Wounded US Troops Say Military Failed Them After Deadliest Iranian Strike

Inside The Iranian Drone Strike That Killed Six US Troops — And The Warnings That Came Before It

“We Knew We Were Not Safe”: US Troops Break Silence Over Deadly Iranian Drone Strike

American soldiers who survived the deadliest Iranian attack on US forces in the current war have begun publicly accusing the military of failing them — both before the drone struck and during the long, painful months that followed.

Six US soldiers were killed and dozens more wounded when an Iranian drone slammed into an American logistics headquarters at Port Shuaiba in Kuwait on 1 March 2026, just one day after the United States and Israel began the war against Iran.

Seven months later, some of the survivors are making extraordinary allegations.

They say senior officers had been warned that the port was vulnerable to Iranian drones.

They say commanders nevertheless moved troops there.

They say there was no sufficiently developed plan for a mass-casualty event.

And several of the seriously wounded say that after surviving the attack, they were left battling a military medical system that failed to recognise traumatic brain injuries, delayed specialist treatment and, in some cases, forced injured soldiers to navigate their own care.

Nine wounded US service members have now spoken on the record to the Associated Press about their treatment — an unusual step for serving personnel — while a wider AP investigation interviewed 13 soldiers, primarily officers or personnel familiar with senior-level briefings.

The Pentagon maintains that wounded troops arriving at its medical facilities are evaluated and admitted according to clinical need.

The Army, meanwhile, has declined to address many of the individual allegations while families await official briefings on an investigation into the attack.

That investigation was completed in June.

It has still not been publicly released.

What happened at Port Shuaiba is therefore becoming more than the story of one devastating Iranian strike.

It is becoming a story about whether the US military correctly understood the changing nature of warfare, whether commanders accepted risks that their own personnel considered unnecessary — and whether America was medically prepared to deal with the casualties once those risks turned into reality.

The Iranian Drone That Tore Through Port Shuaiba

Port Shuaiba lies south of Kuwait City and has long been important to American military logistics in the Gulf.

On the morning of 1 March, US personnel there were helping coordinate the movement of critical military supplies.

Then an Iranian drone hit.

The weapon penetrated the building housing the tactical operations centre and exploded inside.

The blast killed six American soldiers:

• Sgt. Declan Coady

• Master Sgt. Nicole Amor

• Maj. Cody Khork

• Master Sgt. Noah Tietjens

• Maj. Jeffrey O’Brien

• Chief Warrant Officer 3 Robert Marzan

Dozens more were injured.

Some survivors were thrown through the room by the force of the explosion.

Others were struck by fragments of metal and glass.

Lt. Col. Arturo Lincón was about seven feet from the explosion.

Shrapnel tore into his jaw, damaged his salivary gland and entered the back of his neck, severing an artery before becoming embedded in a vertebra. He also suffered the effects of the blast itself, including a ruptured eardrum and what medical staff later identified as a traumatic brain injury.

Lt. Col. Tim Halbur suffered devastating damage to his arm. AP reported that his forearm was fractured in four places, including the elbow, leaving his dominant arm unlikely ever to regain its former range of movement.

Maj. Stephen Ramsbottom suffered shrapnel injuries and a traumatic brain injury.

For the soldiers inside the building, the consequences were immediate.

But according to several survivors, the chain of decisions leading to that moment had begun much earlier.

Soldiers Say Commanders Had Been Warned

Perhaps the most serious question emerging from the investigation is whether American commanders knowingly placed soldiers at a location that lacked adequate protection from the threat they were most likely to face.

According to AP's investigation, Major Gen. John Hinson and Brig. Gen. Clint Barnes oversaw the logistics structure involved in the deployment.

Port Shuaiba was not a new location.

American planners had previously used it as an alternative location when tensions with Iran increased, including after US strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities in 2025.

But the battlefield had changed.

Iran possessed large numbers of relatively inexpensive one-way attack drones.

And according to soldiers interviewed by AP, the vulnerabilities of Port Shuaiba were repeatedly raised before troops moved there.

Five officers and an enlisted soldier familiar with intelligence and threat assessments told AP that commanders knew the port lacked dedicated defences against drones and was increasingly viewed as a potential Iranian target.

Maj. Billy Key, an operations planner with more than two decades in the Army, told AP that alternative sites farther from Iran had been considered.

Those proposals were rejected.

Approximately 75 soldiers were instead sent to Port Shuaiba to establish a temporary logistics headquarters, while personnel from other units were also operating there.

Some officers argued the logistics work could have been performed elsewhere if secure communications were available.

One soldier, however, defended the commanders' decision-making to AP, saying leadership faced the difficult task of balancing operational requirements against the inherent risks of war.

That distinction matters.

The existence of a dangerous location does not automatically establish negligence.

Military commanders routinely operate in circumstances where no option is completely safe.

