An American Air Force pilot has died, after his U-2 spy plane crashed while returning to base from a mission over Afghanistan.

U.S. Central Command said Wednesday the plane was flying back to its base in the United Arab Emirates when the crash occurred at approximately 7 p.m. EDT Tuesday, in "southwest Asia."

The military also disclosed that the plane had been conducting a mission connected with Operation Enduring Freedom -- the anti-terror campaign in Afghanistan.

Other than that, the military has released relatively few details.

Citing "host nation sensitivities," a senior Central Command spokesperson said nothing more could be released.

"The Airmen of the 380th Air Expeditionary Wing mourn the loss of a true American hero in the service of his country," unit wing commander Col. Darryl Burke told reporters.

The wing, stationed at the al-Dhafra air base near Abu Dhabi since 2002, has already initiated an interim investigation board to determine whether the plane was attacked, or crashed due to pilot or mechanical error.

The single-seat U-2, which typically flies at an altitude well beyond the range of most surface-to-air ordnance, has been in U.S. military service for decades.

Due to its design, however, the plane is notoriously difficult to land.

The last time a U-2 spy plane crashed was 2003, when one of the planes put down in South Korea. Although the pilot escaped that crash unharmed, four people on the ground were hurt.

More than 40 years earlier, another U-2 was shot down over then-Soviet territory. The pilot of that plane was captured and held for two years before being traded for a KGB operative in U.S. custody.

Two years later, in October 1962, a U-2 snapped the pictures of a growing Soviet nuclear arsenal that touched off the Cuban missile crisis.

The plane first flew into service in 1955.