Like most people I heard that Hizballah was responsible for the bombing that killed 241 American servicemen. But I decided to look a bit further into the story to learn more about what happened. My research is not nearly complete, but I thought that I would share what I have found to date. I would appreciate further insight in the comment section.
Thank you.
The 1983 Beirut barracks bombing
On October 23, 1983, around 6:20 am, a yellow Mercedes-Benz delivery truck drove to Beirut International Airport, where the 1st Battalion 8th Marines, under the U.S. 2nd Marine Division of the United States Marines, had set up its local headquarters. The truck turned onto an access road leading to the Marines' compound and circled a parking lot. The driver then accelerated and crashed through a barbed wire fence around the parking lot, passed between two sentry posts, crashed through a gate and barreled into the lobby of the Marine headquarters. The Marine sentries at the gate were forbidden from using live ammuntion, for fear that a discharge might kill a civilian, so they were powerless to stop him. According to one Marine survivor, the driver was smiling as he sped past him.
The suicide bomber detonated his explosives, which were equivalent to 12,000 pounds (about 5,400kg) of TNT. The force of the explosion collapsed the four-story cinder-block building into rubble, crushing many inside.
About 20 seconds later, an identical attack occurred against the barracks of the French Third Company of the Sixth French Parachute Infantry Regiment. Another suicide bomber drove his truck down a ramp into the building's underground parking garage and detonated his bomb, leveling the headquarters.
The death toll was 241 American servicemen: 220 Marines, 18 Navy personnel and 3 Army soldiers. Sixty Americans were injured. In the attack on the French barracks, 58 paratroopers were killed and 15 injured. In addition, the elderly Lebanese custodian of the Marines' building was killed in the first blast. [1] The wife and four children of a Lebanese janitor at the French building also were killed.
Who was responsible?
In his September 2001 FRONTLINE interview, Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger said the U.S. still lacks "actual knowledge of who did the bombing" of the Marine barracks. But it suspected Hezbollah, believed to be supported in part by Iran and Syria. Hezbollah denied its involvement.
Iran responsible for 1983 Marine barracks bombing, judge rules
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Iran is responsible for the 1983 suicide bombing of a U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, that killed 241 American servicemen, a U.S. District Court judge ruled Friday.
U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth said the suicide truck bombing was carried out by the group Hezbollah with the approval and funding of Iran's senior government officials.
Lamberth ordered that the plaintiffs in the case -- the servicemen wounded in that bombing and the families of those killed -- have a "right to obtain judicial relief" from Iran. The judge called the October 23, 1983 bombing "the most deadly state-sponsored terrorist attack made against United States citizens before September 11, 2001."
From the subsequent bench trial, Lamberth concluded that Hezbollah was formed under the auspices of the Iranian government, was completely reliant on Iran in 1983 and assisted Iranian Ministry of Information and Security agents in carrying out the operation.
Iran Held Responsible for Bombing U.S. Marines Base in Beirut
The suicide truck bombing was blamed on Hizbullah, the standard-bearer of Iran's Shiite Muslim fundamentalism in Lebanon. The plaintiffs' Attorney Thomas Fortune Fay said evidence showed the Iranian government acted alone, and that its late supreme cleric, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, and other top leaders ordered, authorized and executed the bombing.
"The political purpose of the attack was to remove the United States as a factor from Lebanon," Fay said in his opening statement to U.S. District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth, who is hearing the case without a jury.
Retired Adm. James Lyons, who was deputy chief of naval operations in 1983, testified about an intercepted message from the Iranian ambassador to Syria, who told Iranian officials "to take spectacular action against the U.S. Marines" in Beirut.
Robert Baer, a former CIA agent who spent more than two decades collecting "outstanding intelligence" on the attack, said Iran planned to stamp out the U.S. presence in Lebanon by killing American diplomats and servicemen and kidnapping its civilians. He dismissed any suggestions that Hizbullah had played a role in the attacks.
"The terrorist operations were funded directly by Iran and didn't even go through Hizbullah," he said in video testimony.
