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A U.S. contractor was killed and five service members were wounded Thursday.

The Pentagon says there was another attack on a U.S. base in eastern Syria Friday, following a drone attack on Thursday that prompted retaliatory U.S. airstrikes that targeted Iranian-backed militias believed responsible for the attack.

A Pentagon spokesman said Friday's attack did not cause any damage at the base and there were no injuries.

"On the morning of March 24th, at approximately 8:05 am local time, 10 rockets targeted coalition forces at the Green Village in northeast Syria," said Lt. Col. Phil Ventura, a Pentagon spokesman.

"The attack resulted in no injuries to US or coalition personnel and no damage to equipment or facilities," he added.

The new attack, one of about 80 since the start of 2021, comes a day after the U.S. military conducted retaliatory airstrikes in eastern Syria on Thursday against Iranian-backed groups after a one-way explosive drone attack targeting a U.S. base in the region killed a U.S. contractor and injured six others, including five U.S. service members, the Pentagon said.

"Earlier today, a U.S. contractor was killed and five U.S. service members and one additional U.S. contractor were wounded after a one-way unmanned aerial vehicle struck a maintenance facility on a Coalition base near Hasakah in northeast Syria at approximately 1:38 p.m. local time," the Pentagon said in a statement.

Two of the wounded service members were treated on site, while the other four Americans were medically evacuated to coalition medical facilities in Iraq, officials said. A U.S. official confirmed to ABC News that both contractors were American.

U.S. intelligence assessed that the one-way attack drone that struck the base on Thursday was Iranian in origin, according to the statement. Iran has used such drones in the past in attacks on Saudi Arabia and in Yemen, but this drone technology has become more noticeable after it provided hundreds of Shahed drones to Russia that have been used in attacks against Ukrainian civilians and infrastructure targets.

Earlier on Thursday, Gen. Michael "Erik" Kurilla, who as the commander of U.S. Central Command is the top U.S. military commander in the Middle East, told Congress that there have been 78 such attacks since the beginning of 2021.

"At the direction of President [Joe] Biden, I authorized U.S. Central Command forces to conduct precision airstrikes tonight in eastern Syria against facilities used by groups affiliated with Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC)," Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III said in the statement, issued late Thursday.

"The airstrikes were conducted in response today's attack, as well as a series of recent attacks against Coalition forces in Syria by groups affiliated with the IRGC," he added.

A U.S. official told ABC News that the airstrikes were carried out by U.S. Air Force F-15 fighter aircraft as part of a response approved by President Joe Biden earlier on Thursday.

Biden was enroute to Ottawa, Canada, when he approved the airstrikes presented by the Pentagon and the U.S. intelligence community as response options to the drone attack, White House spokesman John Kirby said during an appearance on CNN.

"He made the decision very, very shortly in that discussion to authorize the strikes against these particular targets," Kirby said. "We're going to work to protect our people and our facilities as best we can. It's a dangerous environment."

"We are not seeking a conflict with Iran," said Kirby. "We've been very clear with the Iranians and with our partners about how serious the mission that we're doing in Syria is and how we're going to protect that mission."

"Iran should not be involved in supporting these attacks on our facilities or on our people, we've made that very very clear," said Kirby.

The U.S. has about 900 troops in eastern Syria providing assistance to Syrian Kurdish forces in preventing a resurgence of the Islamic State.

In recent months, some of the bases have been the target of drone attacks that had, in most instances, not led to injuries or physical damage. Iranian-backed groups in Syria are believed to have been responsible for these attacks.

"These precision strikes are intended to protect and defend U.S. personnel. The United States took proportionate and deliberate action intended to limit the risk of escalation and minimize casualties," the Pentagon statement read.

"As President Biden has made clear, we will take all necessary measures to defend our people and will always respond at a time and place of our choosing," Austin said. "No group will strike our troops with impunity."

"Our thoughts are with the family and colleagues of the contractor who was killed and with those who were wounded in the attack earlier today," the defense secretary added.

In a statement, U.S. Central Command leader Gen. Michael "Erik" Kurilla said, in part, that the U.S. "will always take all necessary measures to defend our people and will always respond at a time and place of our choosing. We are postured for scalable options in the face of any additional Iranian attacks."

"Our troops remain in Syria to ensure the enduring defeat of ISIS, which benefits the security and stability of not only Syria, but the entire region," he added.



During Thursday's House Armed Services Committee hearing focused on the Middle East and Africa, Kurilla was asked by Nebraska Rep. Don Bacon about the frequency of Iranian proxy attacks on U.S. forces.

There have been 78 such attacks since the beginning of 2021, according to Kurilla.

