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| The five Kataib Hezbollah sites struk by CJTFOIR aircraft around Baghdad |
UPDATED - 14 March 2020: With the Iranian Twelver leadership battling COVID-19 among their ranks, the order was given to their strongest Iraqi PMF proxy force, Kataib Hezbollah, to strike the CJTF-OIR base at Camp Taji north of Baghdad. Camp Taji is a coalition base populated by troops from the many nations in the anti-ISIS coalition and both the Iraqi Army and National Guard which they train.
CJTF-OIR aircraft struck the five targets in the illustration above. Those sites were storing Iranian-suppiled advanced conventional weapons. The strikes caused serious damage and killed several enemy combatants, possibly including an Iranian general. They were executed with the expectation that further Katyusha rocket attacks would not occur anytime soon. That expectation was in error.
This morning Camp Taji is under rocket attack once again with several rockets impacting the base in broad daylight. This attack is breaking news of the past half hour (04:20 AM EDT) so specific details are not yet known. However, Iraqi military sources say there have been casualties among personnel of the "Air Defense Command" at camp Taji.
The CJTF-OIR response should be imminent.
The CJTF-OIR response should be imminent.
Update 28 March 2020: The military response did occur and it was massive. An entire IRGC-QF and Iraqi Shi'a militia base in Albukamal, Dier Ez-Zor Province, Syria was annihilated. Not a single above or below ground structure remains. Dozens of enemy troops were wiped out. The location is now just empty desert.