- NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said Wednesday that four U.S. service members died during training exercises in Lithuania. A vehicle belonging to the four soldiers was found submerged in water –– a search for their bodies is ongoing.
- Rutte first announced the deaths while on a trip to Warsaw, saying he did not yet know all the details. He also sent his condolences to the families of the deceased soldiers.
- The soldiers were reportedly training roughly 6 miles from the Lithuanian border with Belarus.
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Four American Army soldiers are dead in Lithuania, according to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Wednesday, March 26.
When Rutte first announced the deaths while on a trip to Warsaw, he said he did not yet know all the details. He also sent his condolences to the families of the deceased soldiers.
Later on Wednesday, the U.S. Army announced that a vehicle belonging to the four soldiers was located submerged in water near a training site. However, search efforts for the soldiers are still underway.
What happened?
One anonymous U.S. official told The Associated Press that the four Army soldiers were involved in a training accident.
The U.S. Army Europe and Africa Public Affairs Office in Germany revealed that the soldiers were performing scheduled tactical training at the time of the incident.
Following the discovery of the vehicle, U.S. Army Europe and Africa Public Affairs Office in Germany released another statement, saying, “The M88 Hercules armored recovery vehicle the four missing U.S. soldiers were operating during a training exercise has been located in Lithuania.”
The service members were reported missing on Tuesday, March 25, during an exercise which took place around 6 miles from the border with Belarus.
A subsequent search and rescue mission was launched involving helicopters and border guards, with their deaths later being confirmed.
Why does the region matter?
As Rutte said, what exactly happened remains unclear. What is known is that the Baltic NATO nations of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia have had rocky diplomatic relations with Russia, a close ally of Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko, and those ties only grew more tense when Moscow invaded Ukraine.
