What next? Awaiting Trump’s response to Iranian missile attack on US bases in Iraq
ALL IS WELL: Once it seemed clear there were no U.S. casualties from Iran’s missile strike on two U.S. bases in Iraq, the White House called off plans for President Trump to address the nation, and instead Trump went to bed after sending a single tweet.
“All is well! Missiles launched from Iran at two military bases located in Iraq. Assessment of casualties & damages taking place now. So far, so good! We have the most powerful and well equipped military anywhere in the world, by far! I will be making a statement tomorrow morning.”
ON HIGH ALERT: The attack, which had been telegraphed by Iran’s movement of missiles on Sunday, began early yesterday evening, Washington time, just hours after most Pentagon workers had been sent home in advance of an expected snowstorm, which fizzled.
“At approximately 5:30 p.m. (EST) on January 7, Iran launched more than a dozen ballistic missiles against U.S. military and coalition forces in Iraq. It is clear that these missiles were launched from Iran and targeted at least two Iraqi military bases hosting U.S. military and coalition personnel at Al-Assad and Irbil,” said a Pentagon statement, issued about an hour and a half after the attack.
“These bases have been on high alert due to indications that the Iranian regime planned to attack our forces and interests in the region.”
CNN cited a U.S. military official and senior administration official as saying the Iranian missiles hit areas of the al-Asad base not populated by Americans.
CLIMBING DOWN THE ESCALATION LADDER: After the attack, Iranian Foreign MInister Javad Zarif called for restraint, essentially saying Iran's honor had been avenged for the U.S. drone strike that killed Revolutionary Guard commander, Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, last week.
“Iran took & concluded proportionate measures in self-defense under Article 51 of UN Charter targeting base from which cowardly armed attack against our citizens & senior officials were launched,” Zarif tweeted. “We do not seek escalation or war, but will defend ourselves against any aggression.”
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called the Iranian missile strikes in a “slap in the face” to the United States.
“They were slapped last night, but such military actions are not enough,” he tweeted in English. “The corruptive presence of the US in the region of West Asia must be stopped.”
YOU DE-ESCALATE, NO YOU DE-ESCALATE: Yesterday, as the U.S. braced for the expected attack, Defense Secretary Mark Esper told reporters in a hastily called briefing that it was up to Iran to break the tit-for-tat cycle of escalation that could start an all-out war neither country wants.
“The United States is not seeking a war with Iran, but we are prepared to finish one,” Esper said. “We are seeking a diplomatic solution, but first this will require Iran to de-escalate. It will require the regime to come to the table with the goal of preventing further bloodshed. And it will require them to cease their malign activities throughout the region.”
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS: We’re still waiting for an official battle damage assessment from the U.S. military, including definitive word that no one was killed or wounded.
The U.S. has spent billions on missile defense systems, including Patriot anti-missile missiles, to defend against exactly this kind of attack. Were missile defenses employed? Were any incoming missiles shot down?
And the biggest unanswered question is whether President Trump will declare victory after what turned out to be a pinprick attack, or whether he will carry out the threat he tweeted Sunday: “If Iran attacks an American Base, or any American, we will be sending some of that brand new beautiful equipment their way...and without hesitation!”
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HAPPENING TODAY: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Defense Secretary Mark Esper, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley are due to brief members of Congress behind closed doors on the intelligence that lead to the decision to take out Soleimani as he arrived at the Baghdad airport Friday.
Yesterday Pompeo scoffed at the idea that Soleimani was on a diplomatic mission, carrying Tehran’s response to a Saudi initiative to calm tensions. “Is there any history that would indicate that it was remotely possible that this kind gentleman, this diplomat of great order, Qasem Soleimani, had traveled to Baghdad for the idea of conducting a peace mission?” Pompeo said. “We've heard these same lies before. It's fundamentally false. He was not there on a diplomatic mission trying to resolve a problem.”
President Trump made the same argument later in a White House meeting with the Greek Prime MInister. ““He was traveling with the head of Hezbollah. They weren't there to discuss a vacation. They weren't there to go to a nice resort someplace in Baghdad. They were there to discuss bad business,” Trump said. “We saved a lot of lives by terminating his life. A lot of lives were saved. They were planning something, and you're going to be hearing about it, or at least various people in Congress are going to be hearing about it.”
‘EXQUISITE INTELLIGENCE’: Esper called the intelligence that Soleimani was meeting with an Iranian-backed Kataib Hezbollah militia commander to coordinate an attack against Americans, “exquisite,” and said it would be shared with members of Congress today.
