A 27-year-old U.S. marine was killed this weekend by an ISIS rocket attack on a base that the American public didn’t know existed.

The death forced the Pentagon to reveal on Sunday—the 13th anniversary of the start of the Iraq War—that it was in the process of setting up a base for marines in Northern Iraq. The Pentagon had supposedly “planned to acknowledge” this escalation of U.S. forces in Iraq later this week, an unnamed defense official told CNN.

The base was attacked a second time on Monday, CNN reported.

The New York Times reported:

“Force protection” is military jargon for providing security. But the U.S. military has long contracted out its security in Iraq to foreign workers—a policy that has been met with harsh criticism from human rights and labor activists, among many others.

Observers have noted that the DoD’s hiring of private contractors in Iraq has only increased under President Obama’s watch. Indeed, a glance at Department of Defense contracts reveals that as recently as January the Pentagon hired a private contractor to provide security to the Balad Iraqi Air Force base.