Marines Barracks Beirut 1983 Suicide Bombing Defense Department Report
On October 23, 1983, a truck full of explosives, driven by a suicide bomber, crashed through the perimeter of the compound of the U.S. contingent of the Multinational Force at Beirut International Airport, Beirut, Lebanon, penetrated the Battalion Landing Team Headquarters building and detonated. The force of the explosion destroyed the building resulting in the deaths of 241 U.S. military personnel, 220 Marines, 18 Navy personnel and three Army soldiers, along with sixty Americans injured. This attack produced the deadliest single-day death toll for the United States Marine Corps since the Battle of Iwo Jima of World War II.
A second suicide truck bomber drove into the French barracks. Fifty-eight paratroopers from the 1st Parachute Chasseur Regiment were killed and 15 injured. This would be the single worst military loss for France since the end of the Algerian War.
This report examines the circumstances of that terrorist attack and its immediate aftermath.
