U.S. Strikes Another Iraqi Target

U.S. aircraft bombed an Iraqi military facility Friday in the fourth such strike in a month, American defense officials reported.

The strike was in answer to an Iraqi attack the previous day on aircraft patrolling the southern "no-fly" zone that U.S. and British coalition forces have been maintaining since shortly after the 1991 Gulf War.

"Coalition strikes in the no-fly zone are...a self-defense measure in response to hostile Iraqi acts against coalition forces and their aircraft," said a statement from U.S. Central Command, which oversees the patrols.

Friday's strike was on a radar facility at Al-Amarah, about 165 miles southeast of the capital, Baghdad, said Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Dave Lapan.

"The facilities struck today had been targeted because they were used to direct yesterday's attack against the coalition aircraft monitoring the no-fly zone in southern Iraq," it said.

Top British and American defense officials have said it is a worrying sign that in the past month Iraq's air defenses have been more aggressively trying to shoot down the U.S. and British pilots on patrol.

Pilots have reported attacks by Iraqi anti-aircraft artillery and surface-to-air missiles. As they did Friday, the allied planes have responded by bombing various elements of Iraq's air defense system.

Lapan said Iraq has shot at coalition aircraft about a half dozen times since the beginning of May. And coalition forces have struck back four times since mid-May, he said.

By Pauline Jelinek