Week 6 of the war — six US aircraft lost in 72 hours, Iran downs first F-15, Trump calls it 'miraculous'

Iran downs first US fighter, turns rescue op into a six-aircraft loss

This was the week Iran shot the first American fighter jet out of its sky — and then forced Washington to burn down two of its own special operations transports to get the pilot's partner out. The White House is calling it "miraculous." The airframes on the ground in Isfahan and Kuwait tell a different story.

April 3 (Day 35). Iranian air defenses brought down a US F-15E Strike Eagle over western Iran — the first US fighter jet destroyed by hostile fire in Operation Epstein Fury. Both crew ejected. The pilot was scooped up within hours. The weapons systems officer, a colonel, disappeared into the mountains of southwestern Iran with a pistol and whatever he was wearing when the canopy blew off.

Hours later, an A-10 Thunderbolt II flying CSAR escort took Iranian fire and went down near the Strait of Hormuz. Its pilot ejected over Kuwait airspace. An HH-60 Pave Hawk rescue helicopter took rounds too, limping home with wounded aboard. Two airframes lost and a third damaged before the sun set — all trying to recover the first.

April 4 (Day 36). Iranian state media released photographs of wreckage showing a US Army CH-47F Chinook destroyed at Camp Buehring, Kuwait. Iran's missiles had reached inside a US logistics hub in a sovereign Gulf state and flattened a $38M heavy-lift helicopter. The Pentagon has said nothing about it.

April 5 (Day 37). US special forces extracted the missing WSO after 36+ hours alone in the Iranian mountains. During the operation, two MC-130J Commando II special operations aircraft were destroyed south of Isfahan. The Wall Street Journal says US forces blew them up themselves after they became stranded. Iran's armed forces, through Tasnim and Fars, credit the IRGC-linked Faraj Rangers with shooting them down. Either way, two of the US Air Force's most expensive and most sensitive special ops aircraft — roughly $230M worth — are smoldering on Iranian soil.

The week's final tally: 1 F-15E destroyed, 1 A-10 destroyed, 1 HH-60 damaged, 1 CH-47F destroyed, 2 MC-130J destroyed. Six airframes in 72 hours. The worst week for US aviation losses of the war.

Trump's "miraculous" victory lap

Within hours of the WSO's extraction, Trump hit Truth Social with "WE GOT HIM!" — calling it "one of the most daring Search and Rescue Operations in U.S. History" and claiming the double rescue proves American "Air Dominance and Superiority over the Iranian skies." He said the operation finished "without a single American killed, or even wounded."

This is the propaganda operation. Air dominance does not lose a fourth-generation fighter over enemy territory. Air dominance does not then lose the Warthog sent to cover the rescue. Air dominance does not lose a Chinook at its own base in Kuwait. Air dominance does not end with American special operators torching two MC-130Js they can't get out of Iran. The US didn't achieve dominance — it spent $300M+ in airframes to pull one colonel off a mountain, and called it a parade.

Even the "no one wounded" line collapses on contact with reporting. The HH-60 came back with wounded aboard, per Air & Space Forces. The rescued WSO himself was injured during ejection and flown to Kuwait for treatment. Trump's own statement acknowledges the injuries two sentences after claiming none.

The rescues are real. The airmen are alive, and that matters. But framing a week that cost the US six aircraft, triggered a 36-hour manhunt deep in Iranian territory, and forced US operators to self-destruct stranded aircraft as evidence of American "superiority" is what propaganda sounds like when it's shouted at the cameras instead of written down.

US casualties: CENTCOM's quiet math

CENTCOM confirmed 303 US service members wounded as of March 25 — a number already three days old when it was released and excluding at least 15 more wounded in the March 27 Iranian barrage on Prince Sultan Air Base (six ballistic missiles, 29 drones, one attack). CENTCOM has not responded to repeated requests for updates.

On April 1, The Intercept published "Casualty Cover-Up: The Pentagon Is Hiding U.S. Losses Under Trump" — a defense official used exactly that phrase. Public wounded total now sits at 318+, with 20 severely injured, mostly traumatic brain injuries. Confirmed dead holds at 15. The real numbers are almost certainly higher.

Iran: the civilian cost Washington doesn't talk about

Iran's Health Ministry reports 2,076+ killed and 26,500+ injured as of early April. Al Jazeera's live tracker breaks out 240 women and 212 children among the dead, with 4,000+ women and 1,621 children injured. The Iranian Red Crescent lists 64,583 residential units damaged and 600+ schools bombed from its March 25 count. None of those numbers have a surplus "+" by accident. The real figures sit higher.

These are the people being bombed. Iran did not start this war. The United States did, on February 28, 2026, without a congressional vote, without a strategic rationale the public has seen, and without anything that looks like an exit.

What it cost

Equipment losses crossed $4.7 billion this week — up from $4.13B seven days ago. The jump came from two MC-130Js ($230M), the F-15E ($94M), the CH-47F ($38M), and the A-10 ($20M). THAAD radar losses still carry $2B of the running total, and the Pentagon has pulled batteries from Asia to backfill — weakening Pacific deterrence to prop up Gulf defenses that keep getting hit anyway.

Context

The war started February 28, 2026 without congressional authorization. It is now 37 days old. In those 37 days: 15 US service members dead, 318+ wounded, 2,076+ Iranian civilians killed, $4.7B+ in US equipment destroyed, and nine US aircraft lost — six of them this week alone.

No vote. No debate. No exit. Just a president calling a disaster "miraculous."