1
Views

Three U.S. Servicemembers Killed in Iranian Strikes on Kuwait

Iran
An Iranian drone closes in on a target at Camp Buehring, Kuwait (social media footage)

Published Mar 1, 2026 5:53 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

Three U.S. servicemembers have been killed and five more injured in Iranian retaliatory strikes in Kuwait, according to U.S. Central Command.

Several more servicemembers were injured by shrapnel and concussion, but are expected to return to duty in short order. For now, Central Command is withholding identification of the victims pending family notification. The command noted that combat operations are ongoing and the situation remains fluid. 

The U.S. Navy base at Bahrain has also been hit by waves of Iranian retaliatory strikes, including drone attacks that continued through Sunday night. Multiple bystander videos showed fires burning at the base. Iran has claimed that the naval station was fully "disabled,"; the Navy had already withdrawn many personnel to safer locations, well in advance of hostilities. 

 

 

 

Iran may be limited in its ability to respond in short order. It has lost about half of its launchers for its vast arsenal of ballistic missiles since the first wave of Israeli strikes last June, according to the Israeli military. The pace of destruction of Iran's missile launcher trucks will determine the rate at which the Iranian military can retaliate against U.S. forces in the Mideast, analysts say - and the number of high-value interceptors that the U.S. and Israel have to expend in order to shield critical facilities. Hits on targets around the Gulf and within Israel show that the risk is greatly reduced through the use of Aegis and Patriot missile defense systems - but not eliminated, even with high expenditures and high numbers of assets. 

In a statement Sunday, Germany, France and Britain stated that they could join in action to destroy Iranian missile launch capability for reasons of self-defense. Without endorsement from the rest of the EU or NATO, the three European nations said that they would consider "necessary and proportionate defensive action to destroy Iran’s capability to fire missiles and drones at their source." All three have security interests in the region: first, Europe's economy benefits from freedom of navigation and continued movement of commerce through the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf; and second, some parts of Europe are within range of Iran's furthest-reaching ballistic missiles.