The fragment came from an explosive device that a suicide bomber of the self-proclaimed Islamic State had installed in the car he blew himself up with on 21 January 2017 while trying to hold back the advance of Iraqi armed forces in Iraq. A fragment of an explosive device was removed by Czech doctors from the body of a member of the Iraqi armed forces after he was brought to the field hospital where our Field Surgical Team (FST) was operating. The second item documenting the deployment of our medics in Iraq is a bullet pulled from the body of a wounded Iraqi soldier. A soldier was hit during a firefight with Islamic State members on 20 May 2017, near Mosul.
The FST’s primary mission was to provide medical support and care for members of the Coalition and Iraqi forces as part of Operation Inherent Resolve. The FST unit was composed mainly of members of the Military Medical Agency, supplemented by soldiers from the Military University Hospital Prague and other military departments and facilities. Members of the 1st Task Force Field Surgical Team departed the Czech Republic for Iraq on 5 December 2016 from Prague-Ruzyně Airport. In Iraq, the unit was integrated into the U.S. field hospital ROLE 2. They returned from deployment on 17 June 2017.