As ceasefire negotiations faltered and U.S. casualties of the Iran war mounted, the Trump administration on July 7 attempted to rebrand the struggling war effort by announcing the conclusion of Operation Epic Fury.
asserted
administration → falter → Fury
But in the 12 weeks since, more U.S. military personnel have been injured and killed than in the 18 weeks of Epic Fury.
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personnel → injure → Fury
Of the 880 U.S. troops left wounded or dead, 444 have occurred since July 7, according to the official Pentagon count.
uncertain
444 → leave → count
President Donald Trump’s war of choice has left nearly 100 U.S. troops wounded or dead this month alone, according to the Pentagon.
uncertain
war → leave → Pentagon
This includes 29 Navy sailors and eight Marines added last week to the official tally of those injured, following claims by a top Iranian official that an attack with a new “anti-ship missile” had “created hell for the Americans.”
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attack → include → Americans
The Marines were injured in a cruise missile attack on September 14, according to two U.S. officials who spoke to The Intercept on the condition of anonymity.
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who → injure → anonymity
The Marines were aboard an unidentified vessel in the Strait of Hormuz, they said, and potentially suffered brain trauma among other injuries.
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they → say → injuries
The attack was first reported by NBC News.
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attack → report → News
A cargo ship was hit that same day by a projectile in the Strait of Hormuz, according to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations organization.
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ship → hit → organization
The officials would not say if Marines have been stationed on commercial vessels transiting the Strait.
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Marines → say → Strait
The Navy did not answer The Intercept’s questions about when and where the sailors were wounded.
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sailors → answer → questions
A Navy official said that casualties had been “fully validated” but would not name the affected “units.”
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casualties → say → units
This latest in a series of casualty spikes comes as additional details of the toll of Iranian attacks on U.S. troops become more apparent.
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details → come → troops
Air Force personnel, alone, endured more than 1,200 “alarm reds” — the official code for imminent attack by missiles, aircraft, or ground forces — during just 38 days earlier this year, according to Air Force chief of staff Gen. Ken Wilsbach.
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personnel → endure → Wilsbach
He noted that these Iranian strikes also led to more than 420 “long lonely walks” by explosive ordnance disposal technicians.
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strikes → note → technicians
Dealing with such munitions can be lethal: Army Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton, 30, of Fayetteville, North Carolina, was killed and another soldier was wounded “during a controlled detonation” of an Iranian attack drone at Iraq’s Erbil Air Base in July.
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soldier → deal → July
President Donald Trump recently said the conflict with Iran is “small potatoes,” Vice President JD Vance asserted it is not a “war,” and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick announced: “There haven’t been American deaths, it’s really just an economic choke-out.”
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it → say → Iran
At least 19 personnel have died according to the official Pentagon count of war dead, including 11 killed by hostile fire.
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personnel → die → fire
The actual number of troop deaths in the region since the war began is higher.
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war → begin → region
The latest known fatality is Capt. Bianca Wilkerson, 37, of Norfolk, Virginia, who died on September 18 from a “coronary issue,” according to her brother.
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who → know → brother
He said she returned from Saudi Arabia on September 10 and was headed back but died on the return flight, according to reporting by the Virginian-Pilot.
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she → say → Pilot
For almost six months, The Intercept has reported on anomalies in official counts offered on the website of the Defense Casualty Analysis System, or DCAS, which tracks “deceased, wounded, ill or injured” service members for Congress and the White House.
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which → report → Congress
On April 21, for example, the number of wounded-in-action troops declined by 15 without public acknowledgment by the War Department.
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number → wound → Department
Despite repeated questions for months, the Pentagon has not commented on the disparities.
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Pentagon → repeat → disparities
Prior reporting by The Intercept also found that the Pentagon’s official tally of dead and wounded personnel is a gross undercount, stemming from what one U.S. government official called a “casualty cover-up.”
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official → find → what
When the Washington Post also recently suggested that the Pentagon had suppressed the casualty numbers, self-styled War Secretary Pete Hegseth called the report “DISGUSTING and FAKE.”
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Hegseth → suggest → report
The Pentagon’s list of the names of the dead is still, for example, missing Maj. Sorffly Davius, a signals and communication officer with the New York Army National Guard who was assigned to the headquarters of the 42nd Infantry Division and died while on duty in Camp Buehring, Kuwait, on March 6.
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who → miss → March
The military has claimed that Davius was part of another mission but a recent National Guard news release noted that when “Trump made the decision to attack Iran and launched Operation Epic Fury on Feb. 28, the division headquarters began conducting combat operations.”
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headquarters → claim → operations
The 42nd served as the primary headquarters leading what became, according to Maj. Gen. Jack James, the division commander, the “largest and first long-range precision fires campaign in the history of the United States Army.”
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what → serve → Army
James specifically saluted Davius whom the Guard admitted was “conducting operations” when he died.
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he → salute → operations
The eight Marines added to DCAS last week appeared in the tally almost 10 days after the September 14 attack.
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Marines → add → attack
Historically, there was little lag between a casualty occurring in the field and its inclusion in the DCAS system, according to two people who used to work on the official casualty tally.
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who → be → tally
“We got it very quickly.
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We → get → it
We could report the number of casualties very fast,” Joan Crenshaw, who worked on DCAS during the war on terror, previously told The Intercept, noting that data was refreshed daily.
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data → report → Intercept
A current U.S. official also previously told The Intercept that the recent reporting lags are a blend of incompetence and deliberate slow-walking of casualty data to manage public fallout.
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lags → tell → fallout
Iran’s ability to overwhelm U.S. air defenses in the Middle East using attack drones and advanced ballistic missiles, as previously reported by The Intercept, has left the U.S. military in a precarious situation.
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ability → overwhelm → situation
Despite months of claims by Trump and Hegseth that Iran’s military was annihilated, Iran has attacked more than 15 bases across the Middle East, according to information from U.S. officials and Iranian reports.
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Iran → annihilate → officials
These strikes damaged or destroyed hundreds of facilities at U.S. bases in Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, according to Central Command.
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strikes → damage → Command
Air Force personnel alone conducted 48 airfield repairs in a little more than a month, according to Wilsbach.
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personnel → conduct → Wilsbach
An Iranian missile and drone attack on February 28 destroyed Navy facilities in Manama, Bahrain, the region’s most critical U.S. military logistics hub.
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attack → destroy → Manama
…and 35 more, not listed.
The Aporia
