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Washington: The United States Navy has torpedoed an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean – the first time an enemy vessel has been sunk by an American torpedo since World War II – as Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth boasted that the US was “just getting started” in its military campaign.
Hegseth also appeared to confirm reports that the US, through its Central Intelligence Agency, was working to arm Kurdish opposition forces in preparation to overthrow the Iranian regime. “What other entities may be doing, we’re aware of, but our objectives aren’t centred on that,” he told reporters.
CNN was the first to report on Tuesday (US time) that the CIA was in active discussions with Iranian opposition groups and Kurdish leaders in Iraq about providing military support, citing four sources familiar with the matter.
President Donald Trump has told the Iranian public to stand by; that it is too dangerous to take to the streets right now, but when the time comes, they must “take over” the government.
As the conflict entered a fifth day, Hegseth and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dan Caine, told reporters the US and Israel were in a militarily dominant position and on the cusp of uncontested control over Iran’s skies.
“America is winning – decisively, devastatingly and without mercy,” Hegseth said. “They are toast, and they know it,” he added, promising “death and destruction from the sky all day long”.
Hegseth confirmed the Americans were responsible for sinking an Iranian warship, the IRIS Dena, off the coast of Sri Lanka. Caine said it was hit by a Mark 48 torpedo fired from a US fast attack submarine, and added to the list of 20 Iranian naval vessels destroyed since the campaign began.
Sri Lankan authorities said about 180 people were on board the vessel: 87 bodies were pulled from the water, another 32 were rescued, and about 60 people were unaccounted for. Hegseth called their fate a “quiet death”.
Defence Department spokesman Sean Parnell said the US “will not stop until Iran’s navy is completely and utterly destroyed”.
Caine said with dominance of Iran’s skies, US forces would expand their attacks inland, striking “progressively deeper into Iranian territory”, and increasing their use of overhead bombs, rather than missiles fired from afar.
Hegseth declined to provide any further information about a deadly strike on an Iranian girls’ school that killed at least 165 students, according to Iranian authorities.
Despite several days passing since the tragedy, Hegseth said the US was still looking into whose munition was responsible for the strike. “All I can say is that we’re investigating that,” he said. “We, of course, never target civilian targets.”
The defence secretary repeated that US forces were operating under their own rules of engagement, or what he called “maximum authorities” that had been personally granted by Trump and himself. He was not asked to explain what that meant.
“This was never meant to be a fair fight, and it isn’t,” he said. “We are punching them while they are down.”
Meanwhile, the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Ali Larijani lashed out at US President Donald Trump, calling him “clownish” and suggesting he was in the pocket of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
He falsely claimed 500 American troops were killed in the war’s first few days; the US says six service members have died.
“Trump has dragged the American people into an unjust war with Iran as a result of Netanyahu’s vile impulses and his clownish actions,” Larijani wrote on X. “Is the slogan still ‘America First’, or has it become ‘Israel First’?”
Those comments directly tapped into arguments made by Trump’s domestic political base, parts of which are deeply sceptical about the intervention in Iran and US support for Israel.
“The story has not ended yet, and the martyrdom of [former supreme leader] Khamenei will come at a heavy price for you.”
There has been speculation that Trump could seek to make a deal to put Larijani in power, although the 67-year-old son of a cleric has denied this and said Iran would not negotiate with the US.
Trump said Venezuela demonstrated the “perfect scenario” for how the mission in Iran could end. In that case, after US forces captured and removed the country’s leader, Nicolás Maduro, the administration did a deal to install his vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, as interim president.
That relationship has so far endured, though Reuters reported on Tuesday that the Trump administration was quietly building a legal case against Rodriguez - including a criminal indictment – which could be used to gain further leverage over her.
Larijani’s comments came as prominent MAGA commentators targeted Trump using similar rhetoric.
Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News host who now has the sixth most popular podcast in the US, according to Spotify, told listeners the war was not designed to make America safer.
“This happened because Israel wanted it to happen. This is Israel’s war, this is not the United States’ war,” he said on The Tucker Carlson Show on Tuesday. “The United States committed troops to this conflict because the prime minister of Israel demanded it.”
Trump has also acknowledged that the worst outcome in Iran would be to install a leader who, in five years’ time, turned out to be no better than their predecessor.
Read more on the US-Israel-Iran war:
- Live updates: US ‘just getting started’, says Hegseth
- “This isn’t Winston Churchill”: Trump sprays Starmer, says Iran decimated
- Tracking the war: Where the US struck and where Iran retaliated
- Israel attacks Lebanon: What is Hezbollah and why is Israel attacking Lebanon?
- The three men to stop Trump: Who are the Islamic Republic’s interim leadership team?
- Opinion: This war is likely to be long and bloody, writes Amin Saikal
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