In a statement on June 12, the US military's Central Command (CENTCOM) said that "a helicopter incident" in northeastern Syria had left 22 service members injured, including 10 who were evacuated to higher-level care facilities outside the area.
CENTCOM, which oversees US troops in the Middle East, did not say what the commandos were doing when the incident occurred or what might have caused it, saying only that there were no reports of enemy fire and that an investigation was underway.
“We have nothing to add pending the outcome of the investigation,” CENTCOM spokesman John Moore said in an email on June 13, according to The New York Times .
A US military CH-47 Chinook transport helicopter in Syria in August 2021.
Military.com Screenshot
Meanwhile, three U.S. military officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation, revealed on June 13 that an MH-47 Chinook transport helicopter carrying commandos crashed in clear weather and was not attacked. They said it was unclear whether the aircraft had mechanical problems, pilot error or some other problem.
The 10 most seriously injured soldiers were taken to a US hospital in Germany, but none of their injuries were life-threatening, the officials said, according to The New York Times .
Russian and American soldiers unexpectedly 'shake hands and greet each other' in Syria
More than 900 US troops and hundreds of contractors operate in Syria. The US troops work with Kurdish fighters to prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State (IS), which was defeated in 2019 after five years of rampage across Iraq and Syria.
Source link
Comment (0)