US military plans to expand helicopter capacity at Erbil Air Base

US Army CH-47 Chinook (foregound) and UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters at Erbil Air Base on 27 February 2025. (US Army/Combined Joint Task Force – Operation ‘Inherent Resolve')

The US military is planning to build more helicopter pads at Erbil – the capital of the Kurdish region in northern Iraq – in the first significant base project revealed since the announcement that the US-led military operation in Iraq will end in September.

A pre-solicitation notice published by the US Army Corps of Engineers on the US government's System for Award Management website on 5 April said the plan is to expand the northern rotary aircraft ramp (apron) at Erbil Air Base to double its staging capacity and pave areas for two large maintenance shelters.

It gave 20 April as the tentative date for the solicitation's release and expected the resulting contract to be worth USD1–5 million and completed 550 days after it is awarded.

The Iraqi and US governments released a joint statement on 27 September 2024 saying that Operation ‘Inherent Resolve', the US-led military mission against the Islamic State group, would be concluded in Iraq by the end of September 2025, with the United States and Iraq transitioning to a bilateral security partnership. The US-led coalition will continue to use bases in Iraq to support operations against the Islamic State group in Syria until September 2026.

The quarterly report on ‘Inherent Resolve' that the US Department of Defense's Office of Inspector General released in February stated that the mission would come to an end in “federal Iraq”, meaning it can continue in the territory controlled by the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government.