Goran Tomasevic/Reuters
An American contractor was killed and 5 U.S. service members have been injured in a drone strike on a facility in northeast Syria on Thursday, the Pentagon stated in an announcement.
U.S. intelligence officers assessed that the unmanned aerial automobile which hit the bottom close to Hasakah was “of Iranian origin.” In response, Secretary of Protection Lloyd Austin licensed U.S. Central Command forces to conduct their very own “precision airstrikes” Thursday evening focusing on services in Syria utilized by teams with hyperlinks to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).
“The airstrikes have been carried out in response to immediately’s assault in addition to a collection of current assaults in opposition to Coalition forces in Syria by teams affiliated with the IRGC,” Austin stated. “As President Biden has made clear, we'll take all vital measures to defend our individuals and can at all times reply at a time and place of our selecting. No group will strike our troops with impunity.”
Two of the injured U.S. service members have been handled on web site whereas one other three required medical evacuation to Coalition medical services in Iraq, the Pentagon stated. The contractor was additionally evacuated. The id of the deceased contractor and people of the injured personnel haven't been launched.
The Pentagon’s assertion stated its airstrikes have been “supposed to guard and defend U.S. personnel” and that its actions have been “proportionate and deliberate.”
In a separate assertion, U.S. Central Command Commander Normal Erik Kurilla stated American forces may perform additional strikes if they're attacked once more. “We're postured for scalable choices within the face of any extra Iranian assaults,” Kurilla stated.
He added that ideas and prayers have been with the American casualties and their households. “Our troops stay in Syria to make sure the defeat of ISIS, which advantages the safety and stability of not solely Syria, however your complete area,” Kurilla stated.
In response to the Syria Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a bunch which paperwork the warfare in Syria, the U.S. strikes left “eight Iranian-backed militiamen useless.”
“The variety of fatalities is predicted to rise, because the strikes left a number of militiamen injured, some significantly, amid unconfirmed stories of extra fatalities,” the SOHR stated, including that the strikes additionally triggered “heavy materials losses.”
Earlier on Thursday, earlier than the strikes, Kurilla informed a Home Armed Companies Committee listening to that Iranian proxy teams had carried out 78 drone and rocket assaults on U.S. forces throughout the Center East since 2021. When requested if such strikes constituted acts of warfare, Kurilla stated: “They're being carried out by the Iranian proxies is what I'd inform you.”
Round 900 American troops are presently deployed in Syria, with a whole bunch of different U.S. contractors additionally working within the area. Though American forces have suffered assaults in Syria earlier than, deadly strikes are unusual.