In the end, Operation Martyr Sulamani, in retaliation for the assassination of its goods general, came quickly in a salvo of missiles on air bases housing American forces in Iraq.

Missiles launched for inside Iran struck two air bases in that bill on al Assad, just west of Baghdad.

Iran says 80 American terrorists were killed, but President Trump tweeted that all was well and said casualties and damage were being assessed.

He'll make a statement at the White House later, but does this straw a line under hostilities going forward?

Middle East editor Jeremy Bowen is in Baghdad.

Iran has been threatening severe retaliation, and the missiles were fired just after midnight.

The Iranians seemed to be trying to calibrate their response to satisfy fury at home and not to provoke President Trump into a particularly destructive military retaliation.

The Iranian foreign minister, Javad Zarif, said in a tweet.

That's the battleground for this diplomacy At the moment that Iran's actions were rooted in international law and Article 51 of the U.

N.

Charter, which deals with a state's right to self defense, he seemed in that tweet to be trying to draw a line under retaliation.

But then quite a different message came from Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader.

He was speaking in calm holy city in Iran, and he seemed to suggest that the night's attacks were not enough.

And tomorrow morning, her opacity, Getty's revenge.

That's something else.

What happened last night was just to slap in the face.

That's something else in Mass.

A lady getting the Ayatollah said the corrupting presence off the United States had to be removed from the region.

The crowd chanted, God is greatest Death to America, Even if this is the beginning of the end of the crisis caused by the assassination, the long term conflict between Iran and the U.

S.

Continues to edge towards war.

On that process won't stop without some kind of diplomacy leading to a political deal.

There seemed to be one back in 2015 when they signed the Iran nuclear agreement, but President Trump pulled out of that a couple of years ago and since then this crisis has grown and grown, there remains a really serious danger off war.

This remains one of the world's most dangerous and unstable conflicts.

German Burnham Ridley Step speaking to us from Baghdad Within the past few hours, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamanei, nine, has demanded.

As we heard the United States leave the Middle East, he had this to say about the attack itself and the mom what you had for battered Getty's revenge.

That's something else.

What happened last night was just to slap in the face.

That's something else in Mass a lady getting, I told her, Ali Khamanei, let's say speak to our security correspondent Frank Gardner, as Jeremy was saying, Frank, I mean slightly different messages coming from the supreme leader and from Iran's foreign minister.

When you read into that were really I think it's symptomatic off the to Iran's.

There is what I call the front of house the fairly sort of emollient statements, relatively mild and moderate, coming from people like the foreign minister, Javad Zarif, who says, You know, we've concluded this, that lets Drawl island, is that the end of it?

But the deep state, the Security, intelligence and Revolutionary Guards establishment in Iran, the hardliners, they're not gonna let it rest it there.

What we've seen now is the end of Phase one.

This is the overt Iranian response, very much for domestic consumption.

There.

We've hit a slap in the face to America.

We punished them.

The domestic narrative is that 80 Americans have been killed by denting.

Anything like that is true.

We haven't even heard of any casualties, but that isn't the end of it.

Over the next few weeks and months, they will continue to harass and Harry U.

S.

Forces in the region not just in Iraq but in other places as well, on the aim being to drive the US out off the wider Middle East, but particular out of Iraq and Syria, clearing away for a swathe of Iranian dominated territory all the way from the Afghan border to the Mediterranean coast.

What's striking there in the immediate aftermath?

President Trump's tweet Pretty neutral, Really.

I mean, things seemed okay.

You need to speak in a few hours time.

It's a Ziff.

Both sides are trying to keep a lid on this.

I mean, is that your sense as well?

I mean, is there any suggestion that there who could have been tipped off about this?

There's no suggestion, but I think it's perfectly possible.

I mean, it is extraordinary that 22 ballistic missiles and these are powerful missiles accurate as well could be aimed directly to bases, housing, coalition and U.

S.

And other forces.

And yet there's not a single casualty reported its extraordinary.

So if you look as well at the attack that took place in Saudi Arabia in September, 25 missiles cruise, Andi drones hit precise bits of machinery in the Saudi oil refinery infrastructure that crippled that I'd put half knocked out half the output in just the space of a few minutes.

So when the Iranians want to do so, I mean, they denied that they say it was the Houthis, but missed experts said the Houthis weren't capable of doing that.

When they really want to do something, they're pretty accurate.

They think very carefully about it.

Remember that the Kurds force that Qassem Suleimani commanded.

This is their bread and butter.

This is what they do.

They are expert at covert operations and military operations, very carefully planned, often reliable.

What's called black ops.

What should we read into?

The fact also that the hard lines of revolution regard have admitted being behind this because that is new, isn't it?

Because normally this is all being played out in something of shadowy proxy proxy fight.

I think there is an acceptance in Washington that, given that the massive impact that the killing of Qasem Soleimani has had on it run on the huge crowds.

The outpouring off lodges grief but calls for vengeance that we saw.

They had to do something pretty big and over and say, Yes, we've struck back at it.

So yes, you're right, it's it's unusual.

It's exceptional for them to do it.

I don't think we're going to see unless there is an American retaliation.

I doubt we're going to see another overt Iranian attack, but we will see some mysterious attacks that properly have the hand of Iran behind them.

But it's be hard to actually pin it to its door.

Right, Frank, if thank you very much indeed.