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Iran Gambles on Escalation With Surprise Attack on U.S. Forces
The Wall Street Journal ^ | Updated July 29, 2026 12:13 pm ET | Jared Malsin and Suha Ma’ayeh

Posted on 07/29/2026 11:21:53 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum

Airstrikes in Jordan show Iran’s Revolutionary Guard is willing to risk Trump’s retaliation

Iran’s surprise missile attack on U.S. forces in Jordan shows Tehran’s military leaders would rather risk ramping up the war than play defense or accept a peace deal that would expose them to greater domestic political pressures.

Iran fired ballistic missiles on U.S. troops early Wednesday local time, demonstrating a willingness by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which exerts more power than ever in Tehran, to escalate during a relative lull in the conflict and attempt to seize the initiative after weeks in which Iran has mostly reacted to U.S. and Israeli attacks.

President Trump was cited by Fox News as saying the U.S. would hit Iran hard in response to the attack. “They’re going to get a beating,” chief foreign correspondent Trey Yingst early Wednesday quoted Trump as telling him. The White House didn’t immediately respond to request for comment.

A senior Jordanian government official said five missiles were intercepted in Jordan’s eastern desert and caused no injuries or material damage. The official declined to comment on the specific targets of the missiles. U.S. troops are posted to a Jordanian base near the Syrian border and at a separate air base in the desert where an Iranian missile strike killed two American servicemembers earlier this month. The Jordanian official said the Iranian attack showed the region was undergoing dramatic change.

The attack illustrates a fundamental shift in which the IRGC has grown more assertive and more comfortable with a state of war that could continue for months, rather than enter into a peace in which it would have to face public dissatisfaction with Iran’s struggling economy and its lethal clampdown on protesters earlier this year, analysts say.


(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...


TOPICS: Military/Veterans
KEYWORDS: albertatroll; ceasefiremisfire; groundhogday; iran; iranescalates; iraq; irgc; jaredmalsin; jordan; koranimals; leftistsource; mou2; saudiarabia; suhamaayeh; wallstreeturinal; yemen
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To: Alberta's Child

For Mellennia.


101 posted on 07/29/2026 6:30:21 PM PDT by cowboyusa (YESHUA IS KING OF AMERICA!)
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To: rlmorel

If you are one of those people who think Trump was led by the nose into this by Israel instead of being given information and deciding it was time to act, you aren’t going to change your mind regardless of information because you’ve made up your mind if you embrace that narrative.

**********************

After taking out the Iranian nuke program in 2025, which was such a success. Why the change of the propaganda being sold to us?

It was destroyed, then after meeting with Israel salespeople we decided not to take out nukes again, but took out their leadership with are little buddy. Then when things go sideways, little buddy recedes to the sidelines while we take the political & economic heat.

Yeah, you’ll never convince me this action wasn’t one of the stupidest foreign policy decision in our history.


102 posted on 07/29/2026 6:37:19 PM PDT by unclebankster (Globalism is the last refuge of a scoundrel. )
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To: 1035rep; Alberta's Child
President Trump has been saying the same thing since 2010. Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. That has never changed.

Okay. How he is going to accomplish that without increased escalation?

For some reason, I have a feeling that the Trump from pre-2016 would have very interesting opinions about the current state of affairs:

Heck, there's more:

What precise playbook would pre-2016 Trump think that 2026 Trump should have followed?

103 posted on 07/29/2026 6:39:15 PM PDT by Ultra Sonic 007 (There is nothing new under the sun.)
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To: SomeCallMeTim
Some of these same people frequent Free Republic and fall into one of those categories stated. There is no alternative to belonging to one of those groups as a justification for opposition to this action in Iran.

To the people who refuse to see a threat, and whose sole opposition appears to be the unwillingness to use military force, one or all of those beliefs that these same people will be used to justify that.

People who believe that allowing Islamic madmen to have nuclear weapons can be ignored are no different than people who ignore a flat tire on their car or an exploding volcano in their vicinity. These same people think that sticking your fingers in your ears and murmuring "lalalalalalalalalala" is going to make the problem improve or completely disappear.

It won't.

