Choppers And Snipers

HELICOPTER GUNSHIP ATTACKS, GROUND RAIDS, more casualties — the news from Somalia increasingly resembles reports from a war zone. To enforce a cease- fire between rival warlords, four rocket- and cannon-firing U.S. Cobra choppers teamed up with Belgian paratroopers to rout forces advancing on the southern port of Kismayu; reports had eight Somalis killed and about 40 wounded. On Saturday at dusk, 700 U.S. troops backed by helicopters swept into the crossroads town of Afgoi to flush out bandit gangs that have been ambushing supplies en route to the famine belt. Meanwhile, in Mogadishu, U.S. Marine Lance Corporal Anthony Botello became the third American to die, when he was shot by snipers while leading a night patrol.