A U.S. contractor was killed and 5 U.S. service members and one U.S. contractor had been wounded Thursday when a suicide drone hit a Coalition base close to Hasakah in northeast Syria simply earlier than 2 p.m. native time, the Pentagon mentioned in an announcement.
The intelligence neighborhood believes the drone to have been of Iranian origin, based on the assertion. The U.S. retaliated with air strikes on Iranian-linked targets within the space.
Protection Secretary Lloyd Austin mentioned, “On the route of President Biden, I licensed U.S. Central Command forces to conduct precision airstrikes tonight in jap Syria towards services utilized by teams affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).”
“The airstrikes had been performed in response to at this time’s assault in addition to a sequence of latest assaults towards Coalition forces in Syria by teams affiliated with the IRGC.”
“Our ideas are with the household and colleagues of the contractor who was killed and with those that had been wounded within the assault earlier at this time,” mentioned Austin.
Two wounded service members had been handled on website, whereas three others and the wounded U.S. contractor had been evacuated to medical services in Iraq.
Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurilla, commander of U.S. Central Command, mentioned in testimony to Congress Thursday that there have been 78 assaults towards services housing U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria since January 2021. The assaults, primarily by drones and rockets, are believed to have carried out by Iran or Iranian-backed proxies.
