US sinks Iranian warship off Sri Lanka; NATO destroys missile heading for Turkey
· The Straits TimesSummary
- The US-Iran war escalated sharply, with a US submarine sinking an Iranian warship off Sri Lanka, killing at least 80, and NATO destroying an Iranian missile towards Turkey.
- US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth stated the US is "punching them while they're down" as US and Israeli forces continued "round-the-clock assaults" on Iran.
- Mojtaba Khamenei, son of Iran's slain supreme leader, emerged as favourite to succeed him, signalling hardliners remain in control amid postponed funeral and market turmoil.
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DUBAI/JERUSALEM/ANKARA – The US-Iran war widened sharply on March 4 after a US submarine sank an Iranian warship off Sri Lanka, killing at least 80 people, and NATO air defences destroyed an Iranian ballistic missile fired towards Turkey.
The escalation came as the powerful son of Iran’s slain supreme leader emerged as a front runner
to succeed him, suggesting Tehran was not about to buckle to pressure. This comes five days after the US and Israel launched a military campaign
that has killed hundreds and convulsed global markets.
The missile incident
is the first time that Turkey – which borders Iran and has NATO’s second-largest military – has been drawn into the conflict, but US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said there was no sense that it would trigger the Atlantic alliance’s collective-defence clause.
In a sign of the conflict’s expanding reach, Mr Hegseth said the US submarine strike hit an Iranian vessel
off Sri Lanka’s southern coast, thousands of kilometres from the Gulf, as fighting paralysed shipping through the Strait of Hormuz for a fifth day, choking off vital Middle East oil and gas flows.
US President Donald Trump has pledged to provide insurance and naval escorts
for ships exporting energy from the region to contain soaring prices, but at least 200 vessels remain anchored off the coast, according to Reuters estimates.
‘Not a fair fight’
The US and Israel pressed on with their round-the-clock assaults on Iran, with Mr Hegseth saying Washington was winning the conflict.
“This was never meant to be a fair fight, and it is not a fair fight. We are punching them while they’re down,” Mr Hegseth, sounding supremely confident, told a briefing at the Pentagon. “We can sustain this fight easily for as long as we need to.”
By contrast, Iran is firing fewer missiles,
signalling that its military capabilities have been greatly diminished, said General Dan Caine, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The Israeli military said its aircraft had struck a compound in eastern Tehran housing Iran’s security bodies, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, intelligence services, cyber warfare units and internal police in charge of cracking down on protests.
Israel also told residents to leave a swathe of southern Lebanon on March 4 as it pressed
its assault
on the Iran-backed group Hezbollah, which has again dragged Lebanon into the conflict by firing drones and rockets into Israel on March 1.
A fall in global markets turned into a rout in Asia, including a record-breaking crash in Seoul, as some investors remained unconvinced by Mr Trump’s assurances that he would quickly reopen the world’s most important shipping corridor.
European markets later stabilised and turned higher after two days of sharp losses on hopes that the war might end soon. Some traders said the improved sentiment followed a New York Times report
that Iranian intelligence had reached out to the CIA early in the war to explore a path towards ending it.
A source from the Iranian Intelligence Ministry rejected the article as “absolute lies and psychological warfare in the midst of war”, Iran’s semi-official news agency Tasnim reported.
Mojtaba Khamenei not in Tehran when father killed
As new explosions rang out in Tehran, plans for the funeral of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – killed by Israeli and US forces on Feb 28
in the first assassination of a nation’s top ruler by an air strike – were thrown into doubt.
The body had been expected to lie in state in a vast Tehran mosque from the evening of March 4, but state media reported that the farewell ceremony had been postponed.
Two Iranian sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that Mr Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the 86‑year‑old slain supreme leader, was not in Tehran when his father was killed.
Iran said the Assembly of Experts that will select the new leader would announce its decision soon, only the second time it has done so since the Islamic Republic’s founding in 1979.
Assembly member Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami told state TV the candidates had already been identified but did not name them.
Israel said it would hunt down whoever is chosen.
Other candidates for supreme leader include Mr Hassan Khomeini, grandson of the Islamic Republic’s founder and a champion of the reformist faction, which has been sidelined in recent decades.
But the favourite appears to be Mr Mojtaba Khamenei, who has amassed power as a senior figure in the security forces and the vast business empire they control, the Iranian sources said. Choosing him would signal that hardliners remain in charge.
Some Iranians have openly celebrated the death of Mr Khamenei, whose security forces killed thousands of anti-government demonstrators only weeks ago in the biggest domestic unrest since the era of the revolution.
But Iranians angry with the government said there was unlikely to be much sign of protest while bombs are falling.
“We have nowhere to go to protect ourselves from strikes, how can we protest?” Ms Farah, 45, said by phone from Tehran, adding that the security forces “are everywhere. They will kill us. I hate this regime, but first I have to think about the safety of my two children.”
US submarine sinks Iranian warship
US Central Command said in a statement that it had “struck or sunk to the bottom of the ocean” more than 20 Iranian ships, including the warship off Sri Lanka – the first such action by a US submarine since World War II.
A Sri Lankan official identified the vessel as the frigate IRIS Dena, saying it had been returning to Iran from eastern India. The local authorities reported that 32 people had been rescued, 87 bodies recovered, and about 60 sailors remained unaccounted for from the estimated 180‑strong crew.
“An American submarine sunk an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters. Instead, it was sunk by a torpedo. Quiet death,” Mr Hegseth said.
Despite voicing misgivings about the war on Iran, some European nations found themselves drawn militarily into the Middle East to safeguard their citizens and strategic interests.
Britain and France said they would use naval and air forces to help defend against Iranian retaliation. Greece has also moved aircraft and warships to nearby Cyprus. REUTERS