But the allegations surrounding Port Shuaiba go further.

Personnel responsible for force protection allegedly told senior leadership in meetings that the port would not be adequately protected against drones.

And the threat was not theoretical.

The Drone Problem The US Could See Coming

America has some of the most sophisticated air-defence systems on Earth.

But intercepting a modern ballistic missile and defending against waves of low-flying, relatively cheap drones are not the same problem.

The major American bases in Kuwait had strengthened their air defences as war approached.

Port Shuaiba did not have the same protection.

The principal US air-defence coverage available nearby came from Patriot systems around Camp Arifjan.

Patriot is extraordinarily capable against higher-end threats.

But using expensive interceptor missiles against large numbers of cheap drones creates both tactical and economic problems — and risks exhausting interceptors needed against ballistic missiles.

AP reported that soldiers familiar with the planning believed senior commanders had concentrated heavily on the missile threat while failing to adequately prepare for drone warfare.

That is particularly significant because drones had already transformed conflicts elsewhere.

Ukraine has demonstrated how small unmanned aircraft can conduct reconnaissance, strike logistics networks and overwhelm traditional defensive assumptions.

Iran and Iranian-aligned groups had also used drones repeatedly across the Middle East.

The United States had already suffered deadly consequences.

In January 2024, three American service members were killed when a drone struck Tower 22 in Jordan.

Yet at Port Shuaiba, soldiers interviewed by AP said there was effectively no system positioned there specifically to intercept the type of low-flying Iranian drone that ultimately struck them.

Warning Signs Appeared Hours Before The Strike

The events immediately preceding the attack are potentially even more consequential.

Maj. Billy Key told AP that at least five quadcopter drones were seen hovering around the port during the night before the strike.

One allegedly came within roughly 40 feet of him.

Key said he reported what he had seen through the chain of command.

Intelligence briefings had reportedly identified quadcopters conducting surveillance as a possible indicator that a larger strike could follow.

Then came the morning of 1 March.

Capt. Cody Khork, who was responsible for safety within the unit and had previously opposed moving personnel to Port Shuaiba, reportedly remained concerned about leaving the bunker.

According to Ramsbottom, there were fears that the radar system being used to determine when it was safe to leave shelter might fail to detect low-flying drones.

Khork was killed later that morning.

Ramsbottom survived.

His description of the situation was stark: soldiers knew the location was dangerous, but did not understand where the drone threat was or how adequately they were protected from it.

The Iranian drone then penetrated the operations centre.

Six Americans died.

Then Came A Second Battle — Getting Medical Treatment

Surviving the explosion should have marked the beginning of an organised military casualty-care system.

Several wounded soldiers say it did not.

According to seven soldiers interviewed by AP, personnel at Port Shuaiba entered the war without a comprehensive plan capable of handling a mass-casualty event.

Immediately after the explosion, soldiers treated one another.

Tourniquets were applied.

First aid was performed.

Then troops reportedly used Google to locate a nearby hospital in Kuwait City and began moving casualties there themselves.

That does not mean injured personnel received no treatment.

Some badly wounded soldiers received emergency surgery in Kuwait.

Lincón, for example, remained in hospital there for approximately a week and underwent surgery to remove shrapnel from his jaw.

But the subsequent movement of wounded personnel through the US military medical system has become one of the most controversial parts of the story.

Seriously Wounded Soldiers Reached Germany — Then Went To Barracks

Some of the injured were eventually evacuated toward Germany, home to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center — one of America's best-known military hospitals and a facility that has treated generations of battlefield casualties.

But the experience described by several Port Shuaiba survivors was nothing like what they expected.

Chief Warrant Officer 4 Rodney Bearman had shrapnel injuries extending from his face down his body.

Some injured soldiers remained in Kuwait for approximately ten days because continuing Iranian missile and drone attacks complicated evacuation.

When they finally departed, AP reported that they travelled aboard a cargo aircraft, with some sitting on the floor secured by straps.

Bearman was reportedly struggling even to eat or lie down.

After arriving in Germany, however, he said the group discovered that they had not been correctly documented as combat casualties.

According to Bearman, a coding error meant they were not admitted to Landstuhl.

Instead, soldiers were sent to barracks and told to obtain outpatient treatment.

Lincón's injuries included damage to a vertebral artery carrying blood toward the brain.

Nevertheless, he was not admitted to Landstuhl and was sent to nearby Army accommodation while arranging appointments.

He later described feeling as though he was effectively managing the situation himself.

The Pentagon presents a different institutional perspective.

A Pentagon official told AP that Landstuhl's battlefield role is heavily focused on stabilising casualties before transferring them to specialised facilities in the United States.

The Pentagon also said wounded troops arriving at military medical facilities are evaluated, with admission decisions made by physicians according to the severity of their injuries and normal healthcare practices.

