On December 22, the U.S. Military Times reported that a U.S. Department of Defense revealed that U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria had suffered at least 102 attacks since mid-October. Of these attacks, 47 in Iraq and 55 in Syria, these were attacks using one-way attack drones, rocket launchers, mortars and short-range ballistic missiles.
On the U.S. side, according to a report by the U.S. Department of Defense and the U.S.**, 66 U.S. soldiers were wounded in the attack, including dozens of head injuries, plus the death of a defense contractor, for a total of 67 people. That's not a small amount.
The status of the US military in the Middle East is not high, and Iraq and Syria have repeatedly asked for the withdrawal of US troops, but the United States has never left. After the clash between Hamas and Israel on October 7, Israel used military force in Gaza, killing a large number of civilians, including the United States, which greatly annoyed the anti-American forces in the Middle East and declared that they would launch attacks on US ** bases in the Middle East.
The U.S. Department of Defense refused to link the attack to U.S. support for Israel's fight against Hamas, believing that Iran was behind the attack, and that Iran supported the attacks on U.S. bases by organizations that would worsen the situation in the Middle East and lead to a wider conflict. Senior U.S. leaders, such as U.S. Joe Biden and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, have warned Iran in several public appearances, asking them to "do something to de-escalate the situation." ”
To this end, the United States also sent the aircraft carrier USS Ford to the eastern Mediterranean, and together with seven warships and more than 4,000 crew members, to Israeli waters. In addition, the United States has added "Patriot" and THAAD to deter attacks by military forces in the Middle East. Burns, the head of the CIA, himself told Iraqi Prime Minister Al-Sudani that if Iraq was indifferent to the attack on Iraq's US bases, it would have very serious consequences.
However, the efforts of the United States did not work, and the troops in the Middle East were attacked again and again. For example, on December 20, a report from Iraqi security forces said that a rocket hit the US Air Force base in Ain al-Assad, in the province of Anbar in western Iraq. In response to Israel's military operations in Gaza, the United States attacked the Assad airport twice on December 15 and December 11. In the Omar region of eastern Syria, the United States was hit by four rockets on December 11, a military base in Omar.
It can be expected that if the United States cannot really stop the Israeli attack on Gaza, then the American team will face more attacks and more personnel. As Iraqi Shiite militant groups noted in a statement issued on November 30, the United States will intensify its strikes against Syrian and Iraqi forces if they continue to inflict large numbers of civilian deaths on Israeli forces in Gaza and southern Lebanon.