On May 4, US Central Command (CENTCOM) denied that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) struck a US warship in the Strait of Hormuz. The IRGC claimed to have a US Navy frigate the same day that CENTCOM announced “Project Freedom,” the US effort to “restore freedom of navigation for commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.”
The IRGC claimed that two missiles struck the US warship operating near Bandar-e-Jask, a small Iranian city and port on the coast of the Gulf of Oman, after the vessel “ignored warnings from the Revolutionary Guard to halt,” Al Jazeera reported. The IRGC’s claim was amplified by Iran’s state media.
The US military is enforcing a blockade against Iran and is intercepting ships that are coming and going from Iranian ports. The blockade line is in the Gulf of Oman.
CENTCOM denied that any of its ships were hit, and stated that its vessels are “supporting Project Freedom and enforcing the naval blockade on Iranian ports.”
“No U.S. Navy ships have been struck,” CENTCOM said on its official X account. However, CENTCOM did not confirm or deny whether US warships were targeted by missiles and if any missed their target or were intercepted.
Iran has a track record of falsely claiming successful attacks on US assets. Near the start of the conflict, on March 1, Iran said that its ballistic missiles struck the USS Abraham Lincoln, a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier. CENTCOM rebutted this claim on March 1, calling it a “LIE,” and stated that the “missiles launched didn’t even come close.”
US launches Project Freedom to reopen the Strait of Hormuz
Iran’s claim of striking a US Navy frigate took place just as the US announced Project Freedom, its effort to end Iran’s blockade of the vital Strait of Hormuz, which Iran closed immediately after the US and Israel initiated military operations on February 28. More than 2,000 ships have been trapped in the Persian Gulf since Iran started blocking the strategic waterway, including hundreds of oil tankers and cargo ships.
Project Freedom “will support merchant vessels seeking to freely transit through the essential international trade corridor,” CENTCOM stated on X. “A quarter of the world’s oil trade at sea and significant volumes of fuel and fertilizer products are transported through the strait.”
CENTCOM stated that US military assets devoted to Project Freedom “will include guided-missile destroyers, over 100 land and sea-based aircraft, multi-domain unmanned platforms, and 15,000 service members.”
Given the timing of the Project Freedom’s announcement and the source of the information on the purported attack on a US frigate—the Iranian government—it is possible that Iran is attempting to deter merchant vessels trapped in the Persian Gulf from cooperating with the US Navy.
