The Iranian Revolutionary Guard(IRGC) has claimed that it has hit a US tanker in the northern Gulf this morning in retialation to the US submarine sinking its warships and killing dozens of its sailors on board on Wednesday. The statement noted that any military and commercial vessels belong to the US, Israel, and European countries that support them will not be allowed to pass through.
“If they are observed, they will certainly be hit,” IRGC said.
“We had previously said that, based on international laws and resolutions, in times of war, the Islamic Republic of Iran will have the right to control the passage through the Strait of Hormuz,” IRGC said, Iran’s Tasnim News reports.
The IRGC strike on the US tanker is in retaliation to the US attack on its on Iranian ship in Indian Ocean that had killed 87 Iranian sailors. Sri Lankan Navy later came to the rescue and saved 32 sailors. The ship said to have 160 people on board.
A torpedo fired by the US submarine sank an Iranian warship off the south coast of Sri Lanka as the Trump administration followed through on its threat to destroy Tehran’s military, navy, and political leadership. The Iranian frigate was sailing in international waters as it returned from the naval exercise organized in Visakhapatnam, India, in the Bay of Bengal.
The torpedo strike prompted questions from the former U.S. officials about whether Washington’s aim of eliminating all of Iran’s military breached international laws. Iranian authorities, including the foreign minister, had expressed anger on the attack by the U.S. submarine on Indian or Iranian sailors.
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“The U.S. has perpetrated an atrocity at sea, 2,000 miles away from Iran’s shores. Frigate Dena, a guest of India’s Navy carrying almost 130 sailors, was struck in international waters without warning,” he said in a post on X. “Mark my words: The U.S. will come to bitterly regret (the) precedent it has set.”
FIRST SINKING OF AN ENEMY SHIP BY TORPEDO SINCE WWII: Video released by the Pentagon shows the torpedo strike that sank an Iranian warship near Sri Lanka, roughly 1,000 miles from Iran’s coastal waters, in the Indian Ocean.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth confirmed during a… pic.twitter.com/omHnPNxHnI
— CBS News (@CBSNews) March 4, 2026
“An American submarine sank an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters,” US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said at the Pentagon. “Instead, it was sunk by a torpedo. Quiet death.”
Video shared by the U.S. showed a massive explosion in the warship that was hit by a torpedo. The attack blew apart the rear of the vessel, after which the ship sank soon. It is the first time since the World War II that an American submarine has sunk any ship using a torpedo. U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, addressing reporters, said that the Iranian warship died a quiet death.
“An American submarine sank an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters,” Hegseth said.
