The Defense General Staff reports that five Italian Special Forces workers were injured today in Iraq following the explosion of a rudimentary bomb, an IED (Improvised Explosive Device).
The team, composed of three incursors of the GOI (Operation Group of the Navy Incursors) and two incursors of the Col Moschin, was carrying out training activities (mentoring and training) in favor of the Iraqi security forces engaged in the fight against the Islamic state, still not entirely annihilated in the region. The most serious of the five is an incursor of the Ninth who has lost a leg.
The Italian raiders were immediately rescued by US Medevac staff, part of the anti-ISIS coalition, and transported to a hospital Role 3 where appropriate care has been given.
Today's attack shows that the self-styled Islamic State is still able to strike, even if the setbacks of recent years have significantly reduced it.
For years now our Special Forces (but also staff of conventional departments) have been engaged in Iraq in training Iraqi soldiers, but also Kurdish peshmergas.
The vast majority of Italian trainers are veterans: from Somalia to Iraq, from Afghanistan to Libya. Basic courses for riflemen, urban combat and explosive traps, for artillerymen and for selected shooters have been trained.
Photo: US Army archive