“To somehow suggest that he wasn't a legitimate target, I think, is fanciful,” Esper said “He was clearly on the battlefield. He was conducting, preparing, planning military operations. He was a legitimate target, and his time was due.”
THE OTHER BIG UNKNOWN: Esper insisted yesterday that the U.S. has no plans to leave Iraq, but declined to speculate what the Pentagon would do if Iraq demanded the departure of U.S. troops in the wake of the Soleimani killing.
“Our policy has not changed: We are not leaving Iraq,” Esper said, again dismissing a letter that the Pentagon says mistakenly suggested the U.S. was making preparations to withdraw its forces. “And a draft, unsigned letter does not constitute a policy change.”
But acting Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi indicated he’s taking the letter seriously, saying the document “was clear,” and that the copy he got was signed. “It’s not like a draft, or a paper that fell out of the photocopier and coincidentally came to us,” Mahdi said in comments broadcast state television, as reported by the Washington Post.
‘THE WORST THING’: At the White House, President Trump said withdrawing America’s 5,000 U.S. troops now would be a mistake. “I think it's the worst thing that could happen to Iraq. If we leave, that would mean that Iran would have a much bigger foothold, and the people of Iraq do not want to see Iran running the country — that, I can tell you.”
“The Iraqi people were not happy when the suggestion was made yesterday that we were thinking about leaving at some point,” Trump said. “They were not happy. But, at some point, we will want to leave.’
THE ULTIMATE IRONY: In an interview on CNN yesterday, Rep. Elissa Slotkin, a former CIA analyst who is sponsoring the Democrat’s war powers resolution in the House, noted that Soleimani’s goal in Iraq was to drive America out.
“I think it would be ironic, because Qasem Soleimani is the architect of the idea that, if you just punish the United States and threaten the United States in Iraq, they will feel like, you know what? The juice isn't worth the squeeze, and we will run out of Iraq with our tail between our legs,” Slotokin told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour.
“That's what he wanted in life. And I hope that he does not get it in death, because, right now, the Iraqi government is in a very, very tough spot. Their sovereignty was violated. And they have the right to decide what happens in their country.”
ALSO TODAY: Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has appointments on Capitol Hill, meeting with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at 10 a.m., followed by an 11 a.m. meeting with House leadership, hosted by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
GREECE WANTS IN ON THE F-35: Mitsotakis, who has presided over an impressive economic turnaround in Greece, told Trump during their White House meeting that as soon as it completes an upgrade of its F-16 fleet in three or four years, it would like to begin buying, and perhaps help build the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.
“Greece is interested, Mr. President, in participating in the F-35 program. As you know, we are already upgrading our F-16s, and that program will be completed in 2023, 2024. So we're very much interested in participating in the F-35 program after that” Mitsotakis told Trump. “And I'm sure that the U.S. will take into consideration the fact that this country is coming out of an economic crisis, in terms of structuring the program in the best possible way for my country.”
IF THAT’S THE LAW, ‘I’M OK WITH IT’: After presumably getting briefed on the law of armed conflict, President Trump backed off his threat to target Iran cultural sites, although he still argued the prohibition didn’t make sense
“They're allowed to kill our people, they're allowed to maim our people, they're allowed to blow up everything that we have and there's nothing that stops them, and we are — according to various laws —supposed to be very careful with their cultural heritage. And you know what? If that's what the law is, I will — I like to obey the law.”
“But think of it: They kill our people, they blow up our people, and then we have to be very gentle with their cultural institutions,” he lamented. “But I'm ok with it. It's ok with me.”
“I will say this: If Iran does anything that they shouldn't be doing, they're going to be suffering the consequences, and very strongly.”
THE AMERICAN: “This is Nawres Hamid. He is the American killed in the Dec. 27 attack in Iraq that spiked tensions between the U.S. and Iran,” tweeted Dan Lamothe of the Washington Post. “He worked as an interpreter for U.S. forces. He was a dad and husband, born in Iraq and naturalized as a U.S. citizen. RIP.”
Hamid’s body was returned to the United States and buried Saturday in Sacramento, the Post reported.
WORRIED ABOUT THE FLEET: Two Senators from the shipbuilding state of Maine, Republican Susan Collins and Independent Angus King, have written Defense Secretary Mark Esper after reading reports suggesting the Pentagon is getting ready to cut the Navy’s procurement account in the FY 2021 budget due to go to Congress next month.
