Washington / Tehran — The United States has rejected Iran’s claim that it captured several American soldiers during the ongoing conflict, calling the allegation false and misleading.
The claim was made by Ali Larijani, head of Iran’s National Security Council, who wrote on social media platform X that several U.S. troops had been taken prisoner since the war began last week. According to Larijani, Iran had been informed that the American soldiers were captured, although the United States was claiming they were killed in combat.
“The truth cannot be hidden for long,” Larijani wrote.
However, the U.S. military quickly dismissed the claim. U.S. Navy Captain Tim Hawkins said the Iranian leadership was spreading misinformation. Officials from the United States Central Command (CENTCOM) also described the claim as “false and deceptive.”
The conflict intensified after the United States and Israel launched a joint military campaign against Iran on February 28, an operation widely referred to as Operation Epic Fury.
Since the start of the operation, at least six American troops have been killed. They died in a drone strike carried out by Iran at a port in Kuwait on March 1. Their bodies were later returned to the United States, where Donald Trump attended a transfer ceremony at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.
Iranian state-linked Tasnim News Agency reported that about 1,332 people have been killed in the fighting over the past week. Among them were 180 children who died in an attack on a school in the southeastern Iranian city of Minab.
An analysis by The New York Times suggested the United States may have been responsible for the strike, although Trump has blamed Iran for the incident.
Despite growing casualties and criticism at home, Trump said he remains confident of victory. “We are winning the war by a large margin. We have destroyed their evil empire,” he said, while refusing to rule out sending ground troops to Iran.
The military operation has also sparked debate within the United States. Several figures within the “Make America Great Again” political movement, including media personality Megyn Kelly and former congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, have criticized the campaign, arguing that it contradicts Trump’s “America First” pledge.
A recent public survey found that 56 percent of Americans oppose the war.
