A Pentagon official said Thursday that US troops in Iraq and Syria have come under attack at least 102 times since October 17, when the attacks started due to US support for the Israeli onslaught on Gaza.
The Pentagon official told Military Times that the number includes 47 attacks in Iraq and 55 in Syria that involved a “mix of one-way attack drones, rockets, mortars, and close-range ballistic missiles.”
At least 66 US troops have been injured in the attacks so far, including five who have been awarded Purple Hearts. US officials say most of the rockets and drones fired at US bases didn’t reach their intended target.
Most of the attacks have been claimed by the Islamic Resistance of Iraq, an umbrella group of Iraqi Shia militias. The US has launched several rounds of airstrikes in Syria and Iraq in response and specifically targeted Kataib Hezbollah, one of the main Iran-aligned Shia militias in Iraq.
The latest attack that’s been confirmed by the US military took place on Wednesday. US Central Command said a 122mm rocket was fired at the Ain al-Asad airbase in western Iraq, causing no casualties or damage.
In 2020, Iraq’s parliament voted to expel all foreign military forces over the US drone strike in Baghdad that killed Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.
The US refused to leave Iraq and pressured the Iraqi government to allow its forces to stay. In an effort to placate anti-US factions, the US formally changed its presence in Iraq from a combat role to an advisory role in December 2021 to help in the fight against ISIS remnants, but the US did not withdraw any troops at the time, and there are 2,500 in the country today.
In Syria, the US backs the Kurdish-led SDF and has about 900 troops occupying the eastern portion of the country, where most of Syria’s oil resources are located. The occupation is part of the US economic war against Syria, which involves crippling economic sanctions specifically designed to prevent the country’s reconstruction.
The epitome of shamelessness: Occupy other countries to bring them “Freedom and Democracy” and if they fight you, you attack them in “self defense.”
OMG i will kick your door in and then i will call the police because your door somehow managed to put a scratch on my boot. how dare you and your door.
son of bitch
what
double what
wut
Hey, just like Russia…. which you support.
The epitome of shamelessness: Occupy and Annex other countries to bring them “Freedom and Democracy” and if they fight you, you attack them in “self defense” and call them Nazis then take more land from them and blame it on the West.
-Russia-
Exactly. It’s the world the USA has wrought. Russia learned the lessons well. If you have nukes the rest of the world can pound sand while you get to pursue your “national interests.” The only difference between Russia and the USA is the sheer number of innocent civilians killed. Russia seems to have a bit more restraint when it comes to targeting while the USA engages in wholesale slaughter of entire populations.
This doesn’t excuse Russian atrocities, of course, but it does put them in their proper context and illustrates how much weight we should give to Americans who criticize Russia’s behavior without calling out their own government’s far worse atrocities.
Every single U.S. soldier occuoying Syria is a traitor to the Constitution. Refusing illegal orders is the sacred duty of every soldier and protected by law.
Again: Tell us what illegal orders you think those troops should refuse to obey. Be specific.
You should also review the definition of treason in the Constitution. It’s clear that you don’t know what it says and means.
It’ll go up to 200 by mid 2024…!
WTF are yall boys doing there in the first place?
oh right, OIL.
The blowback is gonna hurt us. Then the idiots will start more war.
At least 66 US troops have been injured in the attacks so far, including five who have been awarded Purple Hearts. US officials say most of the rockets and drones fired at US bases didn’t reach their intended target.
Now there is a story to tell your grandchildren. You might have to embellish a bit.
Purple Hearts should not be awarded when US troops are in a country uninvited, and don’t leave when told to. This is where referendum should be held to see if the Iraqis want NATO/US out, and that would be a binding vote in order to prove we are all for ‘DEMOCRACY”
It’s not the troops’ fault that they are there.
It’s absolutely the troops fault that they follow illegal and immoral orders.
