CNN
By Haley Britzky, Zachary Cohen, CNN
(CNN) — US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said Wednesday that a US submarine sank an Iranian warship in international waters after Sri Lanka’s Navy said it rescued more than two dozen people from an Iranian vessel that was sunk off its shoreline.
“An American submarine sunk an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters,” Hegseth said during a press conference at the Pentagon. “Instead, it was sunk by a torpedo.”
The Pentagon released video of the attack showing a ship that experiences a massive explosion by its stern as well as what appeared to be still frames showing the ship sinking.
While Hegseth did not directly mention the rescue efforts by the Sri Lankan navy, his description of the strike appeared to match the location of the ongoing rescue effort.
Destroying Iran’s navy has been one of the most cited objectives of senior US administration officials regarding the ongoing military campaign that started over the weekend. Adm. Brad Cooper, commander of US Central Command, said in a recorded video message on Tuesday that the US has destroyed more than 17 Iranian ships thus far, including “the most operational Iranian submarine that now has a hole in its side.”
On Wednesday morning, a spokesperson for Sri Lanka’s navy said “several bodies” had been recovered from an Iranian vessel off its coast, and at least 32 people had been rescued. The spokesperson, Buddhika Sampath, said the navy, air force, and coastguard were engaged in search and rescue operations.
“Further investigations will reveal when and why this vessel was here,” Sampath said.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine said it was the first time an attack submarine had used a torpedo to sink a combat ship since 1945.
It was not immediately clear which event he was referring to, but the USS Sealion, in 1944, destroyed a Japanese battleship using nine Mark 18 torpedoes. The US Naval Undersea Museum said the Sealion is the only allied submarine “to sink a battleship during World War II.”
Torpedoes have been used since then, dropped from aircraft and not in combat. In 1951, a US attack squadron launched torpedoes on a dam in South Korea, blocking advancing enemy forces, according to the US Navy. In 1999, a US attack submarine successfully used a torpedo to sink an oil ship after other efforts with explosives had failed to scuttle the ship.
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