US Forces Carry Out Military Strike on Iran’s Strategic Qشم Island While Iran Fires Missiles in Response; IRGC Claims Seizure of Two US Drones and Downings Amid Escalating Tensions
WASHINGTON : U.S. officials said they responded to an alleged Iranian fire of a surface-to-air missile from qeshm Island at an American aircraft by destroying the missile launcher. Washington has been playing it off and on the radar screen so as not to draw in a broader operation.
Iranian news agencies claimed to have heard “at least five powerful explosions” on qeshm Island, which suggests an attack against “critical sites.” Located at the mouth of the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most important energy transit chokepoint, qeshm Island is home to a number of major Iranian underground missile sites, a naval base and a central desalination plant.
In a retaliatory escalation Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) reportedly captured two American drones with sophisticated electronic warfare equipment and destroyed an MQ-9 Reaper drone with air defense systems, releasing footage of the incident. IRGC claimed that all the U.S. MQ-M drones captured so far are four, adding that 55 MQ-9 drones were shot down throughout the war.