"It is periodic. We see periods where they will do more," he said

"So what Iran does to hide its hand is they use Iranian proxies -- that's under UAVs or rockets -- to be able to attack our forces in Iraq or Syria," Kurilla added.

ABC News analyst Mick Mulroy, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East and retired CIA officer, said the U.S. "must strike back at the Iranian forces in Syria responsible for these attacks to such an extent that they know the consequences of killing and injuring Americans will not be worth the costs."

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Why do we have a base in Syria? I thought we were not friendly with them?


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I believe there are factions in Syria we are friendly with and factions we are not. The base in Syria was established in March of 2016. From everything I have found it was established to help fight against ISIS. As of now I think it's more to help protect the Kurds and to help prevent an all out war by conflicting factions.

That's the thing about the decision to take out Saddam Hussein. He was certainly a horrible human being. But he did manage to keep these factions in fear enough to prevent an all out war between divided factions. What wasn't accounted for it seems is the disastrous mess it would leave behind once that obstacle was eliminated.


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Originally Posted by EveDawg
Why do we have a base in Syria? I thought we were not friendly with them?
Because Isis is still operational and Syria is too weak to handle them or US.

Why did Iran attack a US airbase?


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To avoid confusion, I better edit my post.


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Why did Iran attack a US airbase?



Trump sent them.

Last edited by Versatile Dog; 03/24/23 03:59 PM.
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Originally Posted by Versatile Dog
Trump sent them.

He certainly did at the time this base was established in 2016. ISIS had a pretty strong hold in the region. Of course the force that was needed when those conditions existed was much larger. They did a very good job of weakening ISIS under the trump administration. What was once a very strong presence in the region no longer remained so. At this point, under Biden, after trump weakened ISIS to the degree they are now, a much smaller force is needed to keep those conditions consistent. As we all should have learned from the middle east wars, you can cripple a military force but you can't kill an idea or belief system.


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Originally Posted by PitDAWG
Originally Posted by Versatile Dog
Trump sent them.

He certainly did at the time this base was established in 2016. .

Donald Trump did not take office until Jan 20 2017. He had nothing to do with US affairs (as the executive) before that date.

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Originally Posted by FrankZ
Originally Posted by PitDAWG
Originally Posted by Versatile Dog
Trump sent them.

He certainly did at the time this base was established in 2016. .

Donald Trump did not take office until Jan 20 2017. He had nothing to do with US affairs (as the executive) before that date.


Why would trump deploy Iran to attack a U.S. military base? That’s a ridiculously stupid comment.


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Yes, my mistake. I guess I should have credited Obama.


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Originally Posted by PerfectSpiral
Originally Posted by FrankZ
Originally Posted by PitDAWG
Originally Posted by Versatile Dog
Trump sent them.

He certainly did at the time this base was established in 2016. .

Donald Trump did not take office until Jan 20 2017. He had nothing to do with US affairs (as the executive) before that date.


Why would trump deploy Iran to attack a U.S. military base? That’s a ridiculously stupid comment.

I made the comment to mimic all the ridiculously stupid comments or whataboutisms that you and a few others who blame Trump for everything.

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Do you mean like when I was giving trump credit for taking ISIS to its knees? Like that?


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No, more like other threads, such as the Sigh...the Economy thread where you brought up Trump out of nowhere when others were talking about the economy. And then this happened and you followed up w/more Trump posts.


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Originally Posted by Versatile Dog
All I know is the economy has gone to hell since the election and people are arguing about Trump. It's so freaking ignorant that it's funny for a few minutes until reality sets back in.

Yeah calling for violence and being under criminal investigation in several places should never be mentioned.

rofl

We're only allowed to talk about the economy because according to you nothing else matters. Get that crap outta here.

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So it had nothing to do with this thread or its content. I thought you frowned on such conduct? I guess that only applies when other people do it.


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It had to do w/what you guys do on almost every thread in this forum many times a day. Then again, you knew that. You are just deflecting and not owning up for your transgressions. Nothing new there.

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So you are referring to what you claim to be the same transgression you just committed while admonishing others for doing the same thing. Got it.


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Originally Posted by PitDAWG
So it had nothing to do with this thread or its content. I thought you frowned on such conduct? I guess that only applies when other people do it.

Ignore him, he’s just trolling for attention.


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Originally Posted by PitDAWG
Do you mean like when I was giving trump credit for taking ISIS to its knees? Like that?

Didn’t he claim ISIS was wiped from the earth, or something like that?


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Everyone knows he makes bombastic overstatements that are often times false. However to me that doesn't undermine the fact that he helped cripple them. As I said earlier in the thread, you can't kill an idea or belief system. So ISIS and or offshoots of that will not just be going away. Keeping them in check as is being done now is all one can really do.


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