The missile attack is exacerbating tensions in the region at a time when Washington and Tehran are trying to find a way back to the nuclear deal with Iran. A missile attack on U.S.-led forces in northern Iraq killed a civilian contractor and wounded a U.S. soldier on Monday, the U.S. coalition in Iraq said, in the deadliest attack of its kind in nearly a year. After the attack, a Kia vehicle was found between Erbil and Al Kuwayr loaded with several missiles, according to the statement. Iran responded with a ballistic missile attack on the Ain al-Asad airbase, the same one targeted today in which more than 100 U.S. soldiers suffered varying degrees of traumatic brain injury. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. was “outraged” by the attack.
“A U.S. civilian contractor suffered an episode of carding during detention and sadly died shortly thereafter,” Pentagon spokesman John F. Kirby said, sharing no further information about the person`s identity. There are no recent reports of injuries to U.S. soldiers, and all of them are being considered. Kurdish security sources said at least three rockets landed late at night near Erbil International Airport in the autonomous region. U.S. troops occupy a military base next to the civilian airport. “We are outraged by today`s missile attack in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement late Monday. Other missiles hit a U.S. military company operating north of the capital and the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad a few days later, but only injuries were reported.
The missiles landed in and around a military airfield operated by the coalition at Erbil International Airport. A U.S. contractor died Wednesday in missile strikes on an Iraqi military base, the Pentagon said, posing a new challenge to the Biden administration days after launching military action in retaliation for an earlier attack. The wave of violence comes after a relative lull in attacks by Iranian-backed groups and US responses that have previously escalated alarmingly. Last year, a US attack in Baghdad killed powerful Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and Kataib Hezbollah leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis. A rocket attack on an Iraqi military base on Friday killed a U.S. civilian contractor and wounded several U.S. and Iraqi servicemen, according to the U.S. military command in Baghdad.
A missile attack on a base in northern Iraq last March killed three servicemen – a British and two Americans. State Department spokesman Ned Price condemned the attack on Tuesday and raised the possibility of Iranian involvement. Tensions between the United States and Iran have often manifested themselves on Iraqi soil. A US drone strike that killed Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in January 2020 brought the region to the brink of a full-scale confrontation. A U.S. contractor died of heart failure after rocket fire hit an Iraqi base hosting U.S.-led troops on Wednesday, the Pentagon said, two days before Pope Francis` visit to the country. The attack came at an extremely sensitive time for President Biden and the Iraqi government. While similar missile attacks have regularly been claimed or blamed by Iranian-backed militias, Washington is trying to ease tensions that have arisen between Washington and Tehran during President Donald Trump`s years in office. Missile attacks on U.S. diplomatic and military targets have intensified over the past year since Trump ordered the killing of Iran`s most influential military strategist, Major General Qasem Soleimani, and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, who is responsible for maintaining cohesion between the country`s unequal network of militias. The coalition spokesman tweeted Tuesday that the deceased entrepreneur was not an American, but did not give further details. He said three 107mm missiles landed on the base.
Of the other nine wounded, eight were civilian contractors and one was a U.S. military man, a coalition spokesman said. A U.S. official who declined to be named said the U.S. soldier had a concussion. The statement said U.S. forces are still assessing the extent of damage at the base and it is unclear who was responsible for the attack. The attack was claimed by a little-known group called the Blood Guardian Brigade on a messaging platform used by Iranian-backed militias. The large and powerful Iranian-backed Kataib Hezbollah militia, nominally subordinate to the Iraqi government, explicitly denied any involvement in the attack on Erbil and a subsequent missile attack on the U.S. embassy on February 22 that caused no casualties. A Twitter account used by a representative of Kataib Hezbollah praised the “Iraqi resistance” for today`s attack on the Ain al-Asad airbase.
He also cast a negative light on the upcoming papal visit, saying no one should be “overly optimistic.” The Pentagon said in a statement that about 10 missiles landed at the Ain al-Asad airbase in western Anbar province, which is used by the US-led coalition against ISIS as well as Iraqi troops. A missile defense system that is “used to defend our armed forces,” the statement said. The contractor, who has not been identified, sought protection and died shortly after the cardiac episode. Last month, there were three similar missile attacks in Iraq, blamed by the United States on Iranian-backed militants. The violence comes as Iran calls on the United States to resume participation in the 2015 nuclear deal, which provided for sanctions relief in exchange for restrictions on Iran`s nuclear program. Kataeb Hezbollah has been accused by the United States. for a missile attack on the K1 base near Kirkurk in northern Iraq in December 2019 that killed US contractor Nawres Hamid, 33, and sparked a dangerous escalation between Iran and the US last year. Western officials point to Biden`s response to missile attacks on U.S.
soldiers in Iraq last week as a case-by-case scenario. Although the attacks led to the first unilateral military action by Biden`s presidency, the Iranian-backed militants it targeted were across the border in Syria, not Iraq, a move that seemed deliberately calibrated to avoid further escalation. .