Combat· Lebanon Multinational Force (Beirut Bombing)
Summer 1983 Escalation
Through the summer of 1983 the Marines' situation in Beirut deteriorated sharply from uneasy presence into open danger.
As the Lebanese factions and their foreign backers intensified their fighting, the Marine positions around the airport increasingly came under hostile artillery, mortar, rocket, and small-arms fire, and the Marines found themselves drawn into exchanges they were ill-postured to fight under their peacekeeping mandate. The first Marines to die from hostile action in the deployment were killed during this period, and the perception that the Multinational Force had become a combatant aligned with the Lebanese government deepened among the opposing factions. The escalation eroded what remained of the "presence" mission's logic, exposing the Marines to mounting risk in fixed, observed positions without a clear combat mandate. It set the conditions, in both the tactical exposure and the hardening hostility surrounding them, for the catastrophe that struck that October.
Record no. 656