DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — An Iranian attack on an air base in Qatar key to the US military likely hit a geodesic dome housing equipment used by the Americans for secure communications, satellite images analyzed Friday by The Associated Press show.
The US military and Qatar did not immediately respond to requests for comment over the damage, which so far has not been publicly acknowledged. The Iranian attack on Al Udeid Air Base outside of Doha, Qatar’s capital, on June 23 came as a response to the American bombing of three nuclear sites in Tehran — and provided the Islamic Republic a way to retaliate that quickly led to a ceasefire brokered by US President Donald Trump ending the 12-day Iran-Israel war.
The Iranian attack otherwise did little damage — likely due to the fact that the US evacuated its aircraft from the base home to the forward headquarters of the US military’s Central Command ahead of the attack. Trump also has said Iran signaled when and how it would retaliate, allowing American and Qatari air defense to be ready for the attack, which briefly disrupted air travel in the Middle East but otherwise did not tip over into the regional war long feared by analysts.
Images show burn marks, dome gone after attack
Satellite images from Planet Labs PBC show the geodesic dome visible at the Al Udeid Air Base on the morning of June 23, just hours before the attack. The US Air Force’s 379th Air Expeditionary Wing, which operates out of the base, in 2016 announced the installation of the $15 million piece of equipment, known as a modernized enterprise terminal. Photos of it show a satellite dish inside the dome, known as a radome.
Images taken on June 25 and every day subsequently show the dome is gone, with some damage visible on a nearby building. The rest of the base appears largely untouched in the images.
This handout photo from the US Air Force shows the Modernized Enterprise Terminal sits inside a radome at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, January 21, 2016. (Master Sgt. Joshua Strang/US Air Force via AP)
It is possible that a fragment or something else struck the dome, but given the destruction of the dome, it was likely an Iranian attack, possibly with a bomb-carrying drone, given the limited visible damage to surrounding structures.
The London-based satellite news channel Iran International first reported on the damage, citing satellite photos taken by a different provider.
Trump downplayed attack while Iran boasted about it
In the US, Trump described the Iranian attack as a “very weak response.” He had said Tehran fired 14 missiles, with 13 intercepted and one being “set free” as it was going in a “nonthreatening” direction.
“I want to thank Iran for giving us early notice, which made it possible for no lives to be lost, and nobody to be injured,” he wrote on his website Truth Social.
After the attack, Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard insisted the air base had been the “target of a destructive and powerful missile attack.” Iran’s Supreme National Security Council also claimed the base had been “smashed,” without offering any specific damage assessments.
This handout photo from the US Air Force shows Lt. Col. Carlos Alford, 379th Expeditionary Communications Squadron commander, in front of the Modernized Enterprise Terminal at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, January 21, 2016. (Master Sgt. Joshua Strang/U.S. Air Force via AP)
Potentially signaling he knew the dome had been hit, an adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei separately claimed the base’s communications had been disconnected by the attack.
“All equipment of the base was completely destroyed and now the US command stream and connection from Al Udeid base to its other military bases have been completely cut,” said Ahmad Alamolhoda, a hardline cleric.
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