Small Wars Journal

Iranian Proxy ‘Likely’ Launched Strike That Killed 2 American Troops In Iraq, Says U.S. General

Thu, 03/12/2020 - 11:54am

Iranian Proxy ‘Likely’ Launched Strike That Killed 2 American Troops In Iraq, Says U.S. General by Joe Gould – Defense News

A rocket attack in Iraq that killed two American troops and one U.K. service member was “most likely” conducted by a Shia militia group, but the U.S. Defense Department is still investigating, according to the top commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East.

In congressional testimony Thursday, Gen. Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie said “the Iranian proxy group known as Kataib Hezbollah is the only group known to have conducted an indirect fire attack on this scale against the U.S. coalition forces in Iraq.”

A day after the attack, in which a dozen people were injured in a volley of 18 rockets that hit Iraq’s Camp Taji base, McKenzie said America’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran ― including the presence of more than 10,000 U.S. troops in the Mideast and stiff economic sanctions ― has “reestablished a rough form of deterrence” without attributable state-on-state violence…

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