The United States on Friday carried out a series of military strikes against Iranian forces and the militias they support at seven locations in Syria and Iraq, marking a sharp escalation in the Middle East war that the Biden administration has sought to avoid for four months. .
The airstrikes, targeting command and control operations, intelligence centers, weapons facilities and warehouses used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force and affiliated militia groups, made good on President Biden’s promise to respond to the attack with drone attack in Jordan on Sunday that killed three US soldiers and injured at least 40 other service members.
The military action also sought to send a message to Iran and its militias that continued attacks on US troops in the region and merchant ships in the Red Sea would bring a response.
The strikes hit more than 85 targets in different locations using more than 125 precision-guided munitions, according to a statement from US Central Command.
“Last Sunday, three American soldiers were killed in Jordan by a drone launched by militant groups backed by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps,” President Biden said in a statement. “Our response began today.”
Mr. Biden authorized the strikes earlier in the week. He even telegraphed that he was coming when he told reporters on Tuesday that he had made a decision about the response to the drone attack on a remote outpost in Jordan. Analysts in the Middle East said many Revolutionary Guards trainers, fearing they could be hit, returned to Iran this week, while militia leaders are in hiding.
But US officials made it clear that Friday night’s attacks would be followed by more in the coming days, weeks and perhaps months. Two US officials said the United States also conducted cyber operations against Iranian targets on Friday, but declined to elaborate.
The American response, Mr. Biden said in his statement on Friday, “will continue at times and places of our choosing.”
“The United States does not seek conflict in the Middle East or anywhere else in the world,” he said. “But let all those who want to harm us know this: If you harm an American, we will respond.”
US bombers hit targets at four sites in Syria and three sites in Iraq in a 30-minute attack, US officials said. John F. Kirby, a spokesman for the National Security Council, told reporters Friday night that the Iraqi government had been notified before the strikes.
Mr Kirby said the targets at each location were chosen because they were linked to specific attacks against US troops in the area and to avoid civilian casualties. He said he did not know if any Iranians or members of the militia were killed or injured in the attack.
The point of the strikes, Mr Kirby said, was to “remove the ability” of the militias to continue hitting US troops. “This wasn’t just a texting routine tonight.”
By avoiding targets in Iran, the White House and Central Command are trying to send a message of deterrence while controlling escalation. It is clear from statements from the White House and Tehran that neither the United States nor Iran desire a wider war. But as the strike in Jordan showed, with any military action there is the potential for miscalculation.
The Biden administration carried out what officials called a “scaled” response — striking multiple targets from the air. The Pentagon deployed two US B-1B bombers, which took off from Dyess Air Force Base, Texas, early Friday and made the more than 6,000-mile flight to deliver their munitions payload from the skies over Iraq and Syria. .
Sending B1-B bombers from American soil had several advantages, officials said. The B-1Bs can carry dozens of precision munitions, allowing commanders in the region to keep ground-based strike aircraft and aircraft in reserve for follow-on strikes, a US official said. Middle Eastern countries that host US strike aircraft are increasingly reluctant to use their bases for offensive strikes in Iraq, Syria and Yemen to avoid being seen as supporting Israel. Hitting locations in the Middle East with aircraft launched from the United States and refueled in the air is a muscular display of global reach and capability, the official said.
“The beauty of the American bomber is that we can strike anywhere in the world at a time of our choosing,” Lt. Gen. Douglas A. Sims, director of the Army’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Friday night.
Officials said the strike was planned for fair weather. While the military can strike when there is cloud cover, a clear night allows for a higher degree of confidence.
General Sims said that once it was daylight in Iraq and Syria on Saturday, military analysts would take a closer look at the targets that were struck. But he said the Pentagon felt confident the bombers had hit “exactly what they wanted to hit.” The secondary explosions indicated that the Air Force jets had hit the ammunition depots they were targeting, he said.
In a statement later Friday, Iraqi Armed Forces spokesman Major General Yahya Rasool called the US action in Iraq “unacceptable” and a “violation of Iraqi sovereignty.”
With Friday’s strikes, the government entered a new phase in its efforts to manage the widening conflict, which began on October 7 when the Hamas militant group attacked Israel, killing 1,200 people.
Israel’s retaliation has since killed more than 26,000 people, the majority of them women and children, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
Mr. Biden and his top aides have been reluctant to take steps that could drag the United States into a wider war in an already highly volatile region. “It’s not what I’m looking for,” he told reporters on Tuesday.
The leader of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps similarly said Wednesday that Tehran “does not seek war.” And Kata’ib Hezbollah, one of the groups that US officials say may be responsible for the attack, made the surprise announcement on Tuesday that it had suspended military operations in Iraq, where it operates. But the leader of the Revolutionary Guard Corps also warned that Iran was ready to respond if attacked.
With the latest strikes, that possibility is getting closer. Administration officials said Mr. Biden had no choice but to respond after the strike in Jordan that killed the three American soldiers, especially since their deaths came amid a steady stream of attacks by Iran-backed groups such as the Houthis in Yemen and Kataib Hezbollah. in Iraq. And now experts say there is a real fear that Iran could be drawn further into the fray.
Mr. Biden is under pressure from Republicans at home to respond forcefully to the attacks in Jordan. But critics on Capitol Hill said Friday that the president’s warnings of imminent strikes allowed Iranian militia commanders and advisers to flee.
“The Biden administration has spent nearly a week telegraphing US intentions stupidly to our adversaries, giving them time to relocate and hide,” said Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, the top Republican on the Armed Services Committee.
The U.S. strikes on Friday may be just the beginning of a wide-ranging series of attacks designed to damage or destroy the ability of Iran-backed militias to launch missiles, drones and attack U.S. troops in Iraq, Syria and Jordan. Militias have carried out at least 166 such attacks since Oct. 7, according to the Pentagon.
Mr Kirby signaled that strategy when he said on Tuesday it was “very likely” the United States would take “not just one action, but potentially multiple actions, over a period of time”.
B-1B bombers were in the air on Friday when Mr. Biden attended the dignified transfer of the three soldiers killed in Jordan: Sgt. William Jerome Rivers, 46, Specialist Kennedy Ladon Sanders, 24, and Specialist Breonna Alexsondria Moffett, 23. Their remains arrived at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Friday. The Army Reserve said this week it has posthumously promoted Specialists Moffett and Sanders to sergeant and Sergeant Rivers to staff sergeant.
