Fewer than 50 soldiers were manning the Patriot missile systems defending Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar during Iran’s June 23 attack, and now military leadership is calling them the “unsung heroes of the 21st-century United States Army.”
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine told reporters on June 26 that news of the impending attack filtered in on June 23, less than 48 hours after the United States dropped 14 massive ordnance penetrators, or “bunker buster” bombs, on Iranian nuclear sites during Operation Midnight Hammer.
