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For the second time this year, Iran appears to have fired a missile at the wrong target with deadly consequences, fueling public disillusionment with the government and undermining faith in its military.
On Sunday, a missile from an Iranian Navy frigate hit another Iranian naval ship during a military exercise in the Oman Sea, killing at least 19 sailors, the navy said.
Official details of the accident were scarce on Monday. It was not immediately clear if it was the result of human error or faulty equipment.
There were reports that the ship had sunk, and people familiar with the accident said a rescue mission was underway to find at least 20 other crew members who were still missing.
The navy said Monday that 15 people were injured and that the ship had been brought ashore.
“The scope of the incident is being investigated by experts,” the Iranian Navy said in a statement.
Iran’s military has been under intense global scrutiny since the Ukrainian plane was shot down, and confidence in the government was already at its lowest point due to missteps in handling a severe outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic. .
Iranians have blamed the government for not enforcing an early blockade to fight the virus and for not being transparent about the number of people infected, which led to an explosion of infections that made Iran a regional epicenter of the virus.
Reports of the latest accident drew criticism from the government on social media.
“Shooting at your own targets, be they military or civilian, in such a short time is not a human error,” Maziar Khosravi, a journalist aligned with opposition politicians, wrote on Twitter. “It is a catastrophic failure of management and command.”
The shooting down of the Ukrainian plane occurred during a time of high tension, on a night Iran launched ballistic missiles at US military targets in Iraq in retaliation for the murder of a senior general. His forces were on high alert for a US response.
The friendly fire episode, however, occurred during a planned naval exercise in the Oman Sea near the Iranian port city of Jask.
Iran routinely conducts military exercises in the Persian Gulf and Oman Sea for a dual purpose: to test new locally produced equipment and show its military might as tensions between Washington and Tehran escalate and the threat of military conflict looms.
Last month, President Trump wrote on Twitter that he had ordered the U.S. Navy. USA That he shoot Iranian ships if they harassed American ships in the Persian Gulf. Iran threatened to retaliate if it was attacked.
Since the Trump post, Iran has put its air defense forces on high alert and moved them to positions along the southern shores of the Persian Gulf, according to an Iranian military strategist.
Four people with knowledge of Sunday’s accident said the ship, identified as the Konarak missile boat, was hit by a Jamaran missile, a frigate that is considered one of the pride of the Iranian fleet.
The Konarak was hit while guiding a target out to sea to help the Jamaican test a missile, according to Seyed Mohamad Razavi, a leading media adviser to conservative politicians and a Telegram channel affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards.
The Konarak had not drifted far enough from the target when the missile was fired, they said. Rather than hit the target, the missile slammed into the Konarak’s tail.
“This accident is very sad for all of us,” Razavi wrote on Twitter.
The Jamaran is considered a triumph of Iran’s local naval technology. Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei inaugurated it in 2010 in an unusual appearance aboard the ship.
The bodies of the dead were taken to a hospital in the port city of Chahbahar, in the southern port, people familiar with the incident said.
Military experts said Sunday’s episode was a significant setback for the Iranian navy and its ambitions to project itself as a powerful player in the Persian Gulf and beyond. Along with the downing of the Ukrainian plane, it undermines an effort by Iran to present its armed forces as a force capable of countering the United States and its regional allies, they said.
“This really showed that the situation with Iran is still dangerous, because accidents and miscalculations can occur,” said Fabian Hinz, an expert on the Iranian army at the Middlebury Institute for International Studies in Monterey. “It doesn’t give him confidence about the stability of the Persian Gulf.”
