Two American military transport aircraft became disabled and had to be destroyed inside Iranian territory on Sunday after a special forces mission to extract a downed F-15 crew member ran into serious difficulty, exposing the limits of US operational reach even as President Donald Trump hailed the outcome as one of the most daring rescues in American history. The 37th day of the American-Israeli war on Iran brought simultaneous escalation across the region, with Iranian drone and missile strikes hitting energy infrastructure in Kuwait, the UAE, and Bahrain.
According to the New York Times, the two transport aircraft — dispatched to carry commandos and the rescued officer to safety — became stranded at a remote location deep inside Iran. American commanders ordered both aircraft destroyed on the spot to prevent them from falling into Iranian hands, and three additional planes were scrambled to complete the evacuation. The IRGC claimed to have struck two Black Hawk helicopters and a C-130 transport south of Isfahan, publishing images of wreckage it attributed to American aircraft. Iranian police separately claimed to have shot down another C-130. Tehran framed the episode as a humiliation comparable to the catastrophic failure of Operation Eagle Claw at Tabas in 1980.
The rescued officer — a weapons systems officer aboard the F-15E Strike Eagle shot down on Friday, reported to be a colonel — was eventually brought out alive, and Trump confirmed his recovery on social media. "He sustained injuries, but he will be okay," the president wrote. But the circumstances of the extraction told a more complicated story than the triumphant framing the White House sought to project.
A Joint Operation of Exceptional Depth
Israeli sources told Iran International that the rescue involved two elite Israeli commando units — Shaldag and Matkal — operating alongside US special forces inside Iran, in a disclosure that laid bare the extent of joint ground operations on Iranian soil. The mission lasted approximately 36 hours in total, according to the same sources, and involved at least one helicopter coming under fire, though it reportedly returned to base intact.
Trump claimed the United States had achieved "remarkable air superiority over Iranian skies" and deployed "dozens of aircraft equipped with the world's most lethal weapons." That assertion sat uneasily alongside the loss of aircraft, the firefights between American and Iranian forces on the ground, and the deaths of at least nine to ten civilians in the Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province in southwestern Iran — the area where the rescue operation was concentrated. Local officials reported strikes on the Kuh-e Siah area and the towns of Kakhan and Vezg, with provincial hospitals placed on emergency footing.
Iran's IRGC framed the entire episode in maximalist terms of American defeat. Its spokesman had earlier called the F-15 shootdown "a black and humiliating day" for the United States, noting that it had exposed the hollowness of administration claims to have already destroyed Iran's air force and air defences. The rescue operation — however ultimately successful in recovering the crew member — provided further ammunition for that narrative.
Gulf States Struck as Iran Widens Its Campaign
As the rescue drama unfolded, Iran dramatically widened its drone and missile campaign against Gulf Arab states. In Kuwait, Iranian drones struck two electricity generation plants and a water desalination facility, knocking both offline, and caused significant damage to the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation headquarters while setting fire to the Oil Ministry. The government called Sunday the hardest day the country had faced since the war began.
In the UAE, air defences intercepted incoming missiles and drones, though falling debris ignited multiple fires at the Borouge petrochemical complex in Abu Dhabi, forcing a temporary suspension of operations. In Bahrain, a drone strike set a fuel storage tank at state energy company Bapco Energies ablaze before it was brought under control. No casualties were reported in any of the three countries.
Israel's military said it had targeted more than 120 Iranian air defence and fire systems in the preceding 24 hours, including ballistic missile brigade positions and drone launch infrastructure. Hezbollah launched fresh rocket salvoes at northern Israeli settlements and claimed — in what would be a significant escalatory first — to have struck an Israeli naval vessel with a cruise missile off the Lebanese coast. The Israeli military said it was unaware of any such incident.
Diplomacy on the Margins
Against the backdrop of intensifying military action, Oman and Iran held a working-level meeting of senior foreign ministry officials to explore options for maintaining freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz. Some 800 sailors were reported stranded in Gulf waters due to the shipping crisis the conflict has generated. Egypt's Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty warned in calls with his Iranian, American, and Arab counterparts that the current trajectory "portends a slide toward an unprecedented explosion in the region," condemning attacks on Arab states' civilian infrastructure as violations of international law.
Iran's ambassador to South Korea stated that direct dialogue with Washington was not underway, with communication passing only through intermediaries — and that war and negotiation could not proceed simultaneously. Lebanese President Joseph Aoun defended ongoing indirect negotiations with Israel aimed at halting airstrikes in the south, insisting that "negotiation is not surrender."
US satellite imagery firm Planet Labs announced it would cease providing high-resolution aerial images of Iran and the broader conflict zone at the request of the Trump administration, effective from March 9, citing the need to deny adversaries intelligence that could be used to target American forces and allies.
Photo: Perplexity