The six U.S. service members killed in an Iranian drone attack over the weekend were working in a tactical operations center in Kuwait that offered little protection from overhead strikes, according to imagery, experts and officials.
They are the only U.S. troops known to have been died in retaliatory strikes since the operation in Iran began Saturday. At least 10 American military outposts have been hit, along with bases belonging to France and Britain, according to a Washington Post review of satellite images and videos.
The slain troops were part of a logistical support unit working at the Shuaiba port, a civilian port on the Persian Gulf. The attack occurred on Sunday, officials said. By 11 a.m. that morning, thick smoke was spewing from a building in a complex east of the waterfront, satellite imagery shows.
The building that was struck — a prefabricated, triple-wide trailer-style structure — was flanked by tall concrete barriers to protect against ground threats, said Sean O’Connor, a satellite imagery analyst with Janes. But it “possessed limited defenses able to protect it from a ballistic missile or drone strike,” lacking overhead protection to defend against the main threats to U.S. bases in the Middle East, he said.
The Army’s counter-drone manual, updated last year, makes clear that troops and commanders should assess which sites are likely to be attacked and build overhead protection, which often includes steel reinforced roofs and coverings. Protecting important structures like operations centers helps shield from enemy observation and limits “the damaging effects of an aerial attack,” the manual says. Images show that the building struck in the attack was not protected by such structures.
A 2021 photo of the building struck Sunday shows it had what looks like a thin metal rooftop. It is unclear what if any additional layers of materials or reinforcement existed underneath. The building does not appear to have meaningfully changed since at least 2009, and no additional fortifications appear to have been added after President Donald Trump announced in January that he intended to send U.S. forces to the region, according to a Post review of archival imagery and analysts.
The Pentagon did not respond to requests for comment.
The lack of protection observed in the imagery was corroborated by U.S. and defense officials familiar with the incident who said the operations center was essentially a trailer protected by tall concrete barriers. The trailer did not have any hardened protection above it to deflect or minimize the explosive force, the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details about the attack.
The attack is reminiscent of a deadly 2024 strike in Jordan in which an Iranian drone hit trailers used for living quarters that also did not have overhead protection.
CNN and CBS previously reported the lack of overhead protection at the command post.
These details challenge Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s assertion Monday that the facility in Kuwait was outfitted to withstand an attack.
Air defense weapons at the facility took down other incoming threats, Hegseth said during a news briefing at the Pentagon, but they missed one that “happened to hit a tactical operations center that was fortified.”
A spokesman for Hegseth, Sean Parnell, rebuffed other news reports about the operations center’s defenses in a social media post, describing the U.S. position as “fortified with 6-foot walls” and saying that “every possible measure has been taken to safeguard our troops — at every level.”
The Pentagon identified four of the six soldiers on Tuesday, all of whom served in the Army Reserve: Capt. Cody A. Khork, 35, of Winter Haven, Fla.; Sgt. 1st Class Noah L. Tietjens, 42, of Bellevue, Neb.; Sgt. 1st Class Nicole M. Amor, 39, of White Bear Lake, Minn.; and Sgt. Declan J. Coady, 20, of West Des Moines, Iowa.
Since hostilities began, the spate of retaliatory attacks has heightened concerns about the Pentagon’s ability to protect personnel in the region. Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Monday that he expected “additional losses.” The Pentagon has reported numerous critical injuries but declined to say where they occurred. The U.S. has hit more than 1,000 targets in Iran, U.S. officials said Monday.
At least three other U.S. military installations in Kuwait were struck over the weekend.
More than a dozen structures were damaged at Ali Al Salem Air Base west of Kuwait City, satellite imagery taken on Sunday shows. At least four aircraft shelters were damaged on the base, while structures that are likely used to store military equipment were destroyed, according to imagery analyst William Goodhind of Contested Ground, which uses satellite imagery to track armed conflict. Lower-resolution imagery from Monday also showed damage to troops’ living quarters.
An Iranian Shahed-style drone hit Camp Buehring in northern Kuwait on Sunday, according to video circulated on social media. It flew over the U.S. installation, passing over a gym and an athletic field, before nose-diving and hitting the base.
“They’re right here,” a voice in the video says around the time the explosion sent a burst of orange flames and dark gray smoke into the sky.
At Camp Arifjan, a U.S. installation 17 miles from where the troops were killed, communications equipment was destroyed, satellite imagery taken Sunday shows.
Another Shahed-style drone also struck a base where the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet is housed in Manama, Bahrain, on Saturday, video shows. The drone loitered before plunging toward a spherical structure, which appears to be a radome — a common structure on military bases used to protect equipment.
It’s unclear whether anyone was hurt in the blasts at the bases in Kuwait and Bahrain.
“U.S. and allied air defenses in the Gulf have generally been very successful at intercepting incoming Iranian munitions,” said N.R. Jenzen-Jones, director at Armament Research Services, a munitions research and analysis consultancy. “However, the volume and mix of types of munitions used in some attacks, together with varying angles of attack and flight profiles, can make interception more challenging and has meant that some have struck their targets.”
Shahed-style drones are much slower than missiles, giving analysts more time and opportunity to track and intercept them, though their relatively low altitude can make detection challenging.
Irbil International Airport in Iraqi Kurdistan, a commercial airport that also serves U.S. military purposes, was hit Saturday, video and satellite imagery show.
New explosions were captured near the airport the next day, according to video. In a statement, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a network of Iranian-backed Shiite Islamist factions, took responsibility for the attack Sunday. The Post could not immediately confirm who was responsible.
The Jebel Ali port in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, went up in flames on Saturday night, video showed. The port, which the Emirates embassy in D.C. says hosts more U.S. naval vessels than any other port outside the U.S., was still smoldering on Sunday, video shows. Roughly an hour’s drive away, near Abu Dhabi, a group of structures on Al Dhafra Air Base had also been heavily damaged by Sunday, satellite imagery shows.
Satellite imagery taken on March 1 shows communications equipment was hit at Al-Udeid Air Base, the largest U.S. military base in the Middle East. The Qatari Ministry of Defense said the base was hit again Tuesday. No casualties were immediately reported.
Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia was also damaged over the weekend, satellite imagery shows.
U.S.-allied bases have also been hit.
A Shahed-style drone struck a British military installation on Cyprus, in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, just after midnight Monday local time, causing minor damage.
An explosion Sunday at a French naval base at the Zayed port in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, sent debris into the air, video shows. Images taken later show thick smoke rising from the camp.
“Another one, wow,” a voice in the video says after the explosion. The French government said no one was injured in the attack.
Joyce Sohyun Lee, Dan Lamothe, Imogen Piper and Samuel Oakford contributed to this report.
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