President Joe Biden will join grieving families at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Friday to honor three American service members killed in an Iranian-backed drone attack in Jordan.
Biden was also meeting privately with the families of the service members ahead of the dignified transfer of the remains.
Dignified transfer is the process by which the remains of fallen military members are moved from an aircraft to an awaiting vehicle on their return to U.S. soil.
It is a solemn ritual that has become relatively uncommon in recent years as the U.S. withdrew from conflicts abroad.
Specialist Breonna Moffett, 23, of Savannah, Georgia has been identified as one of the soldiers killed in the drone strike
Sgt. William Jerome Rivers, 46, of Carrollton, Georgia died in the drone strike of a US airbase in Jordan
Kennedy Ladon Sanders, 24, was among three US soldiers killed in the drone strike
Biden’s only previous dignified transfer as president was in August 2021 when the remains of 13 service members killed during a suicide bombing in Kabul were returned.
On that occasion Biden was slammed by military veterans and Republicans for appearing to look at his watch just seconds after saluting the flag-draped caskets being carried past him.
Biden will not speak during the dignified transfer on Friday.
The deaths were the first U.S. fatalities blamed on Iran-backed militia groups.
Those groups have months been intensifying their attacks on American forces in the region.
The service members killed on Sunday were all from Georgia – Sgt. William Jerome Rivers of Carrollton, Sgt. Kennedy Sanders of Waycross and Sgt. Breonna Moffett of Savannah.
Sanders and Moffett were posthumously promoted to sergeant rank.
President Joe Biden was widely criticized for appearing to look at his watch during a dignified transfer onto American soil of the 13 American troops killed in Thursday’s Kabul suicide bomb attack
In 2021 the president stood with his hand over his heart as remains were carried in a flag-draped casket by service members at the Dover Air Force Base in Dover, Delaware on Sunday
In 2021 tThe US Marine Corps posted a photo to Twitter of the flag flag-draped caskets of their fallen brethren killed in a suicide bomb attack in Kabul
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. CQ Brown, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were joining Biden for the dignified transfer at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.
In a statement earlier this week Biden said: “These service members embodied the very best of our nation.
‘Unwavering in their bravery. Unflinching in their duty. Unbending in their commitment to our country – risking their own safety for the safety of their fellow Americans, and our allies and partners with whom we stand in the fight against terrorism. It is a fight we will not cease.”
Rivers, Sanders and Moffett were in the same company of Army engineers that was based in Fort Moore.
Sanders and Moffett were close friends who regularly popped in on each other’s phone calls with their families back home.
Sanders mother, Oneida Oliver-Sanders, said, ‘I just can’t believe I’ll never be able to hug and kiss my baby again. Life is so unfair. I just want my baby’
Joe Biden was attending his second dignified transfer as president
The U.S. government said this week that the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of Iran-backed militias that includes the group Kataib Hezbollah, had planned, resourced and facilitated the drone attack.
More than 40 troops were also injured in the attack at Tower 22, a secretive U.S. military desert outpost whose location allows U.S. forces to infiltrate and quietly leave Syria.
Biden and White House officials have said warned the response to the deadly assault will not be a “one-off” and could last weeks.
They have also stressed that they don’t want a broader war with Iran.
Biden is under pressure from Republicans to deliver a strong retaliation, and from Democrat allies who warn against escalation.