Update (5:00pm ET): As was expected, the US retaliated against Iran one day after Tehran struck a commercial ship in the Strait of Hormuz, a tit-for-tat exchange similar to one observed a week ago, and one which threatened to break the two countries’ fragile ceasefire although we doubt there will be further escalation.

US Central Command said that American aircraft on Friday hit Iranian missile and drone storage sites as well as coastal radar installations, reportedly on Sirik Island located near the Strait of Hormuz, calling it a “powerful response to yesterday’s attack.”

Fox reporter Jennifer Griffin said that according to senior US defense officials the strikes on Iranian targets are "ongoing" right now.

According to unconfirmed reported from military bloggers, there is currently intensified U.S. military air activity is now underway over the Gulf of Oman and the Persian Gulf, with 6 U.S. Air Force aerial refueling tankers operating alongside a U.S. Navy P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraf

On Thursday, the Singapore-flagged container ship Ever Lovely sustained damage from what the US said was a one-way Iranian attack drone. The incident irked President Donald Trump, who said earlier Friday that “I don’t like the fact that they took a shot.”

“They shouldn’t be doing that,” Trump told reporters at the White House.

Earlier on Friday, he wrote on Truth Social that the Iranian attack was "a foolish violation of our Ceasefire Agreement

Since signing a 60-day truce last week, Trump has said that he would resume fighting against Iran if Tehran violates its terms, which provides for the flow of vessels through the vital waterway and talks over its nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief.

The question now is whether the resumption of strikes will slow progress toward restoring shipping traffic in the vital energy thoroughfare to pre-war levels. Washington and Tehran were able to agree to an interim peace deal last week despite trading strikes in the lead-up to that document being finalized.

But the two sides continue to clash over key provisions of the deal, including whether Iran will impose tolls or other monetary costs on ships seeking to sail through Hormuz. Oman told European officials that vessels may ultimately have to be charged some fees, Bloomberg reported earlier.

Now we wait to see if Iran responds militarily, although we doubt it as the entire operation has a smell of coordinated, jointly orchestrated activity to throw red meat at the respective bases, especially after Iran's revolutionary guards said US forces attacked Sirik Island, and Iran "successfully repelled the attack."

• *IRGC: IRAN IS RESPONDING TO US ATTACKS NEAR STRAIT: ISNA
• *IRGC SAYS IRAN 'SUCCESSFULLY REPELLED' US ATTACK: ISNA

Finally, Fox News tweeted that "military strikes targeting Iran are complete for tonight."

And with that, the show is over. 

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Update (11:55am ET): While today's announcement by Dubai that the UAE was under missile attack proved to be a false alarm, the US ceasefire it nonetheless becoming increasingly unstable. Following yesterday's attack by Iran drones on a cargo ship next to Oman, we were wondering how long until Trump responds (and how), and he did just that moments ago when he posted on Truth Social that Iran shoting "at least four One Way Attack Drones at Ships transversing the Strait of Hormuz" is "a foolish violation of our Ceasefire Agreement." 

However, Trump's post follows earlier reports that the US and Iran had set up a deconfliction hotline involving precisely such events in the Gulf, so we doubt that there will be much if any follow through from this latest round of jawboning, especially now that Trump is set on maintaining the flow of oil through Hormuz as much as possible, which has allowed oil to tumble to pre-war levels.

* * * 

With each week and month that passes since the start of Trump's Operation Epic Fury, more and more reports have come out revealing the massive extent of damage to US military facilities in the Mideast region based on Iran's retaliation across the region. 

This is often based on fresh satellite imaging and analysis, despite US government pressure for these research entities to refrain from publishing such data, and to censor open source photographs. After a series of deep investigative reports, it has been proven time and again that the Pentagon and Washington officials have been downplaying and covering up the real extent of devastation caused by Iranian missiles and drones.

More fresh reporting in the Wall Street Journal once again adds confirmation to this, referencing satellite imagery which shows far more serious damage at a key naval base in Bahrain than the US has publicly acknowledged.

The damage is said to be bad enough that the Pentagon is mulling shrinking its troop presence there and elsewhere in the Gulf, including a potential reduced troop footprint in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Iran is hailing this reported pullback as a significant strategic victory produced by its retaliation.

Unnamed officials were cited in the report as saying American forces could retreat as far westward as Israel, after some bases essentially became unusable or uninhabitable altogether.

Concerning the Bahrain base details, WSJ writes:

Notably in Bahrain the headquarters building for the US Navy in the Middle East was struck and seriously damaged, along with sensitive communications centers being destroyed.

But here is a key, somewhat unexpected line in the Journal report: "The extensive damage done to America’s sole naval base in the Middle East - along with hits to at least 20 U.S. sites across the region, including military installations and diplomatic facilities - has the U.S. re-evaluating its entire footprint in the region, according to U.S. officials familiar with the deliberations.

This means that damaged structures and bases may not be rebuilt at all, and the sites may just be abandoned as future key US military hubs, WSJ says.

The draw-down of expensive Pentagon comms centers could include from Bahrain: "The military is now considering revamping the base in Bahrain, reducing the U.S. presence in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and moving some bases or base functions west, farther from the reach of Iranian missiles and drones, according to the officials familiar with the deliberations," WSJ writes.

Reconstruction costs would be staggering, per the same report:

"The estimated construction costs at NSA Bahrain totaled about $400 million," it continues. But ultimately a draw-back from these locations would be based on the proven reality that Iran can easily hit them at any time.

Some further implications to all this are that in any future flare-up or even return to all-out war between the US and Iran, American forces would find themselves executing a conflict much further away from the theatre itself. For example, dozens of major Air Force refueling tankers have already had to be relocated far away from the Gulf, to places like Tel Aviv. Many were destroyed in the opening weeks of the war while parked at Gulf airfields, clearly over-exposed as it seems Iran knew exactly where to target.

Back in late March, US officials admitted to the NY Times that Iran's significantly retaliation damaging US bases was "a war that is much harder to prosecute."