The disagreement therefore is not simply about whether medical personnel saw the wounded.

It is about whether the system recognised the severity of their injuries quickly enough and whether appropriate specialist treatment followed.

Traumatic Brain Injuries Went Undiagnosed

Brain injuries are central to the survivors' complaints.

Blast exposure can produce injuries that are considerably less visible than bleeding wounds or broken bones.

Symptoms can include dizziness, memory problems, blurred vision, headaches, sensory disturbances and changes in balance.

Some do not become fully apparent immediately.

That makes structured neurological assessment particularly important.

Yet medical records reviewed by AP showed that Ramsbottom and another officer were not diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries until they had returned to Fort Hood in Texas.

Another wounded officer told AP that even after the diagnosis, specialist care did not immediately follow. He had to identify appropriate specialists himself, including a neuro-ophthalmologist to investigate vision problems connected to his TBI.

Ramsbottom said he waited more than four months for the results of an MRI.

Key said he did not receive specialist care until the middle of April for injuries including hearing loss, head trauma and lung damage linked to smoke inhalation.

Dr. James Kelly, a neurologist and chief medical scientist at the Invisible Wounds Foundation, told AP that delays in recognising TBI still occur and can affect how quickly patients receive appropriate treatment.

Months after Port Shuaiba, some survivors continue to experience lasting consequences.

Lincón still has shrapnel embedded near his spinal cord because removing it could create an unacceptable risk of paralysis.

He continues to experience dizziness.

He has returned to active duty and received the Purple Heart.

But his war did not end when he left Kuwait.

Earlier Warnings About Medical Readiness Had Already Emerged

The complaints did not suddenly appear in October.

Months earlier, CBS News reported that soldiers said their Army unit had requested additional medical resources before the Iranian attack.

According to that reporting, troops believed the request was not adequately addressed.

Maj. Stephen Ramsbottom told CBS he considered the outcome a failure and questioned whether Master Sgt. Nicole Amor might have survived had stronger medical resources been available at the post.

CBS reported that soldiers had raised concerns over the absence of resources including a fixed aid station and greater ambulance or medical support.

Those claims have not been established as the Army's official conclusion and questions of whether an individual casualty could have survived with different treatment are inherently difficult to prove.

But they reinforce the broader pattern now being described by multiple survivors.

Washington Post Investigation Raised Similar Questions

The Associated Press investigation is also not occurring in isolation.

In July, The Washington Post reported on allegations from survivors that senior commanders had ignored assessments warning against stationing personnel at Port Shuaiba.

The Post reported that the location did not possess systems capable of dealing adequately with the one-way attack drones posing a threat and said force-protection assessments had warned against positioning personnel there.

Its reporting was based on interviews with 17 people, including survivors, firsthand witnesses and individuals familiar with the military investigation.

With AP, CBS and The Washington Post now independently reporting overlapping concerns from personnel connected to the attack, the unanswered questions are becoming harder to dismiss as the complaints of only one or two dissatisfied soldiers.

That still does not establish precisely where responsibility lies.

But it increases pressure for the Army's own investigation to provide a detailed account.

The Army Investigation Is Finished — But The Public Has Not Seen It

The Army completed an investigation into Port Shuaiba in June.

As of 5 October, the complete report has still not been released publicly.

The Army says sensitive material must be redacted and that the families of those killed should be briefed about the official findings before the service discusses specific claims publicly.

That is a legitimate procedural consideration.

But the delay has frustrated some Gold Star families.

Tina Marzan, the widow of Chief Warrant Officer 3 Robert Marzan, has publicly demanded answers about why her husband and the others were placed at the port and whether mistakes contributed to their deaths.

For those families, this is not an abstract discussion about doctrine.

It is a question of whether six soldiers died solely because Iran successfully penetrated American defences — or whether preventable American decisions also increased the consequences of that attack.

The Army's report will therefore matter enormously.

It could validate some of the survivors' allegations.

It could provide operational context that changes the picture.

It could conclude that commanders made reasonable decisions with the information available to them.

Or it could identify specific failures.

Until the findings are released, none of those conclusions should be assumed.

The Bigger Problem: America Is Fighting A Different Kind Of War

Port Shuaiba exposes a broader strategic problem.

For decades, American military superiority rested partly on possessing extraordinarily expensive, sophisticated systems capable of defeating similarly sophisticated threats.

Drone warfare attacks that model from the opposite direction.

A relatively inexpensive unmanned aircraft can threaten equipment, infrastructure or personnel worth vastly more than the weapon itself.

A defender may technically possess a missile capable of destroying it — but firing enormous numbers of expensive interceptors at cheap drones is not necessarily sustainable.

That changes the economics of warfare.

It changes base defence.

It changes logistics.

And it means facilities once considered relatively safe may no longer be safe at all.

