Washington(CNN)
There is a growing belief among some Trump administration officials that Iran's missiles intentionally missed areas populated by Americans when they targeted two Iraqi bases housing US troops early Wednesday local time, multiple administration officials said.

Iran fired a number of missiles aimed at the bases in retaliation for the American strike that killed Iranian general Qasem Soleimani last week, further escalating tensions between the two countries. Officials have said there were no US casualties as a result of the attacks, though a full assessment is underway.

The administration officials floated the notion that Iran could have directed their missiles to hit areas that are populated by Americans, but intentionally did not.

And they suggested Iran may have chosen to send a message rather than take significant enough action to provoke a substantial US military response, a possible signal the administration was looking for rationale to calm the tensions.


Iran attacks Iraqi bases housing US troops in retaliation for Soleimani's death
Iranian missiles also landed close to the US consulate in Erbil, but didn't target the consulate itself, though the belief is that they could have.

"We could have done it and we didn't do it," is the message Iranians appeared to be sending, a State Department official said.

This interpretation will be presented to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during a briefing early Wednesday, and Pompeo is expected to brief President Donald Trump at some point later in the day. The President will address the nation about the incident at 11 a.m. ET, the White House said.

The US gave Iran the "opportunity to do what they needed to do and not escalate by killing Americans," the official said, suggesting how the administration could frame the retaliation. This was "a smart move" by the Iranians who demonstrated that they had "more to lose" if they killed Americans.

Now, the major question is if Iranian proxies follow suit, the official explained. Pompeo is "pragmatic" right now and the general sentiment Tuesday night was "let's take a breath."

There were no additional moves taken overnight to add any more protection to US diplomatic facilities abroad.

Iraq received "an official verbal message" from Iran about the missile attack shortly before midnight on Wednesday, according to a statement from Iraq's Prime Minister Adil Abdul Mahdi. He said Iraq was told that the strike would be "limited to the whereabouts of the US military in Iraq, without giving the exact location."

Trump's decision to kill Soleimani, one of Iran's most powerful men, has touched off a fresh crisis between the US and Iran. Following the strike, Pompeo and other top officials had said US wants to de-escalate the crisis, but Trump on Saturday vowed specific military action against Iran if it "strikes any Americans, or American assets."

Source: https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/01/08/politics/trump-iran-retaliation-missile-attacks/index.html

Hmm...closely watching!

Their strike is just to appease their citizens back home to show they did something worth of revenge.
They were not going to take any American troops lives of course.

Yes because they now know who Trump is . Iran informed Iraq and Finland before the strikes and 'Finland told the US' as if Americanin intelligence would not have intercepted the information first. Finland has always mediated between Iran and the West, so Iran literally informed the US of the strikes.

Iran needed those strikes to save face and show strength for their people back home and were extremely cautious to make sure US servicemen are safe, now that's how Trump owned the Iran. I believe Trump wants to solve Iran's problem once and for all, and what a better way to do it than to pull it from the bottom up.

Don't tell me these bad boys, all the 52 of them as Trump promised are exercise in futility.

Shebi i told you guys...the US just proved my analysis right... Trump's ratings has skyrocketed!!!

the US didn't retaliate, that means a deal has been reached behind the scenes undecided

Iran fired at a base with lesser US troops but more Iraqi troops, whereas there are far more important military bases to target in Iraq where US troops are much.

US defence system refused to intercept the missiles in the air, out of 15 missiles, 10 hit Al Assad base, one hit Erbil base and four failed. Trump and his team hasn't given any speech up til now(very unlike him). The funniest thing is that, the bases were already half cleared prior to the attack and they're zero casualties from the American side. grin

This looks like Iran contacted US proxies and be like " see we will shoot missiles in Us base at Iraq to so so base at a particular time to save face for the death of our general. Don't intercept the missiles just clear ur facilities and men"

Then the US be like "okay, then you will give a speech that if we don't retaliate, you will stop, and Trump won't retaliate, his approval ratings will be high for saving America from a war, he'll then get re-elected on a platter of gold.
Oil prices will spike, Iran will cash out, poor Iraq will suffer from the game. In the end, no WW3. Solemani just died for nothing.

They just proved me right!!! It was all a plan. Solemani was the scape-goat