WASHINGTON — Protection Division officers mentioned on Thursday that 64 troops had sustained traumatic mind accidents after the Iranian ballistic m
WASHINGTON — Protection Division officers mentioned on Thursday that 64 troops had sustained traumatic mind accidents after the Iranian ballistic missile strikes on Ayn Al Asad Air Base in Iraq this month, up 14 from an earlier announcement this week.
The quantity, which has steadily elevated because the Jan. eight assault, is a transparent indicator of the lasting and unseen results so widespread in America’s lengthy wars, made strikingly prevalent by the roadside bombs scattered in Iraq and Afghanistan that killed and maimed 1000’s of troops.
Earlier than Thursday’s replace, the Pentagon had mentioned 50 service members had traumatic mind accidents. Of these, 31 had been handled in Iraq and returned to obligation. The standing of these with new diagnoses, and whether or not they had returned to obligation or had been nonetheless being handled, remained unclear.
Protection Secretary Mark T. Esper, chatting with reporters throughout a information convention alongside the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Mark A. Milley, mentioned on Thursday that the Pentagon took these varieties of accidents “very critically.”
President Trump had appeared to dismiss the mind accidents at a information convention in Davos, Switzerland, final week. “I heard they’d complications,” Mr. Trump mentioned. “I don’t think about them very severe accidents relative to different accidents I’ve seen.”
Mr. Esper defended the president on Thursday. “He’s very involved concerning the well being and welfare of all of our service members, significantly people who had been concerned in our operations in Iraq,” Mr. Esper mentioned.
Mr. Trump’s sentiments echoed these widespread within the early years of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the place troops rattled by explosions, however visibly unhurt, had been ushered shortly again to obligation, solely to have long-term results from the blasts finally manifest weeks and months afterward.
Traumatic mind accidents in troops are sometimes brought on by the extreme and speedy overpressure that follows a close-by explosion.
Solely within the final a number of years has the Pentagon made a substantial effort to grasp mind accidents and their lasting results, which typically deliver long-term bodily or psychological disabilities.
The Trump administration at first mentioned there have been no accidents from the assault on American troops however recanted per week later, noting that a number of had been evacuated for potential concussions.
Pentagon and navy officers have pushed again on the notion that they withheld any details about the accidents, mentioning that the absence of seen wounds meant the Pentagon was not made conscious till days later. They famous that the signs of concussions and traumatic mind accidents typically take days or even weeks to look.
The ballistic missiles that hit the bottom in Iraq had been launched by Iran in retaliation for the killing of a top Iranian general, Qassim Suleimani, by an American drone strike in Baghdad on Jan. 3.
To take care of the specter of Iranian ballistic missiles, which might journey greater than 100 miles and evade rudimentary defenses, the Pentagon is trying to transfer Patriot air defenses into Iraq.
However whereas each Mr. Esper and Common Milley mentioned they consider the weapons are needed for American defenses, the Iraqi authorities is at present holding up the weapons’ deployment.
“That is without doubt one of the issues we’ve got to work on and work by way of” with the Iraqi authorities, Mr. Esper mentioned on Thursday.
There are roughly 5,000 American troops in Iraq.