The Pentagon on Sunday identified the Marine who was killed in northern Iraq over the weekend in an attack by Islamic State militants.
Staff Sgt. Louis F. Cardin, 27, of Temecula, Calif., was killed and several other Marines were wounded Saturday at an Iraqi base after it came under rocket attack by the Islamic State, also known as ISIL or ISIS, the Pentagon said.
"A U.S. Marine providing force protection fire support at a recently established coalition fire base near Makhmur in northern Iraq was killed after coming under ISIL rocket fire," Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said Saturday. "Several other Marines were wounded and they are being treated for their varying injuries."
Cardin was assigned to the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit, based at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, the Pentagon said in a statement. He was the second U.S. serviceman to be killed since the start of Operation Inherent Resolve, the military's name for operations targeting the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.
The last American servicemember to be killed in combat in Iraq was Master Sgt. Joshua Wheeler, 39, who died in October.
Wheeler, a Special Forces soldier from Roland, Okla., was killed in a raid that freed 70 Islamic State hostages from a makeshift prison in northern Iraq. He was the first soldier to die in combat in Iraq since 2011 when U.S. forces withdrew after more than eight years of combat there.
Cardin's death "reminds us of the risks our men and women in uniform face everyday," Cook said Saturday. "Our thoughts and prayers are with the servicemembers involved, their families and their coalition teammates who will continue the fight against ISIL with resolve and determination."
