Delaware: In a solemn ceremony at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, President Biden, accompanied by the First Lady, Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III, and General Charles Q. Brown, honored three Army reservists killed in the Middle East. The ceremony marked the first deaths in a proxy war with Iranian-backed militias since the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel.
The event, known as a “dignified transfer”, was devoid of speeches, with the president and attendees standing solemnly in the cold wind as the flag-draped cases containing the soldiers’ bodies were carried across the tarmac.
Approximately two and a half hours after the ceremony, the Biden administration announced retaliatory airstrikes against Iranian-backed proxies in Iraq and Syria. These strikes aimed to hold those responsible for the attack accountable and deter future assaults without escalating the conflict into a broader war.
During a briefing on Thursday, Defense Secretary Austin emphasized that the retaliatory strike would surpass previous actions in the ongoing four-month conflict in the Middle East. Although U.S. officials hold Iran responsible for the actions of the militias it supports, initial reports indicated that the strikes had not targeted locations within Iran itself.
The three Army reservists were killed by an explosives-laden drone at a remote base in Jordan near the Iraqi border. This attack, the latest in a series since Oct. 7, was the first to result in U.S. fatalities. The soldiers were identified as Sgt. William Jerome Rivers, Specialist Kennedy Ladon Sanders, and Specialist Breonna Alexsondria Moffett.
Before the Dover ceremony, the families of the fallen soldiers met privately with President Biden. Subsequently, they witnessed the transfer cases being carried off a C-5 transport plane by a team of six troops. The president, along with other dignitaries, stood in tribute, each holding their hand over their hearts as the cases passed before them.
