Hawks howl for attack on Iran after fatal militia attacks on US troops in Jordan

(Originally published Jan. 29 in “What in the World“) A drone launched by Iran-backed militants killed three U.S. troops at an American outpost in Jordan near the border with Syria.

The attack appears to give Washington the pretext to escalate its operations in the region in response to the more than 150 attacks by Iran-backed militias against U.S. forces stationed in Iraq and Syria.

The latest attacks were the first to kill any American personnel, an eventuality the White House warned last week might force it to broaden its response in the region, perhaps even by attacking Iran. The drone struck a barracks at an outpost known as Tower 22, injuring 34, and was just one of three bases that the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of Iran-backed militias, claims to have attacked. Roughly 350 U.S. Army and Air Force personnel are based at Tower 22.

U.S. President Joe Biden has vowed to respond to the attacks, by which he undoubtedly meant a military reprisal. So far, Washington has “carefully calibrated” its retaliatory air strikes against the militias to be “limited and proportionate.” But the U.S. has begun discussing removing its remaining troops in Iraq. Though the roughly 2,500 U.S. personnel are ostensibly there to mop up remnants of Islamic State, they have since Israel invaded Gaza in late-October been an irresistible target for militants looking for reprisals. Any such withdrawal now seems unlikely given that it might now look like capitulation. Though Tehran has denied any involvement in the attacks, some Republicans are saying Biden would be a coward not to attack Iran.

The mounting attacks in Iraq, Syria and now Jordan don’t include the rising attacks by Iran’s ally Hezbollah against Israel from southern Lebanon. Nor the continuing drone and missile strikes by Iran-backed Houthi rebels against U.S. naval and international commercial vessels steaming through the Red Sea to and from the Suez Canal. In the latest episode, a UK destroyer, the HMS Diamond, used its Sea Viper missile defense system to repel a Houthi drone attack. That followed a Houthi missile strike Saturday that set fire to an oil tanker.