Did Iran Kill 600 Americans in Iraq War II?

by | May 8, 2019

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claims that Iran killed 600 Americans during Iraq War II. The syllogism goes, Iran supplied EFP bombs to Sadr’s militia, the Mahdi Army, they then used those bombs on U.S. troops. Ergo “Iran,” meaning the ayatollah and his government, killed those troops.

Is that the case?

No. All through 2007, Gen. Petraeus and friends had insisted that all Shi’ite-placed, copper-core-having, “Explosively Formed Penetrators” were being made and supplied by Iran. They never demonstrated this.

In fact, if you check, you will find that over and over again, Western reporters found machine shops where the EFPs were being made in Iraq by Iraqis.

Here are a few blogs full of links from back then.

And here are a few more articles debunking the spin.

It does look like Lebanese Hezbollah taught them how to make them, but they’re not “Iran,” and they did what? Taught Iraqi Shia how to make them. And again, though obviously it’s possible in part at least, it was never shown that any of these bombs originated in Iran, much less that the Iranian government was behind it all. The U.S. claimed that then, and they claim it now, but they have never proven it.

So you can see how attributing every American death at the hands of a Shi’ite in Iraq War II  to “Iran,” based on the Shi’ites’ use of EFP bombs, is just plain old not accurate.

About Scott Horton

Scott Horton is director of the Libertarian Institute, editorial director of Antiwar.com, host of Antiwar Radio on Pacifica, 90.7 FM KPFK in Los Angeles, California and podcasts the Scott Horton Show from ScottHorton.org. He's the author of the 2021 book Enough Already: Time to End the War on Terrorism, the 2017 book, Fool's Errand:Time to End the War in Afghanistan, editor of the 2019 book The Great Ron Paul: The Scott Horton Show Interviews 2004–2019 and the 2022 book Hotter Than The Sun: Time to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. He’s conducted more than 5,800 interviews since 2003. Scott lives in Austin, Texas with his wife, Larisa Alexandrovna Horton.

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