http://www.militarytimes.com/articles/trump-tweets-put-nerve-center-of-isis-war-in-the-middle-of-qatar-dispute
President Trump took to Twitter Tuesday morning and attacked a country that hosts the beating heart of his quest to crush the Islamic State militant group in Iraq and Syria, leaving national security experts stunned and wondering what impact his words would have on the U.S. military's presence in the Middle East.
In the wake of a massive rift in relations between Qatar and its neighbors, Trump took to Twitter and strongly implied that Qatar was funding Islamist extremists and seemed to take credit for Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates all breaking off diplomatic relations with Doha on Monday. The nations claimed to take the action because Qatar was funding the Muslim Brotherhood and the Islamic State. Libya, Yemen and Maldives have all since joined the Gulf states.
“During my recent trip to the Middle East I stated that there can no longer be funding of Radical Ideology,” Trump tweeted. “Leaders pointed to Qatar — look!" He later tweeted that it was, "So good to see the Saudi Arabia visit with the King and 50 countries already paying off. They said they would take a hard line on funding extremism, and all reference was pointing to Qatar. Perhaps this will be the beginning of the end to the horror of terrorism!"
The comments from the president immediately raised the stakes for a major U.S. hub in the region at Al-Udeid Air Base, a central part of the U.S. air war in Iraq and Syria, and which houses 10,000 American troops and aircraft such as B-52 Stratofortresses, C-130 Hercules, KC-135 Stratotankers and E-8 JSTARS. Some worried that his taking sides could precipitate a break with Qatar and leave the U.S. looking for a new place to run the war from in a region mired in tensions.
It is hard to overstate how crucial Al-Udeid is to the coalition’s war against the Islamic State. It is the home of U.S. Central Command's forward headquarters, as well as the Combined Air Operations Center, which the Air Force has repeatedly called the “nerve center” of the air campaigns it wages in the Middle East. The CAOC provides command and control of U.S. and allied nations’ air power over 20 nations there, including Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.
Many national security experts were shocked that Trump would weigh in on the rift, especially since only the day before Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had called on all sides to resolve the feud peacefully. In an email, Peter Singer, an analyst with the New America Foundation, blasted Trump’s decision to weigh in on the Qatar rift.
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