{"id":214326,"date":"2026-07-20T04:44:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T04:44:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/214326\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T04:44:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T04:44:10","slug":"us-service-member-killed-during-detonation-of-iranian-munition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/214326\/","title":{"rendered":"US service member killed during detonation of Iranian munition"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article-paragraph skip\">Get Task &amp; Purpose in your inbox<\/p>\n<p>Sign up for Task &amp; Purpose Today to get the latest in military news each morning.<\/p>\n<p class=\"pw-incontent-excluded article-paragraph skip\">A third American service member died on Saturday during a controlled detonation of an Iranian drone\u2019s ordnance, U.S. Central Command <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/CENTCOM\/status\/2078920477779890312\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">announced<\/a> Sunday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph skip\">U.S. troops were carrying out a controlled detonation of the unexploded ordnance on a downed Iranian attack drone in northern Iraq. CENTCOM did not elaborate on what went wrong, but in the process one American was killed while another suffered minor injuries. The military did not identify the deceased, citing policies to withhold the name until family is notified.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph skip\">The fatal incident comes a <a href=\"https:\/\/taskandpurpose.com\/news\/two-troops-killed-iran-jordan\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">day after two U.S. service members were killed<\/a> in an Iranian drone and missile attack on the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, Jordan in Jordan. As of Sunday afternoon, the Department of Defense has not identified the two troops killed on July 17. Iran targeted several bases used by the United States military across the Middle East, including in the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph skip\">A third service member was declared missing in action on Saturday. In its release, CENTCOM said unidentified remains had been located at the base earlier on Sunday and an examination process is underway to identify the body. Four others were\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph skip\">The U.S. death toll from the war with Iran is now at 17, with more than 400 troops injured.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph skip\">U.S. forces are largely concentrated in Iraqi Kurdistan in the country\u2019s north, after <a href=\"https:\/\/taskandpurpose.com\/news\/us-troops-iraq-alasad-air-base\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">leaving bases<\/a> in the Anbar Province and the Baghdad area. Iran fired several drones at U.S. forces in Kurdistan in the first two weeks of the war. A full withdrawal of American troops is expected to be completed by the end of September.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph skip\">This is a developing story.<\/p>\n<p>\t\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1784522650_776_250319-N-ML799-1660K.jpeg\" class=\"max-w-[100%]\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" fetchpriority=\"low\"\/>\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>Task &amp; Purpose Video<\/p>\n<p>Each week on Tuesdays and Fridays our team will bring you analysis of military tech, tactics, and doctrine.<\/p>\n<p>\t\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Nicholas Slayton is a Contributing Editor for Task &amp; Purpose. In addition to covering breaking news, he writes about history, shipwrecks, and the military\u2019s hunt for unidentified anomalous phenomenon (formerly known as UFOs).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Get Task &amp; Purpose in your inbox Sign up for Task &amp; Purpose Today to get the latest&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214327,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[14],"tags":[9911,2656,94],"class_list":["post-214326","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-iraq","tag-adsafety","tag-central-command","tag-iraq"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116950484199593920","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214326","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214326"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214326\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214327"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}