Defense One reported on Thursday night that 11 US troops sustained injuries in the strikes, which followed report after report after report that some Americans were blown out of towers and received concussions when the missiles hit.

That prompted the Pentagon, following a week of administration assurances that the US had suffered no casualties, to admit there were indeed victims of the Islamic Republic’s assault.

Those service members from al-Asad airbase in Iraq were “treated for concussion symptoms from the blast and are still being assessed” in Germany and Kuwait, Capt. Bill Uriarte, a spokesperson for US Central Command, said in a Thursday night statement sent to reporters.

“When deemed fit for duty, the service members are expected to return to Iraq following screening. The health and welfare of our personnel is a top priority and we will not discuss any individual’s medical status,” he added.

President Donald Trump’s clear red line with Iran was that its military or regional proxies couldn’t kill an American. If they did, the US would respond forcefully. He followed through on that red line in late December after a Tehran-backed proxy militia killed a US contractor in Iraq, prompting the president to strike five of the group’s sites, leaving 25 members dead and another 50 injured.

And after members of that same militia — Kata’ib Hezbollah — surrounded and breached the US Embassy in Baghdad on New Year’s Eve, setting the front reception room ablaze, Trump opted to kill top Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani on January 2.

Six days later, Iran responded with its own counterstrike, launching 16 missiles at the al-Asad airbase and another site in Iraq’s north.

Thankfully, no one died in the attack — leading many to speculate that Iran had purposely tried to avoid killing anyone to try to limit the potential US response.

“This threat exists,” said the German defence minister, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, at a press conference in London.

She was asked about an article in the Washington Post that claimed Trump had secretly warned France, Germany and the UK that the US would impose a “25% tariffs on European cars” if they did not activate the mechanism for the settlement of disputes (MRD) of the Iranian international nuclear agreement reached in Vienna in 2015.

Kramp-Karrenbauer told reporters on Thursday: “This expression or threat, as you will, does exist.” She is in the UK to meet her counterpart, Ben Wallace, to discuss Anglo-European defence cooperation post-Brexit.

Her remarks came as ministers from the five countries with nationals killed in the Ukrainian plane downed by the Iranian military met in London to coordinate their response to the Iran’s handling of the crash inquiry, as well as treatment of victim’s families.

Following the meeting the ministers called for an independent and transparent investigation governed by international civil aviation conventions. With emotions running high over the US assassination of Iranian commander Qassem Suleimani, as well as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ belated admission of responsibility for downing the jet, Iran is likely to bridle at being told how to carry out its own inquiry.

A Ukraine International Airlines Boeing 737 plane was shot down outside Tehran killing all 176 crew and passengers. Iran’s handling of the crash led to four days of street protests mainly in Tehran.

Iran initially denied responsibility for the crash, but three days later admitted that it had downed the plane believing it was an incoming US missile. An Iranian national security commission is investigating the episode.

There is concern that some in Iran are refusing to cooperate with the international investigation and refusing to hand over the black box flight recorder. There are claims within the country that the US may have jammed Iranian radar, making it impossible for the anti-aircraft battery operator to have checked the status of the plane.

Trump made his tariffs threat to Europe relatively recently and European diplomats insist they had already made the decision in principle to trigger the dispute mechanism because of previous Iranian steps away from the deal, but had not announced the move in deference to a request from China.

As a result they claim the Trump threat did not push Europe into abandoning its policy of trying to keep the nuclear deal with Iran alive.

But the threat is a further insight into Trump’s modus operandi, with Europe – in effect using threats of economic sanctions and the power of the dollar to try to force Europe to follow US foreign policy.

The news will only confirm the view of Iranian foreign minister, Javad Zarif, that Europe is failing to stand up to a high school bully. Zarif met the EU external affairs chief, Josep Borrell, to discuss the European decision to trigger the dispute mechanism, describing it as “a strategic mistake”.

Meanwhile, the Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, revealed that Iran is now enriching more uranium than it did before it agreed to a nuclear deal with world powers in 2015.

Speaking on live TV on Thursday, Rouhani said: “We are enriching more uranium than before the deal was reached … Pressure has increased on Iran but we continue to progress.”

Iran has gradually scaled back its commitments under the nuclear deal in retaliation to Washington’s withdrawal from the pact in 2018 and its reimposition of sanctions that have crippled the country’s economy.

Trump withdrew from the nuclear agreement in part because it did not address Iran’s support for armed groups across the region and its ballistic missile programme.

Iran continued to abide by the agreement until last summer, when it began openly breaching some of its limits, saying it would not be bound by the deal if it saw none of its promised economic benefits.

After the airstrike on 3 January that killed Gen Qassem Suleimani, the architect of Iran’s regional military operations, Iran said it would abandon all restrictions in the nuclear deal.

Kaine said Tuesday the new resolution now has support from Republican Sens. Todd Young of Indiana and Susan Collins of Maine, giving him the four GOP votes he needs for it to pass. Republicans Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Rand Paul of Kentucky also back it.

“[I] expect to vote for — if offered the opportunity — the amended Kaine resolution,” Young said earlier Tuesday, emphasizing that he did not support the initial draft. “It’s important that Congress at this time affirm our Article I responsibilities, so long as we don’t undermine the president’s Article II responsibilities, that’s all the Kaine resolution says.”

Collins on Tuesday said Congress can’t be sidelined on important decisions.

“The Kaine resolution would continue to allow the President to respond to emergencies created by aggression from any hostile nation, including Iran, and to repel an imminent attack by Iran or its proxy forces,” she said in a statement. “It simply makes clear that only the Legislative Branch may declare war or commit our armed forces to a sustained military conflict with Iran.”

Lee and Paul said last week they would also back Kaine’s resolution after some changes to its language. Lee announced his support after top Trump administration officials briefed lawmakers about the killing of top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, which the Utah Republican described as “the worst” he’d seen on a military issue in his nine years in the Senate.

In a lengthy piece detailing how the president’s top advisers coalesced behind the strike on Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, The Journal reported that Trump had told associates he felt pressured to satisfy senators who were pushing for stronger US action against Soleimani and who will run defense for him on impeachment.

One of Trump’s most outspoken supporters, GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham, appears to be the only congressional lawmaker Trump briefed about his plan to assassinate Soleimani in the days leading up to the strike.

“I was briefed about the potential operation when I was down in Florida,” Graham told Fox News. “I appreciate being brought into the orbit.”

The South Carolina Republican, an Iran hawk, celebrated the controversial strike, which the administration did not seek congressional authorization to carry out. After Iran retaliated by hitting US-occupied Iraqi bases on Tuesday, Graham called the move “an act of war.”

Graham has criticized the president’s foreign-policy choices in the past – most notably Trump’s withdrawal of troops from northern Syria and his handling of Saudi Arabia following the country’s murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a US resident.

Trump said on Thursday that he approved the strike on Soleimani because the general was plotting to bomb the US Embassy in Iraq.