Search and recovery efforts are underway for four U.S. soldiers engaged in NATO training exercises who have been missing since Wednesday in a wooded, swampy region of Lithuania.
Lithuania shares a 400-mile border with Belarus, a close ally of Vladimir Putin's Russia. On Thursday, Lithuania announced that it had recovered the soldiers' M88 Hercules armored vehicle in a bog, 16 feet underwater. Efforts to find the soldiers continue.
Early Wednesday, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said the soldiers were dead, which the U.S. immediately denied.
“The search is ongoing,” NATO later said in a statement posted on X. “We regret any confusion about remarks @SecGenNATO delivered on this today. He was referring to emerging news reports & was not confirming the fate of the missing, which is still unknown.”
"The soldiers, from the First Brigade, Third Infantry Division, were training near Pabrade, a city in eastern Lithuania near the border with Belarus," reports the New York Times.
If they found the armored vehicle, where are the soldiers?
“Due to the terrain, this is an incredibly complex engineering effort,” Maj. Robin Bruce, a 1st Armored Division engineer, said in the Army statement. He added, “The team is exploring every available option to speed up this process.”
“The challenges presented by the water, thick mud, and soft ground around the site have complicated recovery efforts and have required specialized equipment to drain water from the side and stabilize the ground,” the Army said in a statement on Thursday.
They had been sent out in an M88 Hercules, essentially a giant armored tow truck, to extract another Army vehicle, the military said. They may have driven off the road and into the swamp, according to a U.S. Army official in Europe. The soldiers appeared to have been trapped inside as the M88 sank, the official said.
The Third Infantry Division, based at Fort Stewart in Georgia, was keeping the families of the soldiers informed on the status of the search, the U.S. military said.
“This tragic situation weighs heavily on all of us, and we’re keeping the families, friends and teammates of our soldiers and recovery team in our thoughts and prayers,” Maj. Gen. Curtis Taylor, the commanding general of First Armored Division, said on Thursday.
Bogs are a nasty business. Most bogs look like solid ground right up to the point you're stuck in them. If you do get stuck, pray that it's not deep and that someone is nearby to pull you and your car out.
The initial search for the soldiers, through thick forests and swampy terrain, involved hundreds of American and Lithuanian soldiers and law enforcement officers, Lithuanian military helicopters and dive teams, the Army said.
“We are incredibly appreciative of the dedicated and professional efforts of our Lithuanian allies in ensuring the safety of U.S. personnel,” General Taylor said. “They have worked tirelessly alongside us over the last 48 hours and we continue to be grateful for their support.”
Between 2006 and 2021, there were 6,000 non-combat-related military deaths from a variety of causes. These incidents include vehicle crashes, heatstroke, and other training-related incidents.
Any death is tragic when the life given is in service to the nation.
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