War in Iran: Donald Trump will attend the return of the remains of the six American soldiers killed on Saturday

The time has come for contemplation across the Atlantic. President Donald Trump will attend the return of the remains of the first six American soldiers killed in the war against Iran on Saturday, the White House said on Friday.

The White House announced Wednesday that Donald Trump intended to attend the “solemn transfer” of these six soldiers, five men and a woman, killed Sunday in an Iranian drone strike against an American military position in Port Shuaiba, Kuwait, but the date had not yet been set.

“Tomorrow (Saturday) he will travel to Dover to the Dover military base, to attend the solemn transfer of the remains of the six soldiers who were killed in the first salvo launched by Iran against our forces,” declared White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt, referring to the base in Delaware where the bodies of American soldiers killed abroad are traditionally repatriated.

“Solemn transfer”

This very sober ritual, during which the remains are unloaded one by one from a military transport plane and loaded into a vehicle under the gaze of the officials present, motionless and silent, is regulated to the millimeter.

The American army even uses specific vocabulary, speaking of a “solemn transfer” and not of a “ceremony”, and of “caissons” rather than “coffins”. But behind the military rigor, it is also a moment of great emotion since the families see, for the first time, the coffins in which their loved ones rest.

The six soldiers killed, the day after the United States and Israel launched the war against Iran, were reservists deployed to Kuwait, assigned to the 103rd Sustainment Command based in Des Moines (Iowa), according to the Pentagon.