Port Shuaiba was a logistics location, not the type of heavily fortified combat position most people imagine when they picture American forces at war.

That is precisely why the attack matters.

Iran did not need to defeat the entire US military.

It needed one drone to reach one vulnerable building.

Iran's Strike Was A Tactical Success With Strategic Consequences

From Iran's perspective, the strike demonstrated something US planners now have to consider throughout the region.

American forces depend on an enormous network of bases, ports, airfields, warehouses, command posts and logistical infrastructure.

Not every location can be protected by the same density of air defences.

Not every Patriot battery can fire endlessly.

Not every cheap incoming drone can be met with a multi-million-dollar interceptor.

And a modern military still depends on human beings working inside relatively ordinary structures.

The vulnerability is therefore not unique to Kuwait.

American forces elsewhere in the Middle East have faced sustained missile and drone threats throughout the conflict.

By October, AP reported that the wider war had resulted in 19 US personnel killed, more than 800 wounded and at least $44 billion in American military expenditure.

That makes the lessons from Port Shuaiba particularly important.

The question is no longer whether Iran can kill American troops with drones.

It has already demonstrated that it can.

The question is whether US forces can adapt quickly enough to make a repeat far more difficult.

The Medical System Faces Its Own Readiness Test

There is another lesson hidden beneath the debate over drones.

For much of the post-9/11 era, the United States constructed an extraordinary battlefield medical network.

During the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, badly wounded personnel could move through a chain of forward treatment, evacuation aircraft, regional military hospitals and specialist facilities in Europe and the United States.

But America's footprint in the Middle East subsequently contracted.

Large American-run medical facilities closed or were transferred as deployments declined.

AP notes that the Air Force Theater Hospital at Joint Base Balad in Iraq, for example, was handed to the Iraqi government in 2011.

Years of regional drawdowns by successive US administrations reduced permanent American infrastructure in the region.

That made sense in an era when Washington was attempting to reduce America's military involvement in the Middle East.

A major state-on-state war creates completely different requirements.

Casualty systems designed around relatively small numbers of personnel suddenly have to operate during sustained Iranian missile and drone attacks.

Aircraft movement becomes dangerous.

Hospitals may be distant.

Large numbers of casualties may arrive simultaneously.

Port Shuaiba suggests that America's battlefield medical infrastructure may need to expand as rapidly as its combat operations.

What Happens Next

Three questions now dominate the aftermath of the attack.

1. What did commanders know?

Investigators will need to establish exactly what intelligence was available about Port Shuaiba, who received it and how strongly officers recommended alternative locations.

Knowing that somewhere is dangerous is not the same as knowing it will be attacked.

But if commanders were repeatedly advised that the port was particularly vulnerable to drones and possessed inadequate defences, the reasoning for remaining there becomes crucial.

2. Why was the medical response so difficult?

The Pentagon argues that personnel were evaluated according to clinical standards.

Survivors describe a very different experience: coding problems, barracks instead of hospital beds, delayed TBI diagnoses, slow specialist referrals and soldiers having to organise aspects of their own treatment.

Both the immediate casualty response and the subsequent rehabilitation system deserve scrutiny.

3. What will the Army investigation reveal?

This is now the most important unanswered question.

The Army has already completed its investigation.

Gold Star families and wounded troops are waiting for its conclusions.

If those findings broadly corroborate the survivors' allegations, demands for accountability could intensify.

If they provide previously unknown intelligence or operational reasons for the decisions, commanders may have a stronger defence of their actions.

Either way, releasing as much of the investigation as security considerations permit will be essential to resolving competing accounts.

The Men And Women Who Survived Are Still Living With 1 March

For Washington, Port Shuaiba can easily become another date in an increasingly long war.

For the people inside that operations centre, it has never ended.

Some carry shrapnel.

Some have brain injuries.

Some cannot use their limbs as they once could.

Some are still navigating treatment.

And six families will never have their relatives back.

That is why the emerging allegations carry unusual weight.

These are not outside analysts reviewing decisions years later.

Many of the people questioning what happened were inside the building when the Iranian drone struck.

Some had reportedly raised concerns beforehand.

Some treated their wounded colleagues afterwards.

Now they want to know whether the military institution they served could have done more to protect them — and whether it fulfilled its obligation to care for them once they were hurt.

The answer will depend heavily on evidence the Army already possesses but has not yet made public.

Until that investigation is released, it would be premature to declare individual commanders responsible.

But the evidence already in the public domain establishes something significant.

The Port Shuaiba strike was not merely an example of Iran successfully hitting American forces.

It exposed disputes over threat assessment, drone defence, battlefield medicine and military accountability at a moment when the United States is fighting its most sustained conflict with Iran.

And for the wounded soldiers now speaking publicly, surviving the Iranian attack was only the beginning.