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11 US troops injured in Iran attack on Al-Asad base

US had initially said no casualties had taken place in the January 8 missile attack

By Web Desk
January 17, 2020
US had initially said no casualties had taken place in the January 8 missile attack. Photo: Reuters

WASHINGTON: Eleven US troops were injured in the Iranian missile strike on the Al-Asad air base in Iraq on January 8 launched in retaliation for the killing of a top Iranian general, reported CNN.

"While no US service members were killed in the January 8 Iranian attack on Al Asad Airbase, several were treated for concussion symptoms from the blast and are still being assessed," Captain Bill Urban, spokesman for US Central Command, said in a statement on Thursday.

As a measure of caution, some service members were taken to US facilities in Germany or Kuwait for “follow-on screening,” he added. “When deemed fit for duty, the service members are expected to return to Iraq.”

The spokesperson said 11 of its troops showed symptoms of concussion after an Iranian missile attack on an Iraqi base where US forces were stationed after initially saying no service members were hurt.

“About a week after the attack some service members were still experiencing some symptoms of concussion,” the official said, adding, “We only got wind of this in the last 24 hours.”

As many as 1,500 Americans were deployed at the vast base deep in Iraq’s Anbar desert. The attack was retaliation for a US drone strike in Baghdad on January 3 that killed Qassem Soleimani, the commander of the elite Quds Force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.

President Donald Trump and the US military had said there were no casualties after the strike on the Ain al-Asad airbase in western Iraq and a facility in its northern Kurdish region.

Iranian media had later claimed Tehran had killed 80 American were killed in the missile strike. “An informed source at the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps said over 80 American troops were killed and some 200 wounded in the IRGC’s missile strikes on the US airbase of Ain al-Assad in Anbar province in western Iraq,” Mehr News reported.