We’re discussing, here, US troops in Syria and Iraq. What “illegal and immoral orders” do you think those troops are bound to disobey? Be specific. And be prepared to defend your position in terms other than your personal beliefs about what is or isn’t immoral and what should be illegal.
congressional Declaration of war is required – otherwise illegal
Traitors betraying their oath
Article III, Section 3, Clause 1:
Emphasis added.
It’s difficult to imagine that anything troops in Iraq or Syria might do that would qualify as treason. I suppose it’s remotely possible that some overreaching prosecutor would try to charge on the basis of the “adhering to their Enemies . . .” provision. I don’t know of any Supreme Court cases that establish that a declaration of war is required for that provision to be operative.
“I don’t know of any Supreme Court cases that establish that a declaration of war is required for that provision to be operative.”
There have been precisely two sets of treason prosecutions since World War 2 for actions that weren’t taken DURING World War 2. Neither set went to trial. One was dropped almost immediately after being filed (the Rosenbergs), and in the other case, the accused (an alleged al Qaeda operative was killed rather than captured and brought to trial.
When is the US at “war” in a legal sense? When Congress has so declared.
Right, but . . . The only reference to war in III-3-3 is to levying war against the US. the “adhering to their Enemies” provision doesn’t mention a state of war or absence of same. I agree that it’s unlikely that it could be used in a successful prosecution in an undeclared war, but I don’t think we can be confident of that.
If there is no war, there is no “enemy.”
I agree we can’t be confident that it won’t be reinterpreted to mean whatever’s convenient. It’s always been the case that, constitutionally speaking, the state will try to have its cake and have it too. But the people who wrote it in the first place clearly intended it as applying to war, and also clearly intended for wars to be declared rather than waged less formally.
Yup. The Framers would have been horrified at the thought of an imperial presidency, mired in foreign entanglements and waging wars of choice all over the planet.
Levying war – illegally
Levying war illegally is not a crime with which individual troops could credibly be charged.
l’m afraid that you’re confusing the reality of international law with international as you imagine or want it to be.
Might want to re-read USFM 27-10 closely
I’ll certainly re-read any portion(s) that you claim are relevant to my post just above, although I don’t any are.
You should stop. You’re not going to convince anyone who actually has a solid basic understanding of this subject. And blaming troops for anything other than their individual behavior, if you do so publicly, will make you a very unpopular person anywhere outside relatively-tiny cliques that are generally despised.
So your argument is those US military illegally occupying Syria aren’t traitors just war criminals ?
It’s becoming increasingly obvious that treason and war crimes, and which humans and/or entities may be guilty of those things depending upon a range of specific possibilities, are things you just don’t understand at all. I’m finished with this exchange.
Illegal invasion and occupation of a country ( Eastern Syria in this case ) is a war crime.
Maybe you are correct – those soldiers ( volunteers all) are not traitors rather simple war criminals
So Russia should not award medals to their soldiers in Ukraine because they were not invited there?
Actually they were invited by the People of the Donbass who parted ways with the illegitimate Nazi led regime of occupied Kiev.
Better do your homework!
And people of Ukraine told Russia to leave. Well at least 100,000 Russians did leave inside a plastic bag.
And people of Ukraine told Russia to leave.
That’s what’s known as ethnic cleansing… A very Nazi thing to do.
The Ukraine people aren’t Nazis but their usurper government in Kiev is.
“Purple Hearts should not be awarded when US troops are in a country uninvited” You have to be nuts. You want to punish the troops for what the government told them to do? I never heard of an invite to US to go to Vietnam. Do you want to tear the Vietnam memorial wall down?
Hell yes, tear it down. Why should there be a memorial for one big war crime?
Of course we were invited into Vietnam by the government of South Vietnam. Go back to your history book. The “punishment” of the troops occurred by sending them into god-forsaken places that were no threat to the freedoms and security of the US. You can support them, by creating less of them getting killed/wounded for absolutely nothing except the profits by the mongers.
There is no reason in hell for any US troops to be on any foreign soil. This includes my Europe, Africa or the Mideast
Maybe we should bring troops home, then they won’t be attacked? Let’s start worrying less about empire and more about the home front.