The United States military launched strikes on Iranian targets Wednesday night after Iran tried to attack American forces the day before.

U.S. Central Command called it “a powerful response,” which is military language for: You had your chance to stop being idiots, and now your stuff is exploding.

Iran fired missiles toward a base in Jordan where American troops are stationed. The United States says it intercepted the attack, meaning Iran launched a bunch of expensive missiles and accomplished basically nothing except making America angry.

President Donald Trump had already promised retaliation.

And when Trump says America is going to hit back, it turns out he does not mean sending Iran a strongly worded letter written by some State Department nerd.

He means missiles.

The new American strikes are another escalation after several quieter days in the war. Apparently Iran saw a brief period without massive explosions and decided that was unacceptable.

The United States also teamed up with Saudi Arabia to attack Iranian-backed militias in Iraq. At least 20 militia fighters and six Iranian advisers were reportedly killed.

Iran loves using militias in other countries because it wants to attack people without admitting it is attacking people. It is basically the international version of getting your little brother to start a fight and then pretending you had nothing to do with it.

Unfortunately for Iran, America knows who is paying the little brother.

Iranian state television released footage that it claims shows missiles being launched at American airbases in Jordan.

Great job, guys. You filmed yourselves launching missiles at the most powerful military in human history.

That should end well.

The fighting comes after about five months of war that has raised gas prices, damaged the world economy, and made normal Americans wonder why Iran cannot go one week without starting some new B.S.

Some people are also worried that America is using too many advanced missiles and other weapons defending its bases and allies.

Here is another idea: Iran could stop firing missiles at Americans.

Then we would not have to use missiles to shoot down their missiles before launching even more missiles at the places where they keep their missiles.

This whole thing is extremely complicated according to foreign-policy experts, which means they will explain it for six hours and somehow never mention the obvious part:

Iran attacked American troops.

America hit back harder.

Now a bunch of Iranian military officers are probably standing around a smoking crater wondering why they thought this was a good idea.