Iran's military said it fired missiles and drones early Thursday at bases used by American forces in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, drawing two Gulf Arab states deeper into a war neither has joined as a combatant, six months after it began.
Iran's army said the strikes hit satellite communications systems, equipment depots and hangars housing fighter jets at Ahmed Al Jaber Air Base in Kuwait, and struck radar systems and troop positions at Al Minhad Air Base in the UAE, according to state television reports carried by Iranian media. Kuwait's government confirmed its air defenses intercepted an attack but did not say whether any Iranian weapons got through or caused damage; there was no independent confirmation from the US military that American facilities were struck, and no casualties were reported on either side.
Thursday's barrage was part of a broader wave. Iran's Revolutionary Guards said separately that they fired roughly two dozen ballistic missiles at Jordan and Kuwait and dozens more drones at Bahrain, Kuwait and Erbil, in Iraq's Kurdistan region, over the preceding two days. US and regional officials said most of the weapons were intercepted or fell short, with no American casualties, even as Iranian state media claimed, without evidence corroborated by any host government, that the strikes caused significant American losses.
Kuwait's foreign ministry called the attacks a "flagrant violation" of its sovereignty and "a serious violation of international law, the UN Charter and UN Security Council Resolution 2817," warning the escalation "threatened regional security and stability and undermined diplomatic efforts aimed at de-escalation." Kuwait reaffirmed what it called its right to take all necessary measures to defend its territory.
Caught in a war they didn't start
Kuwait, the UAE and Bahrain all host American military infrastructure but are not formal parties to the US-Israeli campaign against Iran that began February 28. Gulf officials have complained in recent months that they receive little advance warning before major American strikes and that scarce missile-defense interceptors are being stretched thin protecting US and Israeli interests ahead of their own, according to accounts from officials in two Gulf states. The UAE has in the past disputed Iranian claims that its bases were hit, and Thursday's damage assessments were, once again, impossible to verify independently.
The reaction across the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council has been notably uneven. Qatar, which hosts the US military's largest regional airbase, has avoided any military involvement in the conflict, while Bahrain and Kuwait have aligned with Saudi Arabia in publicly urging de-escalation and protection of civilian infrastructure rather than assigning blame to Washington or Tehran directly.
President Trump, who has said Washington is prepared to strike Iran "any time we want," told reporters this week he did not expect the renewed fighting to last "too long," though he offered no timetable, saying only "I don't think it will be very much longer." He and UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan spoke by phone as the strikes were unfolding, according to Emirati accounts of the call.
What happens next
Thursday's exchanges came almost exactly six months into a war that began with US and Israeli airstrikes on Iranian nuclear and military sites and has since cycled between intense exchanges and near-total lulls, including roughly three weeks of quiet through most of August before this week's flare-up. Neither side has signaled interest in a ceasefire, and Iran's army has vowed further "harsh and devastating" retaliation for any additional American strikes on its territory.
For Gulf capitals, the immediate test is whether this week's exchanges stay confined to military infrastructure, as Thursday's did by all accounts, or spread to the energy facilities, ports and civilian areas that regional officials have warned for months could turn a war being fought largely overhead into one fought in their own cities.
