What he probably heard was the sound of seven 500-pound bombs hitting a compound near the border. The compound was used by two Iranian-affiliated Iraqi militias, Kata’ib Hezbollah and Kata’ib Sayyid Al-Shuhada, according to the Pentagon.
Before and after satellite images released by Maxar Technologies, a space technology company, vividly show how much destruction those bombs caused.
The “front” image shows a compound just over a third of a kilometer (about 370 meters) from the Iraqi border, with a dozen buildings of various sizes. In the image “after” almost all buildings have been destroyed and the dirt in and around the compound has turned black from the blast.
It is unclear how many militiamen were killed. Kata’ib Hezbollah only acknowledged one death, without specifying where he died on the Iraqi-Syrian border. A US official said “a handful” were killed, while other reports claim that between 17 and 22 people died.
The Pentagon says the attack was intended as a US response to a series of recent missile and mortar attacks against US and coalition positions in Iraq. On February 15, a salvo of missiles fell on the grounds of Erbil International Airport and residential areas of the city, killing a contractor and injuring several US personnel and Iraqi civilians. The green zone in Baghdad, where the US Embassy is located, has been a regular target for mortar and missile fire. Kata’ib Hezbollah has repeatedly denied any involvement in these attacks, and did so again in a statement released Friday.
Pentagon officials told CNN that the compound it was targeting was unrelated to these attacks, but Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said he was “confident” it was being used by the same militias that were targeting missile attacks on the ground. US and coalition forces in Iraq were targeting.
The armed groups allegedly using it, Kata’ib Hezbollah and Kata’ib Sayyid Al-Shuhada, are just two of many militias that came to the fore during the war against ISIS in Syria and Iraq, filling the void left behind by an Iraqi army. that was in full retreat.
I spent a lot of time with some of those militias in 2015 and 2016 as they fought north from Baghdad. Some were well organized and disciplined, others radical and fleeting.
Their commanders were never shy of the support they received from Iran.
“Yes, we declare to the world that we have Iranian advisers,” Hadi Al-Amari, a senior commander of the pro-Iranian Iraqi Badr Brigades told me in 2015 on the front line outside the city of Tikrit, then under ISIS control. “We are proud of them and thank them very much for participating.”
Nearby, I ran into an Iranian in combat gear who told me in broken Arabic that he was a volunteer.
A militia commander told me at the time that “it was better to have four Iranian advisers on the front line than 400 American advisers who were in the Green Zone in Baghdad.”
Since then, Iranian-backed Iraqi militias have become increasingly powerful, while relations between Washington and Tehran have deteriorated dramatically.
Now the US is in a situation where it hopes to make it clear that it will not tolerate more attacks by Iranian-backed militias on its positions in Iraq, but at the same time want to reopen dialogue with Iran. Sending that message without burning the bridges it’s trying to build to Tehran isn’t going to be an easy task.
Friday’s strike was the first known military action by the Biden administration, making it the seventh consecutive US administration to use military force in the Middle East.
Administrations in Washington are coming. Administrations in Washington go. However, some things never change.