Al Udeid Air Base Attacked

     Al Udeid Air Base was attacked early this morning by Iran in retaliation for Israel's and our bombing campaigns against their uranium enrichment facilities in the central and northern parts of Iran. Al Udeid Air Base is one of the hubs of our Middle East footprint. In fact, Trump visited Al Udeid Air Base just last month. Qatar is saying that all bunt one Iranian was shot down by their ground defense forces but other sources are contradicting that. But, beneath the lede in the AP article is this: "The U.S. was warned by Iran in advance, and there were no casualties, said President Donald Trump, who dismissed the attack as a 'very weak response'.”

     If it was a "very weak response" then that was by design. The Iranians fired exactly as many missiles as the bombs we'd dropped on them two days ago. Plus, Iran said they chose the base partly because it was far away from any population center. The fact that Trump knew about the bombing in advance is telling if not damning. The understanding between Iran, Israel and the US is that the missile attack wouldn't be too damaging and that no one would be killed.

     Plus, Anderson Cooper of CNN interviewed an Israeli official who confirmed all this, that Israel and the US knew about this bombing in advance and let the Iranians do it, anyway, despite there being no guarantee of no loss of human life. In other words, Trump allowed Iran to have a safety valve and allowed one of our most important Middle East bases to be bombed. That should be the main headline, not that Al Udeid Air Base was attacked.