United States forces struck five Iranian oil tankers on Tuesday, sinking one, after Iran twice tried to hit a US Navy warship — and Tehran retaliated by firing 20 ballistic missiles at a base in Jordan used by American forces.
Four crude oil carriers were struck in the Gulf of Oman and a fifth near Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf, US Central Command said. Centcom described the vessels as part of a “multi-billion-dollar shadow network that funds the IRGC and its regional proxies.”
One of the ships, identified as the M/T Riesco, was filmed on fire and sinking in the Gulf of Oman in video Centcom posted to X, CNN reported. US forces instructed the crews of all the targeted vessels to abandon ship before the strikes.
The strikes answered two Iranian attempts to hit a US Navy ship over the preceding two days. The ship evaded the ballistic missiles and continued patrolling, Centcom said, adding that “no American personnel were harmed.”
Jordan intercepted 18 of 20
Iran said it had targeted Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, a facility in Jordan used by US forces. The Jordanian army said its air defences intercepted 18 of the 20 ballistic missiles, with the other two falling in unpopulated areas. No casualties were reported.
Iranian accounts put the strikes closer to shore than Centcom did. The semi-official Tasnim agency said one tanker was hit four miles from Kharg; state broadcaster IRIB said a second was hit off the coast of Jask, near the Gulf of Oman, and that the crews of both were taken ashore in lifeboats.
A threat to shipping at Gulf ports
The IRGC Navy Command warned crews on tankers near ports in Kuwait and Bahrain to leave their vessels, in a statement carried by IRIB.
“We warn all crews aboard oil tankers in the vicinity of ports in Kuwait and Bahrain — which host these (American) terrorists and are partners in their hostile actions — to immediately leave their vessels, whether they are at anchor or docked at the ports, as the vessels will be targeted.”
Oil rose in early Asian trading. Benchmark Brent crude was up 1.5 per cent at $99.41, with US-traded oil 1.6 per cent higher at $94.55, Hiru News reported, carrying BBC copy. Brent was at $96 a week ago.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking to reporters in Barranquilla during a trip to Colombia, said the pattern would hold. “Iran continues to try to hit US naval ships and for every time they do that, or try to do that, they’re going to lose tankers.”
Separately on Tuesday, the Trump administration sanctioned 27 Iranian airlines and nine service providers and sales agents accused of servicing Mahan Air, under US sanctions since 2011.
The count from the weekend was higher than first reported
Centcom’s account also revises the record of the previous round. US forces struck three Iranian crude oil carriers at the weekend after the IRGC tried to attack a US aircraft carrier and a guided-missile destroyer.
When that strike was reported on September 5, Iranian agencies described a single tanker hit near Kharg by four missiles, and neither Tehran nor Washington had confirmed anything. The weekend total was three.
The war began with US and Israeli attacks on Iran on 28 February, more than six months ago. Fighting flared again last week after a month of relative calm.
Why this reaches Sri Lanka
The strikes fell on the same day the US Embassy in Colombo formally asked Sri Lanka’s Foreign Ministry whether it was aware of, and monitoring, the Iranian vessels anchored off the island. Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath put the count at 47 vessels in international waters more than 24 nautical miles out, and said the Navy is watching them.
Neither government has linked the two. But the class of vessel Centcom struck on Tuesday — sanctions-evading tankers it calls a shadow network funding the IRGC — is the same class the Foreign Ministry described off the southern coast in late August, when it cited tracking services for close to 20 Iranian tankers near the Exclusive Economic Zone, most of them shadow-fleet ships.
Sri Lanka has already seen this war reach its waters. A Deputy Minister of Defence confirmed in April that a US submarine had sunk the IRIS Dena roughly 19 nautical miles off the coast.
Not reported
Neither outlet says whether any of the 47 vessels off Sri Lanka belong to the network Centcom named, or whether Washington has raised the tankers with Colombo as targets rather than as a monitoring question. Centcom has not said where the four Gulf of Oman tankers were registered or how many crew were taken off. No casualty figure has been given for the tanker crews, and Iran has not confirmed the loss of the M/T Riesco. It is not stated whether the IRGC’s warning to crews at Kuwaiti and Bahraini ports has disrupted loadings, or whether Jordan will respond beyond the interceptions.
Ada Derana’s site returned a CloudFront block on every attempt at the time of filing, so its coverage could not be verified or dated.
