Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Charles Keating was shot and killed when he and other special operations forces went to the rescue of the us forces that got caught in a gun battle involving more than 100 ISIS fighters, Army Col. Steve Warren said Wednesday.
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“These risks will continue … but allowing (ISIS) safe haven would carry greater risk for us all”, he said, as he expressed sorrow over the death of Petty Officer First Class Charles Keating.
The Islamic State launched the attack on Teleskof, about 14 miles north of Mosul, just after 6 a.m., said Lt. Col. Manav Dosky, an Iraqi Kurdish intelligence officer. The death of the 31-year-old Keating was a “tragic reminder” of the dangers faced by USA and coalition troops, and “of course we’ll be re-assessing force protection going forward”, he said.
The death is the third US combat casualty since the USA redeployed forces to Iraq in the summer of 2014 to adviser local forces and conduct special operations against ISIS. He’d also been to Afghanistan once.
Carter added that’s “a kind of circumstance we regret, but you can’t say it’s not a circumstance that cannot be expected in a circumstance where you have a dynamic battlefield, and we are participants in this”. “And a very sad loss”, said Ash Carter, the secretary of defense, from Stuttgart, Germany.
More details are emerging about Phoenix native Charlie Keating IV, who was killed Tuesday while fighting for USA military forces in Iraq.
Up to 60 militants were killed and the Peshmerga later regained control of the town. The helicopters, damaged by gunfire, were still able to get Keating to a US military field hospital in Irbil, Warren said.
“What this enemy likes to do is when they are taking a beatdown they like to distract, stage a high-profile event in order to distract everyone away from the fact they are taking a beatdown elsewhere”, Warren said.
“It was a bad day for us here yesterday”, Warren said.
Charlie Keating IV was famous for his family but made a name for himself as a star distance runner at his Phoenix high school and then as a Navy SEAL.
Keating, who was born and raised in Arizona, was the grandson of the late Arizona financier Charles H. Keating Jr., who was involved in a savings and loan scandal that swept in members of Congress in the late 1980s.
In March, the Pentagon announced the establishment of small U.S. Marine base outside Mosul.
“He had a poster on his wall at 8 years old, and this was what he wanted to do”, said Krista Joseph, Keating’s mother.
As Williams reports, Keating was medevaced off the battlefield by helicopter, but died of his injuries.
Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey ordered all state flags lowered to half-staff Wednesday in honor of Keating.
Keating had been planning to get married in November, according to his former track coach Rob Reniewicki.
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The US has said Iraqi forces must fight for their own country and it can only provide a training and advisory role in the war-torn nation, after it emerged that ISIS had killed a third American soldier.
