations, was kidnapped in the capital May 16 and held for three weeks before officials negotiated her release.

After successfully holding a presidential election last October, officials have begun preparing for a parliamentary vote in September, but the pre-election atmosphere this time is tense. Ethnic rivalries, the continuing power of regional militia bosses, and widespread corruption have marred election preparations.

Among all of the country's problems, the most serious appears to be the re-emergence of armed guerrillas. In the past three months, there have been dozens of attacks and clashes in several provinces. More than 400 suspected insurgents have been killed, along with several hundred Afghan civilians and soldiers. The U.S. military has suffered 45 deaths, including the 16 killed in the helicopter crash.

Until recently, the guerrillas have mainly clashed with troops in remote, rugged areas near the border with Pakistan, which, according to Afghan officials, they use as a haven. But the insurgents are increasingly targeting Afghan civilians.

On Thursday armed fighters kidnapped and killed a group of tribal elders in central Uruzgan province, then sent a boy to offer to exchange the bodies for those of dead militiamen who had been killed Wednesday while attacking a police station.

In other recent incidents, an Afghan election worker was shot in the face; six anti-drug workers were killed while driving the body of a slain colleague to Kabul; a prominent moderate Islamic cleric was assassinated; and, a suicide bomber killed 20 people at the cleric's funeral. Staff writers Bradley Graham and Pamela Constable in Washington contributed to this report.