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Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/10/25/biden-iran-proxy-attacks-us-troops/
Biden Weighs Striking Iranian Proxies after Attacks on U.S. Troops
(Washington Post) Dan Lamothe - President Biden faces mounting pressure to strike Iranian proxies that have repeatedly attacked and injured U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria this month. Biden said Wednesday that he warned Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, that if Tehran continues to "move against" U.S. forces in the Middle East, "we will respond." Nearly two dozen American troops were hurt within the last eight days after 14 or more aerial assaults on their bases in Iraq and Syria. Retired Gen. Joseph Votel, former head of U.S. Central Command, said the U.S. has "unfortunately" allowed the attacks to become "a little bit of a norm" by not responding to them. With the additional military assets dispatched to the region, "we can and should respond more directly to these threats on our troops." Bradley Bowman, senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and an Afghanistan war veteran, said, "If you have these attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria and we don't respond in some way, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to think that we're going to get more of the same. The goal here is to prevent a smaller problem from becoming larger. We cannot permit cost-free attacks on our troops."