Last night, at about 9 PM US eastern time (4:30 AM in Tehran), US Central Command issued a statement announcing that US forces “completed self-defense strikes against Iran, June 9, at the Commander in Chief’s direction in response to yesterday’s downing of a U.S. Army Apache helicopter.”
“CENTCOM forces struck Iranian air defense, ground control stations, and surveillance radar sites near the Strait of Hormuz with precision munitions from U.S. Air Force and Navy fighter jets. The operation was a proportional response to recent attacks on U.S. forces and international commercial ships transiting regional waters.”
According to Axios, American forces launched three rounds of strikes targeting Iranian air defense and radar systems near the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday evening. Iran’s military said it targeted bases in Jordan and Kuwait, while a spokesperson for Bahrain’s king said his country’s air defenses had repelled Iranian attacks. Iran fired at least four ballistic missiles and several drones in its initial response, according to a U.S. official.
A U.S. official told Axios that an investigation determined an Iranian drone hit the helicopter, causing it to crash near the Strait of Hormuz. The U.S. official said the investigation had not determined whether it was intentional.
The Iranian targets included both the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan, one of the bases from which the US has been launching operations against Iran, and the US 5th Fleet headquarters in Bahrain. Both the Jordanian and Bahraini military authorities claimed successful interceptions of Iranian missiles, reported The New York Times.
Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters announced in a statement, that “some US bases in the region were targeted by a powerful attack by the heroic army of the Islamic Republic and the brave men of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.” It added that “the criminal US army” should know that if it repeats its aggression against Iran, “more severe and widespread attacks will be carried out against the bank of targets set in the region.”
The Iranian Foreign Ministry denounced recent US military actions against the country, decrying Washington for violating the UN Charter and escalating tensions through unlawful and aggressive conduct in a statement issued this morning, reported Tasnim. The US attacks “constitute a blatant violation of the Charter of the United Nations, particularly Article 2, Paragraph 4, and the fundamental rule prohibiting the use of force in international relations, and through these aggressive actions, the ruling establishment of the United States once again demonstrated its criminal and warmongering nature,” it said.
The ministry reminded the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council countries of their “legal and moral responsibility... to prevent any use by the terrorist US military and the Zionist regime of their territory and facilities for planning, organizing, executing, and supporting aggressive actions against Iran,” adding that “Iran will not hesitate in exercising its inherent right of self-defense” by attacking such facilities and bases.