“We write to express our strong support for a 355-ship Navy and to urge continued support from the Department for a robust shipbuilding budget,” the senators wrote. “As you continue to develop and finalize the Department’s FY 2021 budget request, we urge you to reverse course from cutbacks to shipbuilding plans that may be under deliberation and to support a 355-ship Navy.”
Last month, Congress appropriated $5.1 billion for three Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers, which Collins says will support jobs in the defense industry, including Bath Iron Works, Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, and Pratt & Whitney.
US AFGHANISTAN AMB. LEAVING: The State Department announced this week that John Bass, the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan is stepping down after two-years in the high stress job.
“His two-year tour of service in Kabul was remarkable,” Pompeo said yesterday. “Ambassador Bass is a respected strategic thinker, a man of incredible integrity. He's helped that country move forward to a brighter, more peaceful and more secure future for all the Afghan people.
"Bass's departure had long been planned, but it comes at a particularly delicate moment for U.S.-Afghan relations,” says Michael Kugelman, deputy director of the Asia Program at The Wilson Center.
“American negotiators are trying to put the finishing touches on an agreement with the Taliban, even as an inpatient President Trump is stoking fears in Kabul about the prospect of a unilateral U.S. troop withdrawal. While Bass ruffled some feathers in Afghanistan for often publicly opining on Afghan politics, his presence in Kabul had a steadying influence on a bilateral relationship that has blown hot and cold over the last two years."
NOMINATED: The White House has announced President Trump’s intention to nominate J. David Patterson of Tennessee, to be the principal deputy under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness.
Patterson currently is senior vice president of strategic business opportunities at SMA, Inc., and previously served as an executive with Boeing and the National Defense Business Institute at the University of Tennessee.
Replies
January 8, 2020
Iranian Rockets Fly**Ukrainian Plane Explodes Over Iran**Quake Hits Iran Nuke Plant—Then Devils Horns Rise From Persian Gulf
By: Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers
A riveting new Security Council (SC) report circulating in the Kremlin today noting the unannounced surprise meeting held in Damascus-Syria yesterday between President Putin and his Syrian counterpart President Bashar al-Assad to discuss the “Iranian Chaos Theory Masterplan” initiated by President Donald Trump to bring about a lasting peace between the West and Islamic nations in the Middle East, states that Trump’s main agenda to destroy the regional power of Sunni Muslim terror supporting Saudi Arabia got a boost when Iran staged their missile launch charade a few hours ago against US bases in Iraq—that caused global oil prices to soar to the benefit of Iran and Russia—but wiped out billions-of-dollars of Saudi wealth after their Saudi Ara...--a beginning of woes to be experienced by the Saudis whose Iranian supporting Shiite extremist organization, Hezbollah al-Heja...—and whose expectation of the Saudis being supported by the US as they battle for their kingdom’s survival looks more unlikely by the day—best exampled by the 3 January call held between US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud—the American readout of which for domestic propaganda purposes had such statements as: “The Secretary thanked the Crown Prince for Saudi Arabia’s steadfast support and for recognizing the continuing aggressive threats posed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Qods Force”—but whose truer meaning Saudi readout of shows the US is tired of supporting endless wars: “During telephone conversation, the latest developments in Iraq and ...”—all occurring near simultaneously with the explosion of an Ukrainian airliner taking off from the Tehran-Iran ...—and a magnitude 4.9 earthquake striking the Bushehr nuclear plant in Iran—with all of this chaotic turmoil then being fittingly met with a rare “Devils Horns” eclipse rising from the Persian Gulf and reaching down from the c.... [Note: Some words and/or phrases appearing in quotes in this report are English language approximations of Russian words/phrases having no exact counterpart.]
Rare “Devils Horn” eclipse rises from Persian Gulf (top photo) and reaches down from clouds to halo airliner (bottom photo) as rockets fly, a plane explodes and quake strikes nuclear plant.
According to this report, yesterday the Foreign Ministry exhaustively detailed the chaos theory masterplan initiated by President Trump—whose main “theater of the absurd” components of means nothing is as it first appears, and will frequently be the exact opposite of what one thinks is occurring—the only exception being the Ministry noting that the “only actual battlefield death, so far, in the maelstrom of this cha...”—the same General Soleimani who, in July-2018, threatened Trump with the words “Mr. Gambler, Trump! I’m telling you that WE ARE CLOSE TO YOU, exact...”—a threat made all too real this past Sunday, 5 January, when a supposedly disgraced ex-US Marine named Brandon Magnan, and an as y....
