Iran’s missile strikes force 1,500 US sailors out of Bahrain: Report

Hundreds of US sailors have been forced out of Bahrain after their base came under attack by Iran’s retaliatory missile and drone strikes, a report says.

Bahrain hosts the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet at Naval Support Activity Bahrain (NSA Bahrain) in the capital Manama.

At the time the US and Israel launched their joint military aggression against Iran on February 28, around 8,000 US military personnel were stationed at the base.

Video circulating on social media showed Iranian drones and missiles striking the US naval base multiple times on the first day the country was assaulted by the US and Israel.

The retaliatory attacks forced the US military to evacuate 1,500 sailors and their families back to the US from the NSA base, Washington-based National Public Radio (NPR) cited a Navy spokesman as saying.

In addition to the base in Bahrain, US soldiers have been evacuated from other US military bases in the region, the NPR said.

It said American sailors keep arriving at the US naval base in Norfolk, Virginia, with little more than the clothes they could fit in a backpack.

The sailors, the report said, left cars and furniture behind as they rushed to leave amid Iran’s retaliatory airstrikes.

Struggling to protect US forces from Iran’s drone and missile strikes, the Pentagon has issued a new federal contract notice seeking private contractors to provide “prefabricated, transportable, hardened shelter systems designed to protect personnel from blast and fragmentation threats.”

The Pentagon said at least 13 US military forces have been killed and 365 wounded as of Friday.

Meanwhile, US investigative news site the Intercept reported that US Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees military operations in West Asia, is engaged in “casualty cover-up.”

It said CENTCOM has provided “low-ball and outdated figures” and failed to provide details about its fatalities.

It has also refused to provide a simple count of US bases that Iran’s drones and missiles have attacked.

“We have nothing for you,” a CENTCOM spokesperson told The Intercept.

Over the past five weeks, US bases in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Jordan and Kuwait have come under Iran’s powerful drone and missile strikes.

Iran has called on regional countries to report the whereabouts of US troops. It has also demanded “the expulsion of the US forces from the region for their own security.”

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