Wednesday July 25 8:13 PM ET

Official: Iraqi Missile Nearly Hits Spy Plane

By Charles Aldinger

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Iraqi military came close to hitting a high-altitude U.S. U-2 spy plane with a missile this week, a senior U.S. defense official said on Wednesday.

The official said the modified Russian-made anti-aircraft missile just missed the plane in a ``no-fly zone'' over southern Iraq on Tuesday.

``It was close to the aircraft,'' the official said, confirming a CBS News report that the Iraqis had improved their ability to strike at the unarmed surveillance aircraft, which take photographs and obtain other intelligence from an altitude of more than 70,000 feet.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has recently warned that U.S. and British pilots patrolling no-fly zones over northern and southern Iraq were in increasing danger from Iraq's defenses.

``We have known that they have had this capability for a long time and we were waiting for when they would try it,'' the defense official, who asked not to be identified, told Reuters.

The defense official said that the unarmed U-2 was almost hit by the missile despite the fact that the U.S. military believed it was ``unguided'' -- fired without the benefit of targeting radars on the ground.

The attempt was first reported in a CBS News report. The U-S pilot suddenly saw an anti-aircraft missile streaking toward him and then it exploded behind and below him, CBS said.

The explosion was close enough that the pilot felt the shock, although not close enough that it did any damage to the U-2, the report said.

``There is some level of concern here, but as we have said before, we reserve the right to strike back at a time and place of our choosing,'' the defense official told Reuters.

U.S. and British warplanes have been patrolling the zones over Iraq for nearly a decade since the 1991 Gulf War (news - web sites). Iraq was banned from using all aircraft, including helicopters, in the air exclusion zones. The zones were set up by Western powers to protect minority Kurds and Shiites in Iraq from attack by Saddam's military.

No allied aircraft have been lost, although the Iraqi military has repeatedly fired anti-aircraft guns and missiles at the warplanes, which have responded by dropping bombs and firing missiles at Iraqi air defense sites.

The Bush Administration is still formulating a policy on Iraq and has been reviewing the no-fly zones and working on revising sanctions against Baghdad.

-- Anonymous, July 26, 2001