US Sinks Iranian Tanker as Tehran Fires Missiles at Jordan Base

Washington (GNP): The United States military struck five Iranian oil tankers on Tuesday, sinking one of them, after Iran twice attempted to target a US Navy warship in the Gulf region. US Central Command said the tankers, linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, were hit in the Gulf of Oman and near Kharg Island. This terminal handles roughly 90 percent of Iran’s crude oil exports.

Tehran responded within hours by launching a barrage of ballistic missiles at a US military base in Jordan. Jordanian authorities said their air defence systems intercepted 18 of the 20 missiles fired, with the remaining two landing in unpopulated areas and causing no casualties. The exchange marks the latest escalation in a confrontation between Washington and Tehran that has intensified over the past week and follows joint US-Israeli strikes on Iran carried out in February.

Central Command confirmed that the American warship evaded both Iranian missile attempts and that no US personnel were harmed in the incident. Officials said the tanker strikes were carried out in direct response to those attempted attacks and described the vessels as part of a shadow fleet funding the Revolutionary Guard and its regional proxies. One of the ships, identified as the M/T Riesco, sank in the Gulf of Oman following the strike.

The Revolutionary Guard’s navy said afterward that it had targeted two American vessels, eight oil tankers and ten other ships attempting to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, according to Iranian state media. The claims had not been independently verified as of Wednesday. The escalation has rattled energy markets, with Brent crude climbing 1.5 percent to trade near 99 dollars a barrel in Asian trading, while US benchmark crude rose 1.3 percent to above 94 dollars.

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Compounding the regional instability, Yemen’s Houthi movement launched a drone and missile attack on energy facilities and civilian infrastructure inside Saudi Arabia on the same day, injuring 73 people and forcing a temporary halt to operations at several oil installations, Saudi authorities said.

The latest strikes came hours after Iran’s navy claimed to have seized an unscrewed US submarine drone in the Strait of Hormuz. A Central Command spokesperson said the vessel had malfunctioned more than a day earlier while surveying regional waters and carried no classified sonar, radar equipment, or sensitive data.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, “Iran continues to try to hit US naval ships, and for every time they do that, they’re going to lose tankers.”