M88 Hercules Panzer Tief in the mud: US soldiers missed

Four US soldiers are missing in Lithuania, and they are looking for feverishly. “All scenarios are still being checked,” said Defense Minister Dovile Sakaliene on the Pabrade military training area – and reports on the soldiers’ death. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte had previously assumed that the soldiers were dead.

But Lithuania’s Minister of Defense Sakaliene says: “There are currently no confirmed information and no corpses were found. So it would simply be wrong to say that the soldiers are dead.”

The four US soldiers were no longer found after an exercise and have been missing since Tuesday afternoon. The Lithuanian military and the police had therefore started a search together with the US military, in which its armored vehicle-an M88 Hercules mountain armor-was found in a water on the practice site. Pabrade is located directly on the NATO east flank to Belarus.

According to Sakaliene, the tons of heavy military vehicle is about five meters deep in the mud. “We cannot confirm whether soldiers are in the vehicle,” said the minister, who, like Prime Minister Gintautas Paluckas, made her way to the practice site located at a good 50 kilometers northeast of the capital of Vilnius. “Until we see the vehicle, all scenarios are considered possible.”

According to reports of Lithuanian media, the soldiers are said to have died in an accident. But there was initially no official confirmation for this. US defense minister Pete Hegseth wrote on the platform X that the four soldiers were missing. You won’t rest until they were found.

Lithuania’s army chief Raimundas Vaiksnoras said that the search and salvage campaign was technically very complex and takes place in a swamp area that is still being drained. The vehicle has sunk so deeply that it could not even be reached with metal bars. In addition to the water, a gas line also runs, he said.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte meanwhile caused confusion with statements on the edge of a visit to Poland, according to which the four US soldiers were killed. A NATO spokeswoman moved this out later and wrote on platform X that Rutte referred to new news reports with his statements and not to the not confirmed fate of the missing.

According to the European Command Center of the US Army in Wiesbaden, the soldiers belong to an infantry brigade and carried out a planned tactical training at the time of their disappearance. Since 2014, the United States has been moving units for maneuvers to the Baltic Lithuania and the NATO east border. According to Lithuania, a US battalion is currently stationed in a Pabrade.

This article is continuously updated.