NATO shot down an Iranian ballistic missile heading toward Turkish airspace on Wednesday, and the Turkish Ministry of Defense said it is unclear whether the missile was targeted at Turkey. However, a senior U.S. military official and a Western official said the missile appeared to be aimed at Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey, which hosts U.S. and other allied forces. If true, this would mark a significant escalation of the war that has spread from the Middle East to the Indian Ocean and could trigger NATO's collective defense clause. On the same day, the U.S. Senate rejected a war powers resolution that sought to limit the president's ability to continue ordering strikes against Iran without congressional approval, marking the first test of Congress' response to Trump's bypassing of authorization for the action against Iran. The report said that Democrats, along with Republican Senator Rand Paul, pushed the bill, but most Republican senators still supported the president.
On the battlefield, the U.S. military said that the operation against Iran had struck more than 2,000 targets and sunk 20 Iranian warships, and the focus of the operation will now shift from the sea to the Iranian interior. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine said the next phase will involve deeper strikes. Defense Secretary Hegseth said during the same briefing that U.S. and Israeli forces will achieve "complete air superiority" over Iran within days and will launch a second round of large-scale air strikes using 500-pound and 2,000-pound bombs. On Wednesday, the Israeli military announced a new round of strikes against Iranian facilities, including missile facilities, targets related to the Basij militia under the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and internal security force command structures. Iranian state media said the funeral of Khamenei, who was assassinated, has been "indefinitely postponed" to allow mourners time to travel to Tehran. Meanwhile, Iran continues to retaliate against U.S. interests and allies, and the U.S. has warned American citizens to leave the region immediately, but the embassy and airspace closure orders have made the evacuation more complicated.
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Original: toutiao.com/article/1858805258741771/
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