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The US has launched air strikes in Iraq targeting the Iranian-backed Shia militia members believed responsible for the rocket attack that killed and wounded American and British troops at a base north of Baghdad, US officials say.
Key points:
- Two US troops and 1 British service member were killed in rocket attack on Iraq base
- No-one has claimed responsibility for the attack and Iran has not commented
- US strikes targeted five Kataib Hezbollah weapons storage facilities in Iraq
The Pentagon said "defensive precision strikes" targeted five Kataib Hezbollah weapons storage facilities in Iraq, following Wednesday's deadly rocket attack that killed two American and one British service member.
"These weapons storage facilities include facilities that housed weapons used to target US and coalition troops," a Pentagon statement said.
The strikes were "defensive, proportional and in direct response to the threat posed by Iranian-backed Shia militia groups," the statement added.
An official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because operations were still ongoing, said the air strikes were a partnered operation with British forces.
The strikes marked a rapid escalation in tensions with Tehran and its proxy groups in Iraq, just two months after Iran carried out a massive ballistic missile attack against American troops at a base in Iraq.
They came just hours after President Donald Trump authorised a military response to Wednesday's attack in which two American troops and a British service member were killed.
Defence Secretary Mark Esper and Army General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned just prior to the attack that all options were on the table.
"I have spoken with the president. He's given me the authority to do what we need to do, consistent with his guidance," Mr Esper told reporters at the Pentagon.
Asked if a US response could include strikes inside Iran, Mr Esper hinted that strikes against the militia itself were the priority.
"I'm not going to take any option off the table right now, but we are focused on the group — groups — that we believe perpetrated this in Iraq, as the immediate [focus]," he said.
No-one has claimed responsibility for the attack and Iran has not commented.
'We gotta hold the perpetrators accountable'
The US has repeatedly and publicly warned that killing Americans overseas constituted a red line that would trigger a US response.
"We gotta hold the perpetrators accountable," Mr Esper said.
"You don't get to shoot at our bases and kill and wound Americans and get away with it."
Washington blamed Kataib Hezbollah for a strike in Iraq in December that killed a US contractor, leading to a cycle of tit-for-tat confrontations that culminated in January's US killing of top Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and a retaliatory Iranian missile attack that left more than 100 US troops with brain injuries.
In the latest attack, about 14 US-led coalition personnel were wounded. Private industry contractors were also among the wounded.
Mr Milley said five of the wounded were categorised as "urgent," suggesting serious injuries that could require rapid medical evacuation.
Britain named its fallen service member as Lance Corporal Brodie Gillon, a 26-year-old with the Irish Guards Battle Group.
The United States has not yet identified the US service members killed.
'Pretty good confidence we know who did this'
US Marine General Kenneth McKenzie, head of the military's Central Command, said only Iran-backed Kataib Hezbollah had been known to wage such an attack in the past.
"While we are still investigating the attack, I will note that the Iranian proxy group Kataib Hezbollah is the only group known to have previously conducted an indirect fire attack of this scale against US and coalition forces in Iraq," Mr McKenzie told a US Senate hearing.
The US-led military coalition in Iraq said 18 Katyusha rockets struck Iraq's Taji military camp.
A US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a total of 30 of the rockets were fired from a nearby truck and that only 18 of them landed at the Iraqi base.
Mr Milley said the truck yielded evidence about those responsible.
"We have good indication based on forensics of where [the attack] was fired from, who did the firing and so on and so forth," Mr Milley said, adding that "we have pretty good confidence we know who did this".
In a sign of concern that tensions between the United States and Iran could be headed toward open conflict, the Democratic-led US House of Representatives passed legislation on Wednesday to limit Mr Trump's ability to wage war against Iran.
The Republican president has been engaged in a maximum-pressure campaign of renewed sanctions and near-constant rhetoric against Iran, after pulling the US out of the international nuclear deal reached during the administration of his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama.
Tensions between Washington and Tehran have mostly played out on Iraqi soil in recent months.
Iran-backed paramilitary groups have regularly been shelling bases in Iraq that host US forces and the area around the US Embassy in Baghdad.
ABC/Wires
Topics: unrest-conflict-and-war, world-politics, government-and-politics, iraq, united-states, iran-islamic-republic-of