AP satellite analysis finds Iranian strikes damaged 26 US sites, hitting radars first; cheap mass drones unsettle the premise of fixed bases

More than 115 strikes in the order of radars, aircraft, buildings

According to AP, radar enclosures at Camp Arifjan in Kuwait and the naval support activity in Bahrain were destroyed within the first two days, and portable radars were hit at Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia and Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan. The Jordan radar was one of only 13 of its type in the US Army at about half a billion dollars each, and the Qatar radar came from a 1.1 billion dollar contract in 2013. N.R. Jenzen-Jones of ARES said Iran prioritised the backbone of US air defence.

In the first month more than 50 strikes at 18 locations targeted aircraft, damaging an E-3 early-warning aircraft, and the Congressional Research Service counts 15 US aircraft damaged. Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait was struck more than 30 times, with at least 15 hangars destroyed. A drone attack on Port Shuaiba on 1 March killed six US soldiers. The Pentagon estimates damage above 5 billion dollars and CSIS puts structural rebuilding alone above 4 billion. CENTCOM declines to detail damage on operational-security grounds.

Withheld imagery and the Pentagon's rebuttal

AP notes that major imagery providers with US government contracts blocked or delayed releases at Washington's request, so the gap was filled from other suppliers such as Airbus OneAtlas. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell replied that forces and bases are well protected and stronger than ever. Two regional officials said the US has moved many aircraft, air-defence systems and communications equipment out of the Gulf, and the Wall Street Journal reports that relocating bases beyond Iranian range is under consideration. The overall picture of damage thus rests on independent imagery analysis amid information control and repositioning.

What cheap mass drone attacks ask of fixed bases

Raphael Cohen of RAND said modern forces are susceptible to large-scale, cheap drone attacks and that the idea of relying on fixed infrastructure is over. The sequence of blinding sensors first, then aircraft, then personnel facilities is a textbook suppression-of-air-defence pattern executed with inexpensive drones. Layered counter-drone defence and the dispersal and hardening of bases therefore bear directly on the design of forward bases, including in the Indo-Pacific. The AP piece does not mention AI and gives no breakdown of the systems used, so the degree of autonomy involved is unverified.