Washington: Iran and its allies have damaged at least 16 US military sites across eight Middle Eastern countries during the US-Israeli war with Iran starting on February 28, rendering some of those positions virtually unusable, a CNN investigation has found.
The damaged facilities constitute the majority of US military sites in the region, according to the CNN report, citing a congressional aide familiar with the damage assessments.
“There has been a spectrum of assessments,” a source said. “From a pretty dramatic side, of the whole facility is destroyed and needs to be shut down, to leaders who say these things are worth repairing due to the strategic benefit they give the US.”
Satellite images showed that Tehran’s main targets included US advanced radar systems, communications systems and aircraft deployed in the Middle East, many of them expensive and difficult to replace, said the report, which drew on dozens of satellite images and interviews with sources in the United States and Gulf Arab nations.
“It’s notable they really identified those facilities as the most cost-effective targets to hit,” the congressional aide said. “Our radar systems (are) our most expensive and our most limited resources in the region.”
Acting Pentagon Comptroller Jules Hurst III told lawmakers on Wednesday that the conflict with Iran had so far cost US taxpayers 25 billion USD.
Repairs to the US Navy Fifth Fleet headquarters could total $200 million alone, one congressional official told The New York Times following a Pentagon assessment.
An external assessment from the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) shows Iranian forces also struck Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait, a runway at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, and a munitions storage facility at a military base in northern Iraq, per NBC.
(IANS)
