US war with Iran toll surges past 600 wounded, 28 killed after Pentagon revises casualty data

The human cost of the US war with Iran rose sharply over the weekend after the Pentagon quietly revised its official casualty database, adding more than 140 wounded service members and restoring four deaths that had briefly disappeared from public records, reigniting questions in Congress over the military's handling of wartime casualty reporting.

The updated figures, posted Saturday in the Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS), bring the known US toll from Operation Epic Fury to 18 service members killed and 624 wounded since the conflict began on Feb. 28, making it the highest publicly reported casualty count of the five-month war.

The four American troops killed during renewed fighting between the US and Iran in recent weeks were no longer listed from the Iran war death toll in the Pentagon’s official casualty count, but were instead placed in a new, separate category.

It is raising questions about properly counting the impact to US service members as the Trump administration has escalated strikes on Iran in a bid to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, while providing little indication of how it intends to wind down a conflict that is unpopular with many Americans.

The revised total marks a dramatic increase from the 482 wounded listed just days earlier, after lawmakers and journalists questioned why official casualty figures had inexplicably declined even as Iranian missile and drone attacks intensified.

The Pentagon has attributed the discrepancies to technical problems.

Joel Valdez, the Defense Department's acting press secretary, said the lower figures reflected "temporary data disruptions" affecting the DCAS website rather than changes to the underlying casualty records. Officials said the database has since been updated with the latest information.

The revised database also introduces a new category labeled "Overseas Operations," which officials said tracks personnel killed or wounded beginning July 7. The Pentagon has not publicly explained why the new classification was added during an active conflict or whether it changes how casualties are reported.

The revisions have drawn bipartisan attention on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers are demanding greater transparency.

Twelve Democratic members of the Senate Armed Services Committee last week sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth seeking an explanation for the fluctuating casualty totals and asking whether reporting procedures had changed during the war.

The lawmakers said accurate casualty reporting is essential for congressional oversight and for maintaining public confidence during military operations.

The latest figures come as U.S. forces remain on heightened alert despite a fragile pause in direct hostilities between Washington and Tehran. While both governments have signaled support for diplomatic efforts aimed at preventing renewed escalation, thousands of American troops remain deployed across the Middle East, and military officials continue to warn that the security situation remains volatile.

The updated casualty count underscores the scale of the conflict, which has included Iranian ballistic missile attacks on U.S. installations, drone strikes, naval confrontations in the Gulf and sustained American air operations targeting Iranian military infrastructure.

Although active combat has eased in recent days, the revised Pentagon figures suggest the war's human toll was significantly greater than previously understood, raising fresh questions over how military casualties are collected, verified and disclosed during one of the United States' most consequential conflicts in recent years.

Pentagon press secretary Joel Valdez argued Thursday that the drop in casualty figures in the online system was not an effort to hide the growing human toll of the war but rather the result of “anomalies” and “temporary data disruptions” that were being resolved “imminently."

As late as Tuesday, the website was reporting the war's official toll as 18 killed and 482 wounded.

It appeared to reflect that four soldiers had been killed since fighting resumed despite the signing of an interim ceasefire deal last month — three on a base in Jordan that was struck July 17 by Iranian ballistic missiles and drones, and one in Iraq a day later during a controlled detonation of an Iranian drone.

Adding further confusion, when the Pentagon announced two of the deaths in Jordan, it said the troops were supporting the US mission to counter the Islamic State group.

The other two were announced in press releases simply as supporting overseas operations.

President Donald Trump has confirmed the total, writing in a Truth Social post on Tuesday that the “Iran Military Conflict” had claimed 18 lives.

By Wednesday, the Iran war figures in the Pentagon's system fell back to 14 dead and 420 wounded.

However, a US official told The Associated Press at the time that the actual number of wounded personnel in the war had actually grown to well over 500 troops.

The Pentagon's top spokesman, Sean Parnell, took to social media that day to assert that the reported drop was a “temporary data disruption.”

The U.S. and Israel launched the war in Iran on Feb. 28, and 14 troops were killed in the initial waves of fighting. Washington and Tehran agreed to a ceasefire in April and then signed an interim deal to end the war in mid-June.

It was short-lived. Iran struck three merchant vessels in the Strait of Hormuz on July 7 that were transiting along a route near the coast of Oman overseen by the US military.

American forces launched strikes in response to the attacks on vessels in the key energy shipping corridor. Trump soon declared that the ceasefire was over.

The Pentagon system's new “Overseas Operations” category says it tallies casualties starting July 7.

Since then, the U.S. and Iran have exchanged regular fire in a bid to control the crucial waterway, with the U.S. hitting Iranian targets nightly for nearly two weeks and Tehran responding with attacks on neighboring countries hosting American forces. There have been no strikes for two nights as mediators push for diplomacy.

Since the renewed hostilities began, the Pentagon has provided even less information about military strategy and casualties than it did during the first phase of the conflict. The Pentagon has not held a press briefing about the war since early May, and officials at US Central Command have stopped providing casualty updates to reporters.

Pentagon officials such as Valdez and Parnell have insisted that the DCAS website is proof of the commitment to transparency about the number of dead and injured in the war.