The Week: America’s Alarming Bomber Evacuation

• There may have been signs that Kimberly Guilfoyle has bad judgment.

• The U.S. rushed to evacuate its fleet of B-1 bombers from England’s Royal Air Force Fairford military base. According to the Wall Street Journal, the move was a necessary response to a “multifaceted Iranian plot to target the aircraft and kill personnel at RAF Fairford, including American pilots,” which could include a “complex drone attack ordered by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.” That the Islamic Republic could plausibly execute such an operation is alarming. If British soil isn’t safe for America’s most complex and sensitive weapons platforms, America’s deployments in Europe will have to be reconsidered. The evacuation came after the arrest of five masked individuals who were behaving suspiciously outside the base. The facts of that incident remain unclear. What’s certain, however, is that the U.K. must get its house in order. It has allowed its ability to project military power abroad to atrophy on the assumption that the United States will always be there to backstop its shortcomings. At the same time, it now apparently can’t even provide us with secure bases. NATO countries have legitimately complained about President Donald Trump’s tendency to unnecessarily strain alliances, but it shouldn’t be too much to expect basic competence on the part of our friends.

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• There may have been signs that Kimberly Guilfoyle has bad judgment.

• The U.S. rushed to evacuate its fleet of B-1 bombers from England’s Royal Air Force Fairford military base. According to the Wall Street Journal, the move was a necessary response to a “multifaceted Iranian plot to target the aircraft and kill personnel at RAF Fairford, including American pilots,” which could include a “complex drone attack ordered by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.” That the Islamic Republic could plausibly execute such an operation is alarming. If British soil isn’t safe for America’s most complex and sensitive weapons platforms, America’s deployments in Europe will have to be reconsidered. The evacuation came after the arrest of five masked individuals who were behaving suspiciously outside the base. The facts of that incident remain unclear. What’s certain, however, is that the U.K. must get its house in order. It has allowed its ability to project military power abroad to atrophy on the assumption that the United States will always be there to backstop its shortcomings. At the same time, it now apparently can’t even provide us with secure bases. NATO countries have legitimately complained about President Donald Trump’s tendency to unnecessarily strain alliances, but it shouldn’t be too much to expect basic competence on the part of our friends.