Months after the devastating March 1 drone strike at Port Shuaiba in Kuwait, multiple U.S. soldiers have broken their silence to claim that the military medical system failed them when they needed it most. The attack, which occurred on the second day of the war with Iran, claimed the lives of six service members and left dozens more wounded. Per the Associated Press, the soldiers’ stories paint a troubling narrative of soldiers forced to navigate their own recovery while grappling with a bureaucracy.
When the drone struck, the soldiers noted that those who were trained in first aid and equipped with tourniquets had to scramble to save one another. According to accounts provided to AP News, there was no comprehensive plan for a mass casualty event. The testimonies claimed that some soldiers had to use Google on their phones to locate the nearest hospital in Kuwait City. They then had to commandeer civilian passenger vans to transport the wounded, as there was no organized medical evacuation ready to respond.
