President Donald Trump sent a tweet Tuesday night assuring Americans that “all is well” after Iran launched missiles at U.S. forces in Iraq. In his tweet, Trump claimed “so far, so good” about the “ongoing assessment of casualties & damages,” but offered no specifics.
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.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 8, 2020
The tweet instantly gained traction, with 136,000 retweets and over half a million likes at the time of this writing.
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Trump’s message came a few hours after Iran retaliated for the killing of a top general by firing more than a dozen ballistic missiles at two Iraqi air bases housing U.S. forces on Wednesday. The extent of any casualties or damage still remains unclear.
Later, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that strikes were a “slap in the face” to the U.S. and not sufficient retaliation for the killing of Gen. Qassem Solemani last week.
But Khamenei said Iran’s real revenge would be forcing the U.S. to leave the region. “They [America] were truck with such a slap last night,” he told a large crowd in Tehran chanting the familiar “death to America” phrase, as reported by CBS News.
“Military action like this is not sufficient,” he continued. “What is important is ending the corrupting presence of America in the region.”
Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani echoed the supreme leader’s comment, saying Iran’s “real revenge and the ultimate response by regional nations is when America is expelled from this region and its hand of aggression is cut off forever.”
Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif defended Iran’s attack, tweeting that Tehran “took & concluded proportionate measures in self-defense.” He added that “we do not seek escalation or war, but will defend ourselves against any aggression,” according to CBS News.
The missiles targeted the Al Asad and Erbil military bases. The Al Asad base houses about 1,500 U.S. and coalition forces; it’s around 100 miles northwest of Baghdad and was visited by Trump in 2018. The base was already on high alert and recently paused its operations against ISIS to shift resources to prepare for a possible revenge attack by Iran, CBS News reports.
The attacks at 1:20 a.m. local time (5:30 p.m. ET on Tuesday) came after Iranian leaders promised “revenge” and “harsh retaliation” for Soleimani’s death in a U.S. airstrike near Baghdad airport last week.
A spokesman for Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said the timing of Wednesday’s strikes was symbolic, coming at roughly the same time that Soleimani died, Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency reported.
