At least a dozen American diplomats and intelligence officers have been rescued from Iraq by the RAF after they were stranded, GB News can disclose.
The US State Department staff, contractors and intelligencers had been transported from the US consulate in Irbil to the airport by bus and told to expect extraction.
But it never came. The team were sitting waiting on the tarmac for hours but there was no plan to move them on, according to sources familiar with the matter.
They said the group approached a nearby British military contingent who volunteered to airlift them to Cyprus in an A400M Atlas military transport plane.
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The RAF plane, which is used for both strategic and tactical airlift, has been conducting routine flights from Cyprus to the Kurdish city in support of operations in the region.
The Americans were taken to the British airbase on Cyprus by the Atlas flight, but the debacle did not end there for the American team of diplomats, contractors and spooks.
Once on the British base, the Americans then learned there was still no plan to recover them.
A security source in the Middle East told GB News that the Americans were “livid” at being “abandoned twice.”
The Americans are understood to have been livid at being 'abandoned twice'
|PA
The British operation to recover the Americans was conducted as US President Donald Trump accused Sir Keir Starmer and the UK of being “very uncooperative”.
In a series of barbs at the Prime Minister, who initially refused requests to let the US use British airbases to strike Iran, Mr Trump referred to Sir Keir as “no Winston Churchill”.
A Whitehall source said: “We will always be there for our close allies and partners and we are happy to help.”
A Ministry of Defence spokesperson said: "We can confirm the RAF conducted a routine flight to Cyprus, which also carried a number of US consulate staff and contractors, at their request.”
A US State Department spokesman said: "The characterisation of the United States abandoning its people is false. There is no higher priority than the safety of our people. The Department of State ordered non-emergency U.S. government employees to leave Iraq due to threats from Iran and Iran-aligned terrorist militias.
"We cannot comment on specific operational details, but as a general matter, U.S. Mission Iraq continues to implement all needed steps to ensure the safety of our diplomatic personnel and facilities. The United States strongly condemns Iran and Iran-backed terrorist militias’ attacks on diplomatic, military, and civilian infrastructure, in Iraq, including in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region.
"The Secretary and Iraqi Prime Minister Sudani reiterated the importance of the Iraqi government taking all possible measures to safeguard U.S. diplomatic personnel and facilities. There must be urgent action to dismantle Iran-aligned terrorist militias, halt their attacks, and ensure they cannot use Iraqi territory to threaten the United States and the region."
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