A man surveys the destroyed Talha Bin al-Zubair shrine about 20 kilometers (13 miles) outside Basra, Iraq, 550 kilometers (340 miles) southeast of Baghdad, Friday, June 15, 2007. Gunmen armed with rocket-propelled grenades attacked the shrine late Thursday, partially damaging the building and returned early Friday, planting bombs inside the structure to completely destroy the building, police said. [AP]

An Air Force announcement, which referred to the 12:27 a.m. crash of the F-16 as an accident, did not say where it occurred or what happened to the pilot, the single crew member. It said the military was investigating the cause of the crash.

An Ohio National Guard spokesman said the pilot, whom he did not identify, was a member of the 180th Fighter Wing based in Toledo. Spokesman Mark Wayda said about 270 of the unit's 1,000 members were deployed to Iraq last month. The jet was operating under the 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing at Balad Air Base, 50 miles north of Baghdad.

The loss of an F-16 is an uncommon event. One crashed last Nov. 27 in the western province of Anbar, killing the pilot.

Speaking to reporters on the flight to Baghdad, Gates said the military wasn't trying to paint an overly optimistic picture of how the war is going.