And those same people are too shortsighted or shallow to see what has been going on has had an overarching effect in rebuilding the landscape in the Persian Gulf. These Gulf countries who would have been either intimidated by Iran into silence or grudging alliance with Iran have become openly hostile to being held hostage and attacked. Formerly, Iran held their wealth hostage by threatening the Strait of Hormuz.

These Gulf countries Iran has held hostage since 1979 have begun the process of breaking free of their political slavery and, with the massive pipeline projects in the works to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and ship their oil directly to the Gulf of Oman for loading into tankers bound for the oil markets, will break the economic stranglehold that Iran has renewed time and again, threatening to cut their economic throats with a Strait of Hormuz scimitar held to their necks.

This will all make both our country and the world a safer and more prosperous place. But hey, the "mid-terms are coming up, my gas prices are too high, and I watch the media to shape my views" crowd will never lack for members, and they will refuse to accept that it is possible to change things if one has the courage and the guts to do so, even in the face of the naysayers.

104 posted on 07/29/2026 6:44:17 PM PDT by rlmorel (Factio Communistica Sinensis Delenda Est)
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To: rlmorel
These Gulf countries Iran has held hostage since 1979 have begun the process of breaking free of their political slavery and, with the massive pipeline projects in the works to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and ship their oil directly to the Gulf of Oman for loading into tankers bound for the oil markets, will break the economic stranglehold that Iran has renewed time and again, threatening to cut their economic throats with a Strait of Hormuz scimitar held to their necks.

That's great. There's nothing that stops them from doing this without our help. This should have been our approach for 50+ years.

Engineering can succeed where diplomacy and politics fail.

105 posted on 07/29/2026 6:54:06 PM PDT by Alberta's Child (If I leave here, it’s because I’m tired of arguing with geriatric parrots wearing MAGA hats.)
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To: Ultra Sonic 007

“Okay. How he is going to accomplish that without increased escalation? “

I don’t know. I’ll leave that to the professionals.


106 posted on 07/29/2026 6:54:14 PM PDT by 1035rep
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To: unclebankster

If the Andrew Jackson painting could cont to life, it would hit President Trump on the head with his Cain, and tell him to stop goofing around, and fight a total War.


107 posted on 07/29/2026 7:53:34 PM PDT by cowboyusa (YESHUA IS KING OF AMERICA!)
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To: Alberta's Child
I don't think the Cubans feel that way towards the repatriation of Cuba.

-PJ

108 posted on 07/29/2026 7:59:57 PM PDT by Political Junkie Too ( * LAAP = Left-wing Activist Agitprop Press (formerly known as the MSM))
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To: Alberta's Child

When we were dependent on Arab oil, there was little we could do as we were hostage just as fully as those Gulf States were. I lived through those gas crises in the Seventies, so that was apparent to me.

Another thing Trump has done is allow our energy sector to flourish, without which we would still be hostage. And with his administration’s efforts to exploit nuclear power, that is going to go further still.

Yes, you are correct, they could have done this without our help, but without that help, Iran would still be able to bottle up their oil today and hold them hostage. This has given them time to fully see their way out, and it isn’t by kowtowing to Iran.

When Iran’s stand over the Strait of Hormuz is reduced, and their allies by coercion deserting them, they become just another independent oil rich state.

And that is good for everyone, not just Americans. It is even good for the Iranians.


109 posted on 07/29/2026 8:22:59 PM PDT by rlmorel (Factio Communistica Sinensis Delenda Est)
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To: Magnum44

There are now 39 million Mexicans in the United States, which is three million more than the entire population of Mexico in 1960.

This occurred by violent incursions of our border mostly over the last 40 years.

If that isn’t an Invasion, what is?


110 posted on 07/29/2026 10:03:24 PM PDT by Regulator (It's fraud, Jim)
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To: Alberta's Child

Anti semitic terrorist nation sympathizer bump


111 posted on 07/30/2026 2:49:52 AM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

“ Mossad is omniscient.”

I’m not sure who said that, I certainly didn’t

Israel has a thing about survival. Their agents, Mossad, are pretty good at finding risks, locating dangers and acting accordingly. Read up on it.


112 posted on 07/30/2026 2:34:38 PM PDT by muir_redwoods (You choose; a world without dogs or a world without muslims.)
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