Long before last week’s U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, and Iran’s retaliatory missile attack, the faint outline of a new American base appeared roughly 30 miles inland from Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea coast.
The base was first visible in satellite imagery in early 2022. Its nascent existence hinted at what military planners had long anticipated: a sustained military conflict with Iran was entirely possible.
If that day ever came, the U.S. military would rely on more than just warplanes and naval ships. It would need a new way to transport and store supplies that lay farther from Iran than most American bases are, and would therefore be less vulnerable to attack.
While the base near the Red Sea, called Logistical Support Area Jenkins, has received little public attention, the images, according to a New York Times analysis of satellite imagery, suggest it is likely to become a major logistical hub.
Until last year, L.S.A. Jenkins appeared to sit mostly idle. But since then, the site has been rapidly expanding, according to the Times analysis. Among the upgrades are expanded facilities for storing ammunition and housing troops as well as improvements to base security.
It could prove crucial if the United States and Iran, or its proxies, end up in another military confrontation. Whether the base played a role in Saturday’s one-off strike mission against Iran is unclear.
A Department of Defense official declined to comment on L.S.A. Jenkins and the base’s role in the region.
The United States has numerous military installations in the Middle East that need access to supplies, ranging from smaller outposts in Syria and Iraq to sprawling bases housing aircraft and naval ships. As far back as 2021, Department of Defense officials expressed interest in developing sites along the Red Sea to help service those bases.
“The initial impetus was to try to push some of the U.S. military infrastructure outside some of Iran’s missile and drone ranges,” Brian Carter, the Middle East portfolio manager at the American Enterprise Institute, said. He added that it could also support other military campaigns, such as fighting the Houthi militants in Yemen.
Many of the existing U.S. bases along the Persian Gulf are highly vulnerable to short-range Iranian missiles, experts and former Western military officials said. On Monday, after days of threats against U.S. forces in the region, missiles from Iran targeted one of those sites, Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, but were intercepted.
The advantage of bases farther away, on the opposite side of Saudi Arabia, is that to target them, Iran must use medium-range ballistic missiles, which are less accurate and reliable, said Decker Eveleth, a research analyst with the Center for Naval Analyses. He added that the longer flight time these missiles need from Iran would allow more time for air defenses to intercept them and for troops to take cover. “Targeting something that’s on the other side of Saudi Arabia, that’s a much more difficult ask,” Mr. Eveleth said.
L.S.A. Jenkins’s location, however, does not fully remove the threat of attacks by short-range munitions. It lies closer to Yemen, where Houthi militants, who the U.S. government says benefit from Iranian weapons components and expertise, have previously launched missiles and drones at U.S. Navy ships in the Red Sea.
When the base was first constructed in 2022, it was little more than two square, paved areas and some empty bunkers partly surrounded by a dirt berm, without any sign of personnel stationed there.
By January 2024, satellite imagery analyzed by The Times showed a small camp consisting of shipping containers and a few white tents established in a corner of the base. Pictures released by the military during a logistics readiness exercise at L.S.A. Jenkins a few months later show trucks pulling into a bare-bones facility of dirt roads and barbed wire fences. Since then, it has expanded significantly.
Satellite imagery captured last week shows dozens of structures and tents, vehicles, paved roads, an upgraded munitions storage site and construction at several locations across the mile-wide facility. In the ammunition caches, white boxes matching the color, size and shape of naval missile canisters are stacked in neat rows of six.
Government contracting documents also detail an uptick in spending on supplies, vehicles and tents for the facility and personnel there, totaling over $3 million, since early 2024. And social media videos show detachments from U.S. Army units responsible for logistics, including the 364th Expeditionary Sustainment Command, have been involved in getting the site up and running.
Satellite imagery and government contracts also show that at least two more American logistical sites have been built at airports in Ta’if and Jeddah — two cities in western Saudi Arabia — though those sites are much smaller and less active than L.S.A. Jenkins. They primarily consist of bunkers used to store munitions and fuel as well as paved areas that could host living quarters and air defense sites.
A slide presentation, presented at a military engineering conference earlier this year, contains proposed plans for an even larger installation at L.S.A. Jenkins, in addition to construction at other bases across the Middle East.
The upgrades in and around the base would include additions to a nearby airport, more munitions storage, vehicle maintenance, wash and staging areas, and a site for troops’ “morale, welfare and recreation.”
“It makes it easier on us, harder on them,” Gen. Frank McKenzie, retired, the former head of U.S. Central Command, said about the role of the bases in a war with Iran. “In every way possible, it’s a good thing.”
Riley Mellen is a reporter on The Times’s Visual Investigations team, which combines traditional reporting with advanced digital forensics.
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