ABNA24 - Almost 750 US troops have been wounded or killed in West Asia since October 2023, an analysis by The Intercept found. But the Pentagon won’t acknowledge it.
US Central Command, or CENTCOM, which oversees military operations in West Asia, appears to be engaged in what a defense official called a “casualty cover-up”, offering The Intercept low-ball and outdated figures and failing to provide clarifications on military deaths and injuries.At least 15 US troops were wounded Friday in an Iranian attack on a Saudi air base that hosts American troops, according to two government officials who spoke with The Intercept. Hundreds of US personnel have been killed or injured in the region since the US launched a war on Iran just over a month ago.US President Donald Trump said casualties were inevitable. “When you have conflicts like this, you always have death,” he said afterward. CENTCOM has sent outdated statements on casualty numbers, meanwhile, resulting in undercounts, including a statement sent Monday from spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins noting that “Since the start of Operation Epic Fury, approximately 303 US service members have been wounded.”
The comment was three days old and excluded at least 15 wounded in the Friday attack on Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia. The command did not reply to repeated requests for updated figures.CENTCOM also would not provide a count of troops who have died in the region since the start of the war. An Intercept analysis puts the number at no less than 15.“This is, quite obviously, a subject that [War Secretary Pete] Hegseth and the White House want to keep under major wraps,” said the defense official who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to speak frankly.In 2024, during the administration of former President Joe Biden, the Pentagon provided The Intercept with detailed chronologies of attacks on US bases in West Asia that listed the specific outpost that was attacked, the type of strike, and whether — or how many — casualties resulted, along with an aggregate count of attacks by country.The Trump administration’s numbers, by comparison, lack detail and clarity. The current CENTCOM casualty figures do not appear to include more than 200 sailors treated for smoke inhalation or otherwise injured due to a fire that raged aboard the USS Gerald R. Ford before it limped off to Souda Bay, Greece, for repairs. CENTCOM did not reply to close to a dozen requests for clarification on the casualty count and related information sent this week.
“CENTCOM and the White House should be providing accurate and timely information on the costs and casualties involved in this war. After all, it is American taxpayers who are funding it and US economic prosperity and economic wellbeing that is being undermined by it,” Jennifer Kavanagh, the director of military analysis at Defense Priorities, a think tank that advocates for measured US foreign policy, told The Intercept.As the US has relentlessly bombed Iran, that country has responded with attacks on US bases across West Asia using ballistic missiles and drones. CENTCOM refuses to even offer a simple count of US bases that have been attacked during the war. “We have nothing for you,” a spokesperson told The Intercept. An analysis by The Intercept, however, finds that bases in Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and the United Arab Emirates have been targeted. Iranian strikes have forced US troops to retreat from their bases to hotels and office buildings across the region, according to the two government officials. Retired Gen. Joseph Votel, a former head of Central Command, recalled that US troops in the region have faced drone attacks for at least a decade.
Last month, an Iranian drone strike on a hotel in Bahrain wounded two War Department employees, according to a State Department cable reviewed by the Washington Post. CENTCOM did not respond to a request to confirm to The Intercept that those injuries stem from a March 2 attack on the Crowne Plaza hotel, a luxury property in Manama, Bahrain’s capital, but one official indicated this was likely.Votel said that a failure to provide troops with adequate protection may handcuff US operations. “I think this really complicates command and control and could affect unit cohesion and effectiveness,” he told The Intercept, referring to the transfer of troops to hotels and office buildings. “That said, we may not have many options if we cannot protect the military bases where they would normally be bedded down,” he added.
At least 15 US troops in West Asia have died since the beginning of the Iran War, including six personnel who were killed in a drone strike on Port Shuaiba, Kuwait, and a soldier who died due to an attack on March 1, 2026, at Prince Sultan Air Base, Saudi Arabia. More than 520 US personnel have also been injured, including those who suffered smoke inhalation on the Ford.Prior to the current war with Iran, US bases in West Asia were increasingly targeted by a mix of one-way attack drones, rockets, mortars, and close-range ballistic missiles after Israel’s war in Gaza began in October 2023, most of the attacks occurring in the year following the outset of the conflict. At least 175 troops were killed or wounded in those attacks, including three service members who died in a January 2024 strike on Tower 22, a facility in Jordan. Other attacks targeted Al-Asad Air Base, the Baghdad Diplomatic Support Center, Camp Victory, Union III, Erbil Air Base, and Bashur Air Base in Iraq and Al-Tanf garrison, Deir Ezzur Air Base, Mission Support Site Euphrates, Mission Support Site Green Village, Patrol Base Shaddadi, Rumalyn Landing Zone, Tell Baydar, and Tal Tamir in Syria.
The casualty statistics do not include contractors, most of them foreigners who suffered non-combat injuries. Official US statistics show that there were almost 12,900 cases of injuries to contractors in the CENTCOM area of operations during 2024 alone. More than 3,700 were the most serious non-fatal injuries, including traumatic brain injuries, requiring more than seven days away from work. Eighteen contractors were also killed, all of them in Iraq. The numbers are likely significant undercounts, but if even the fractional number of known contractor injuries is added to the tally, the casualty count for Americans and those on US bases may top 13,600.
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