Military officials question fortifications at site where U.S. troops were killed in Iranian strike

The first American service members to die in the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran were killed in an apparent Iranian drone attack on a makeshift office space in Kuwait, three U.S. military officials with direct knowledge of Iran’s attack told CBS News.

At least six Americans were killed in a strike on a tactical operations center at the Shuaiba port in Kuwait, one of several U.S.-allied countries in the Persian Gulf region that have faced intense Iranian missile and drone attacks since the U.S. and Israel began striking Iran early Saturday. U.S. Central Command has publicly confirmed the deaths.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the deadly strike was caused by a powerful Iranian weapon that made it through both air defenses and the operations center’s fortifications.

“You have air defenses, and a lot’s coming in, and you hit most of it,” Hegseth said during a news conference at the Pentagon. “Every once in a while, you might have one, unfortunately, we call it a squirter, that makes its way through. And in that particular case, it happened to hit a tactical operations center that was fortified, but these are powerful weapons.”

But the three U.S. military officials questioned the assertion that the building was adequately fortified. They told CBS News the operations center was a triple-wide trailer made into an office space — a common setup at U.S. bases abroad.

The trailer’s only fortifications were T-walls, which are 12-foot-tall, steel-reinforced concrete barriers used to protect military personnel from explosions, rocket attacks and shrapnel, the military officials said.

But T-walls could not protect the facility from an overhead strike. Two officials told CBS News that the strike appeared to hit dead-center on top of the building.

Three officials also told CBS News, speaking under condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media outlets, that prior to the attack, there were discussions on the ground about whether the tactical operations center in question should not have been used, as it concentrated too many U.S. troops in a location that wasn’t defendable. 

Preliminary battle damage assessments suggest the operations center in Kuwait was attacked by a one-way drone, according to three U.S. military officials with direct knowledge of Iran’s attack. Iran typically uses Shahed-136 “kamikaze” drones.

Fire engulfed the buildings, which made recovery of the bodies difficult in the immediate aftermath of the strike, the officials told CBS News.

Two of the three sources told CBS News they did not recall hearing the warning sirens that are commonly associated with counter-battery systems designed to detect incoming enemy ordnance that ultimately killed the service members. They also said that the warning siren had worked all week prior to the strike on the tactical operations center, but in prior incidents, some of the drones were already inside the base before the siren would sound. 

Additionally, two sources said there was no American counter-rocket, artillery and mortar system at Shuaiba port that could be used to bring down incoming drones or other deadly munitions. Kuwait had interceptors in the vicinity, but it’s unclear if those were employed.

Requests were made for more capabilities to defeat incoming drones, but those additional resources never came, the two sources said. One source told CBS News: “We basically had no drone defeat capability.”

“I’m sorry for their families’ losses,” one of the sources told CBS News. “They were nice people doing what their nation asked of them.” 

CNN first reported on the six service members killed at Shuaiba port and that they seemingly had no prior warning. CBS News is first to report on the type of ordnance that impacted the operations center, and that some American troops feel the center’s defenses were inadequate and perhaps that the operations center established should not have been used at all. 

Asked for comment, the Pentagon referred CBS News to U.S. Central Command’s prior statements on the deceased service members.

In addition to the six who were killed in Kuwait, at least 18 service members had been seriously wounded as of Monday morning in the combat operation, dubbed Operation Epic Fury, a U.S. Central Command spokesperson told CBS News.

Hegseth called the service members who were killed “the absolute best of America.”

“May we prosecute the remainder of this operation in a manner that honors them,” he said.