The Pentagon reveals the truth about the deployment of Patriot missiles in Iraq
The Pentagon reveals the truth about the deployment of Patriot missiles in Iraq
04/02/2020 23:38:47
International: The Euphrates News. The Pentagon announced today, Thursday, that work is continuing to establish a missile defense system (Patriot) in Iraq.
A Pentagon spokesman said that “for security reasons, we will not disclose the status of the missile system while it is operating in Iraq.”
“The Iraqi government understands the common need of missile defense to protect the forces in the country,” he added.
Washington and Baghdad have been negotiating the deployment of the air defense system since January, when Tehran targeted ballistic missiles at the Ain al-Assad base in western Iraq, in response to the assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani.
It was not immediately clear if the United States had finally obtained the approval of the Iraqi government.
Reports said that one of the Patriot batteries reached the Ain al-Assad base in Anbar Province, where US soldiers are deployed, last week, and is being installed, according to an American military official and an Iraqi military source.
The US official said that “another battery arrived at the (silk) base in Arbil, the largest city in the Kurdistan region,” adding that “two other batteries are still in Kuwait, waiting to be transferred to Iraq.”
Patriot systems consist of highly sophisticated radars and interceptors that can destroy a ballistic missile while it is flying.
“High-ranking Iraqi officials indicated during a meeting with US Central Command chief Gen. Kenneth Mackenzie last February that Washington could give Baghdad political cover by reducing its number in Iraq with the deployment of defensive missiles,” a military source familiar with the negotiations told France Press.
Ammar Al-Masoudi
alforatnews.com
