An HH-60M Black Hawk helicopter prepares to land July 30, 2023, at al Asad Air Base in Iraq. (hane Hamann/U.S. Army)
WASHINGTON — Five individuals were arrested in connection with a rocket attack on an air base in western Iraq earlier this week that injured four U.S. troops and a defense contractor, the Pentagon confirmed Thursday.
The arrests were announced by the Iraqi Security Media Cell, an official body responsible for disseminating security information.
“We certainly welcome those actions. We have a good partnership with the Iraqi government,” said Sabrina Singh, deputy press secretary for the Pentagon.
The Americans were injured when two rockets struck al Asad Air Base at about 9 p.m. local time Monday. Of those injured, three service members have been transferred to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany for continued treatment. The contractor and one service member have returned to duty.
An initial assessment from the Defense Department said seven Americans were injured. However, two additional individuals who were thought to be injured were screened by medics and immediately cleared to return to duty, Singh told reporters Thursday at the Pentagon.
In the attack, three rockets were launched by an Iranian-backed militia. Two impacted the base, while the third rocket was intercepted. U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, is investigating how the rockets got through defense measures, Singh said.
“We want to make sure that this doesn’t happen again,” she said.
The attack is the latest targeting al Asad in recent weeks. On July 25, two rockets were launched but did not strike the base. Less than two weeks earlier, on July 16, the base came under attack by two drones, one of which struck the base but caused minimal damage. The second drone launched in the same attack was shot down. No injuries were reported following either attack.
Monday’s attack followed an order last week by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to move additional warships and a fighter squadron to the Middle East to bolster defenses in the region. The decision to move U.S. forces came ahead of an anticipated Iranian attack in response to the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran.
Austin ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group to replace the USS Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group, which is now deployed in the Middle East. CENTCOM also announced Thursday that Air Force F-22 Raptors had arrived in the region to help mitigate the possibility of regional escalation by Iran or its proxies.
The fighter jets can be an “invaluable defensive platform,” Singh said. “I think it sends a very clear signal to the region that we want to see tensions deescalate, and it sends a really, I think, powerful message of deterrence.”
U.S. bases in the region have been prone to attacks. After the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas militants on Israel, Iran-linked groups launched some 175 rocket and drone strikes on U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria.
Stars and Stripes reporters Matthew Adams and Alison Bath contributed to this report.
