Former Navy sailor pleads guilty to federal charge in 2022 plot to attack Illinois naval station

A former US Navy sailor pleaded guilty to a federal charge accusing him of a 2022 plot to attack Naval Station Great Lakes in northern Illinois, according to a plea agreement unsealed Thursday.

A former US Navy sailor pleaded guilty to a federal charge accusing him of a 2022 plot to attack Naval Station Great Lakes in northern Illinois, according to a plea agreement unsealed Thursday. Xuanyu Harry Pang, 38, allegedly devised a plan involving Iranian actors to conduct an attack against the US to avenge the death of Qasem Soleimani, a general of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps who was killed by a US airstrike in 2020, according to court documents. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the US in 2019. In November, Pang pleaded guilty in a Chicago federal court to conspiring to and attempting to willfully injure and destroy national defense material, national defense premises, and national defense utilities – namely Naval Station Great Lakes – with the intent to injure, interfere with, and obstruct the national defense of the US, the Department of Justice said in a news release Thursday. Pang enlisted in the United States Navy and began his training at Naval Station Great Lakes around February 2022, according to court documents. Pang faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. CNN has reached out to Pang’s attorney for comment. Pang is alleged to have communicated in 2021 with an individual in Colombia about potentially assisting him with his plan, the Department of Justice said.