Kabul Airport attack: Slain US Marine who cradled Afghan baby, avowed she loved her job

The US Marine officer who had gone viral for cradling an Afghan baby at the Hamid Karzai International Airport is confirmed to have been martyred in the Kabul attacks. US Marine Sgt. Nicole Gee (23) lost her life in the devasting suicide bombing which claimed the lives of 13 US servicemen and wounded at least 18 others on August 26. 

Days before the attack, Nicole Gee had posted the infamous image of cradling an Afghan baby at the Kabul airport with a caption that read, 'Kabul, Afghanistan I love my job.' The 23-year-old Marine of Sacramento, California, was a maintenance technician with the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit from Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. The Kabul attacks reported to have been orchestrated by the ISIS-K, an offshoot of the Islamic State group is reportedly the most lethal day for American forces in Afghanistan since 2011.

US Marines condole her death

Mourning the death of the young US Marine, her fellow officers remarked that her last breath was taken doing what she loved, which was helping people. Brig. Gen. Forrest C. Poole III, commanding general of 2nd Marine Logistics Group told Associated Press that Gee's unit was mourning “the immense loss". Other fellow marines such as Sgt. Mallory Harrison, who lived with Gee for three years, wrote about how hard the death hit her.

“I can’t quite describe the feeling I get when I force myself to come back to reality & think about how I’m never going to see her again. How her last breath was taken doing what she loved — helping people. Then there was an explosion. And just like that, she’s gone," Sgt. Mallory Harrison wrote in a Facebook post.

Kabul Airport attack & US retaliation

The United States military on Friday struck back against the ISIS-K in the aftermath of the devastating twin blasts at the Kabul Airport. The strikes come in response to the death of 13 US servicemen who were involved in the evacuation operations at Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport. At least 170 Afghans including several children, who were lodged at the gates of the airport to escape the Taliban regime, also lost their lives in the attack. Sharing details of the drone strikes that targeted the ISIS-K 'mastermind' behind the attacks, Pentagon in a statement said that as per initial indications, the target had been eliminated.