IRGC Reports 650 U.S. Casualties

(MENAFN) Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has released sharply divergent casualty figures from its retaliatory strikes against U.S. forces, setting off a fierce battle of competing narratives between Tehran and Washington, local media reported Tuesday.

An IRGC spokesperson claimed up to 650 American soldiers were either killed or wounded across the first two days of what the corps characterized as retaliatory operations. The spokesperson alleged that IRGC missiles and drones struck the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain on multiple occasions, asserting that attacks on U.S. military installations there alone produced 160 casualties.

The U.S. military offered a drastically lower accounting. As of 4 p.m. Monday (2100 GMT), Washington confirmed six service members had been killed in active military operations against Iran. U.S. media separately reported 18 additional troops sustained serious wounds. U.S. officials flatly rejected the IRGC's Bahrain claims, stating no fatalities had occurred at any American bases there.

The IRGC spokesperson further alleged that a U.S. combat support vessel sustained heavy damage from Iranian missiles, and reiterated that four cruise missiles had been fired at the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, which the spokesperson claimed subsequently "fled" southeast toward the Indian Ocean.

U.S. Central Command swiftly and formally rebuked those assertions, branding the Iranian claims as "disinformation" and a "lie," and insisting the missiles launched by Iran "didn't even come close" to striking the carrier.

Independent verification of claims made by either side remains impossible at this time.

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