US crew member missing in Iran rescued as Iran downplays mission's success

LAST UPDATE | 5 hrs ago

IRAN’S MILITARY HAS said the US special forces mission to rescue an airforce member whose fighter jet was shot down was “completely foiled”, contradicting President Donald Trump’s claim that the operation was a “miraculous” success. 

The military’s statement came after Trump said earlier today that the officer had been rescued and was “SAFE and SOUND”.

“The so-called US military rescue operation, planned as a deception and escape mission at an abandoned airport in southern Isfahan under the pretext of recovering the pilot of a downed aircraft, was completely foiled,” said Ebrahim Zolfaghari, spokesman for the military’s central command, Khatam Al-Anbiya.

The statement did not say whether or not Iranian forces had captured the aviator. 

In a video statement carried by state television, he said that “two C-130 military transport planes and two Black Hawk helicopters were destroyed” during the operation.

He added that Trump went ahead with “empty rhetoric and diversion although the reality on the ground demonstrates the superior position of Iran’s powerful armed forces.”

State media shared images of charred wreckage scattered across a desert area, with smoke still rising from the site.

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Iranian media reported that strikes during the rescue operation killed five people in the southwest, although it was not immediately clear whether they were civilians or military.

Since Friday, Iranian media has also shared footage showing local residents, some carrying flags and rifles, searching for the aviator after authorities offered a bounty for information.

In a post on Truth Social, the US President had said the service member is injured but “will be just fine” and that the US had been monitoring his location.

It came  after a frantic search-and-rescue operation. The crew member had been missing since Friday, when Iran downed a US F-15E Strike Eagle. A second crew member was rescued earlier.

Trump said the United States did not confirm the rescue of the first aviator from the F-15 fighter jet that was shot down in Iran on Friday “because we did not want to jeopardize our second rescue operation”.

Describing the rescue mission as “daring”, Trump said: “At my direction, the US Military sent dozens of aircraft, armed with the most lethal weapons in the World, to retrieve him”.

In his social media post early today, Trump said the second aviator “was behind enemy lines in the treacherous mountains of Iran, being hunted down by our enemies, who were getting closer and closer by the hour”.

The fighter jet was the first US aircraft to have crashed in Iranian territory since the conflict began in late February, although it was not the first aidcraft the US has lost during the war. 

With reporting from AFP and Press Association

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