The Barracks Bombing The First Battalion Eighth
Marines, under the U.S. Second Marine Division,
had established its headquarters at the Beirut Inter-
national Airport. On the early morning of October
23, 1983, a truck driver drove into the compound
and detonated a load of explosives in a suicide
bombing.
The American death toll from the explosion was
241 servicemen: 220 Marines, 18 Navy personnel,
and 3 Army soldiers. Sixty Americans were injured.
Rescue efforts at the U.S. compound continued for
days. Rescuers were harassed at times by sniper fire,
and some survivors were pulled from the rubble and
airlifted to hospitals for treatment.
It remains uncertain who was responsible for the
bombing. Several radical Shiite militant groups
claimed responsibility for the attacks. In May 2003,
in a case brought by the families of the servicemen
who were killed in Beirut, U.S. District Court Judge
Royce C. Lamberth declared that the Islamic Repub-
lic of Iran was responsible for the 1983 attack. Lam-
berth found that there was sufficient evidence to
conclude that Hezbollah, an organization formed
with the assistance of the Iranian government, had
conducted the bombing operations.
President Reagan called the attack a “despicable
act” and remained firm in his commitment to keep a
military force in Lebanon. On October 27, 1983,
President Reagan made a televised address to the
United States of America. He declared that the mili-
tary presence in Lebanon was important to the
United States, because “peace in the Middle East is
of vital concern to our nation” and “the area is key to
the economic and political life of the West.” He also
stated that U.S. involvement was “a moral obligation
to assure the continued existence of Israel as a na-
tion.”
Impact Following the barracks bombing, the
Marines were redeployed offshore, where they could
not be targeted by terrorist bombing attacks. Unable
to sustain the resolve he had expressed months be-
fore, on February 7, 1984, President Reagan ordered
the Marines to begin withdrawal from Lebanon. On
February 26, 1984, the last Marines left Beirut.
In despair over the departure of U.S. military
forces from Beirut, the Lebanese Army collapsed in
February of 1984, with many soldiers deserting to
join militias. By April, the rest of the multinational
force had also withdrawn from Beirut. The city re-
mained in a state of civil war.
Israel did not begin the withdrawal of its military
forces until January of 1985. By June of 1985, Israeli
forces had completely withdrawn from Lebanon,
with the exception of occupying a security zone in-
side southern Lebanon to protect the northern ter-
ritories of Israel.
Along with the U.S. Embassy bombing, the bar-
racks bombing prompted a review of the security of
U.S. facilities overseas for the U.S. Department of
State. The results of this review were published as the
Inman Report.
Further Reading
Frank, Benis M.U.S. Marines in Lebanon, 1982-1984.
Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Divi-
sion, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S.
G.P.O., 1987. The official account of the U.S.
Marines in Lebanon.
McWhirter, James A.A Self-Inflicted Wound: The U.S.
in Lebanon 1982-1984. Carlisle Barracks, Pa. : U.S.
Army War College, 1989. Critical analysis of U.S.
foreign policy in Lebanon and the reaction to theBeirut bombings.
United States. Congress. House. Committee on For-
eign Affairs. Subcommittee on Europe and the
Middle East.The U.S. Embassy Bombing in Beirut:
Hearing Before the Committee on Foreign Affairs and Its
Subcommittees on International Operations and on Eu-
rope and the Middle East of the House of Representa-
tives, Ninety-eighth Congress, First Session, June 28,
1983. Washington, D.C.: U.S. G.P.O., 1983. The
official record of the congressional hearing en-
quiring into the embassy bombing of April of
1983.
Michael E. ManatonSee also Foreign policy of the United States; Mid-
dle East and North America; Terrorism.Beloved
Identification Pulitzer Prize-winning novel
Author Toni Morrison (1931- )
Date Published in 1987
Belovedconfirmed Toni Morrison’s position as a major
American author, and, at the same time, it furthered Ameri-
can sensitivity to issues of race and the legacy of slaver y in
the lives both of black people and white.102 Beloved The Eighties in America