As to the true and dangerous nature of General Soleimani being kept hidden from the American people, this report details, among the most important persons warning about this international terror leader was President Trump’s former national security advisor US Army General Michael Flynn—who, in 2015, while working for the Obama Regime, sent out a warning Tweet asking: “Soleimani–#1 terrorist in the world, now a good guy & Iran, #1 ...”—a warning Tweet that, of course, made General Flynn a prime target for Deep State destruction—and yesterday further saw these Deep State maniacs demanding that a jud....
Most interesting to note about the leftist lies being told about General Soleimani to the American people, though, this report notes, is that at the same time The New York Times blared its comical headline “The Nightmare Stage of Trump’s Rule Is Here” for a distorted article warning that “unstable and impeached, the president pushes the US toward war with...” because President Trump ordered Soleimani assassinated—buried deep within in its pages was a little noticed or read other article about Soleimani titled “Trump Kills Iran’s Most Overrated Warrior”—which explained why Trump and Iran’s Supreme Leader turned Soleimani into a sacrificial chess piece pawn:
One day they may name a street after President Trump in Tehran.
Why?
Because Trump just ordered the assassination of possibly the dumbest man in Iran and the most overrated strategist in the Middle East: Major General Qassim Soleimani.
Think of the miscalculations this guy made. In 2015, the United States and the major European powers agreed to lift virtually all their sanctions on Iran, many dating back to 1979, in return for Iran halting its nuclear weapons program for a mere 15 years, but still maintaining the right to have a peaceful nuclear program. It was a great deal for Iran. Its economy grew by over 12 percent the next year.
And what did Soleimani do with that windfall?
Mr. “Military Genius” Soleimani decided that he would overreach again and try to put direct pressure on Israel.
He would do this by trying to transfer precision-guided rockets from Iran to Iranian proxy forces in Lebanon and Syria.
Alas, Soleimani discovered that fighting Israel — specifically, its combined air force, special forces, intelligence and cyber — is not like fighting the Nusra front or the Islamic State.
The Israelis hit back hard, sending a whole bunch of Iranians home from Syria in caskets and hammering their proxies as far away as Western Iraq.
Indeed, Israeli intelligence had so penetrated Soleimani’s Quds Force and its proxies that Soleimani would land a plane with precision munitions in Syria at 5 p.m., and the Israeli air force would blow it up by 5:30 p.m. Soleimani men were like fish in a barrel.
If Iran had a free press and a real parliament, he would have been fired for colossal mismanagement.
It was Soleimani and his proxies — his “kingmakers” in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq — who increasingly came to be seen, and hated, as imperial powers in the region, even more so than Trump’s America.
This triggered popular, authentic, bottom-up democracy movements in Lebanon and Iraq that involved Sunnis and Shiites locking arms together to demand noncorrupt, nonsectarian democratic governance.
On Nov. 27, Iraqi Shiites — yes, Iraqi Shiites — burned down the Iranian consulate in Najaf, Iraq, removing the Iranian flag from the building and putting an Iraqi flag in its place.
That was after Iraqi Shiites, in September 2018, set the Iranian consulate in Basra ablaze, shouting condemnations of Iran’s interference in Iraqi politics.
As for the “crushing revenge” charade rocket attack to avenge the death of General Soleimani, this report notes, it began with Iran calling Iraqi Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi to pre-warn him about what was going to occur—which allowed both US and Iraqi troops the time they needed to go into their bomb proof bunkers so none of them would be harmed—an “attack” followed by Iran basically saying that’s it and “we do not seek escalation or war”—that President Trump immediately responded to with his Tweet saying “All is well”, going to bed, and telling the American people he’d talk to them in the morning—all with Trump knowing that Iranian President Rouhani has declared that “all US troops out of Middle East will be Iran’s final answer to Sol...”—which is exactly what Trump has been trying to do since the very day he took office.
Unlike in past times when President Trump was blocked from bringing all of his US troops home from the Middle East and ending his nation’s endless wars, this report concludes, this time around he comically has all of his enemies crying for the same thing to be done before he can start World War III—a masterful move as Trump knows his deranged enemies will ALWAYS choose to take the opposite side of whatever they think his is—but whose endgame is yet to play out—thus meaning that more heart-stopping moves are going to made in this most dangerous of games before it’s finished—and makes one glad that even before he was elected, his personal doctor told the entire world: “If elected, Mr. Trump, I can state unequivocally, will be the healt...”.
January 8, 2020 © EU and US all rights reserved. Permission to use this report in its entirety is granted under the condition it is linked to its original source at WhatDoesItMean.Com. Freebase content licensed under CC-BY and GFDL.