$4.2M US torpedo detonates under Iranian warship in historic ‘No Mercy’ strike

A multi-million-dollar U.S. Navy torpedo detonated underneath an Iranian warship successful a nighttime submarine onslaught disconnected Sri Lanka’s confederate seashore — an attack, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Wednesday successful a Pentagon update, was the archetypal of its benignant since World War II.

The weapon, identified arsenic a Mark 48 Advanced Capability (ADCAP) torpedo, underscored the standard of unit used, and signaled to Tehran that "the gloves truly are off," according to a erstwhile U.S. submarine commander.

"The Mark 48 is 1 of the astir lethal anti-ship weapons successful the U.S. inventory," Thomas Shugart, an adjunct elder chap astatine the Center for a New American Security, told Fox News Digital.

The torpedo carries an 800-pound warhead and is designed not to onslaught a vessel directly, Shugart said, but to detonate beneath it, creating a monolithic vapor bubble that breaks the vessel’s backmost and splits it successful half.

A U.S. submarine sunk an Iranian warship successful planetary waters successful the Indian Ocean, War Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed Wednesday. (@DeptofWar / X)

"This torpedo detonated underneath the stern of the Iranian vessel and lifted it up retired of the water, and truthful it sank successful a substance of minutes," helium added.

The torpedo costs astir $4.2 cardinal per unit, according to caller data, with Shugart likening the onslaught to uncommon submarine attacks successful modern naval history.

In summation to World War II, helium pointed to the 1982 Falklands War arsenic 1 illustration of a submarine-launched torpedo sinking a large aboveground combatant.

"This was the 2nd clip ever that a nuclear-powered submarine has fired a torpedo and sunk a ship," Shugart said.

"The lone different clip that happened was a British submarine called HMS Conqueror, which likewise sank an Argentine cruiser, the General Belgrano, during the Falklands War successful 1982," helium added.

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Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump's prime to beryllium Defense secretary, astatine the completion of his confirmation proceeding earlier the Senate Armed Services Committee, astatine the Capitol successful Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis) (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

The naval submarine operation, helium said, would person progressive accrued surveillance, guardant naval deployments and targeted actions designed to show U.S. maritime dominance.

"It decidedly seems to maine similar a connection that the gloves truly are off," Shugart added.

"There are different ways that the U.S. subject could person disabled that vessel oregon adjacent sunk it, but successful a mode that I wouldn't accidental was much merciful, but successful a mode that wasn't rather arsenic convulsive and without immoderate warning."

"An American submarine sank an Iranian warship that thought it was harmless successful planetary waters," Hegseth said astatine the Wednesday briefing.

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Hesgeth described the onslaught arsenic "a quiescent death," adding that it marked the archetypal sinking of an force vessel by torpedo since World War II.

"The U.S. Navy submarines are precise highly mobile, very, precise quiet, and our crews are highly well-trained," Shugart explained. "This was not a situation for a U.S. Navy submarine to occurrence a torpedo."

"To hunt down and descend an Iranian vessel similar that is not — that's not a challenging task for a U.S. nuclear-powered submarine," helium said.

The targeted vessel, identified arsenic the IRIS Dena, was the newest frigate successful Iran’s naval fleet and was equipped with surface-to-air missiles, anti-ship missiles, torpedo launchers and different dense weaponry.

According to Sri Lanka’s Foreign Affairs Minister Vijitha Herath, the country’s seashore defender received a distress telephone astatine 5:08 a.m. section clip Wednesday from the Iranian vas reporting an explosion.

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Healthcare workers unload the bodies of Iranian sailors from a conveyance who died erstwhile their IRIS Dena warship sank extracurricular Sri Lanka's territorial waters, successful Galle, Sri Lanka, Wednesday, March 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena)

"I'm not definite Iran has immoderate operational submarines anymore, but if they were operational, their biggest submarines would beryllium astatine slightest 20 oregon 30 years old," Shugart said.

"They would beryllium ex-Russian diesel-electric submarines, truthful they're not nuclear-powered similar the U.S. ones, with outer communications and unlimited mobility."

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"They tin run astatine precocious velocity for arsenic agelong arsenic they privation with unlimited endurance, different than the nutrient connected board. They transportation the astir precocious weapons, the astir precocious sensors."

"This onslaught sent a connection that if determination are immoderate Iranian warships near oregon immoderate Iranian government-owned ships, they should expect nary mercy," helium added.

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