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U.S. service member killed in northern Iraq battle against ISIS

 
Defense Secretary Ash Carter testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington last month. [Associated Press]
Defense Secretary Ash Carter testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington last month. [Associated Press]
Published May 3, 2016

WASHINGTON — A U.S. service member was killed in northern Iraq on Tuesday — the third to die in combat since a U.S.-led coalition began fighting the Islamic State in Iraq in 2014. It was also the third such death in combat since the U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq in 2011.

The death occurred around 9:30 a.m., when enemy forces north of Mosul penetrated the front lines of the Kurdish peshmerga militias, which are fighting alongside the coalition against the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL. The service member, who was conducting "advise and assist" duties in support of the peshmerga, was not identified. He was about 2 miles to 3 miles behind the front lines when he was killed.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter confirmed the death during a meeting in Stuttgart, Germany, and a Pentagon spokesman, Peter Cook, said in a statement: "This sad news is a reminder of the dangers our men and women in uniform face every day in the ongoing fight to destroy ISIL and end the threat the group poses to the United States and the rest of the world. Our coalition will honor this sacrifice by dealing ISIL a lasting defeat."

No identifying details were provided. Cook and the top U.S. military spokesman in the region, Col. Steven H. Warren, said that further details would be released when they were available.

Two other U.S. service members have been killed in the fight against the Islamic State.

The first was Master Sgt. Joshua L. Wheeler, 39, of Sequoyah County, Okla., who in October became the first American in four years to die in combat in Iraq. Wheeler was killed while responding to a helicopter raid by Kurdish commandos, aimed at rescuing about 70 hostages who were about to be killed by Islamic State militants.

The second was Staff Sgt. Louis F. Cardin, 27, of Temecula, Calif., who was killed in March when rockets were launched at a secret fire base of about 100 Marines in northern Iraq. He was leading Marines under his command to a bunker for safety when a rocket exploded near him.