US special forces carried out a daring rescue mission to bring back an airman stranded 200 miles behind enemy lines after Iran shot down a $31m fighter jet on Friday. Donald Trump said on Sunday that dozens of military aircraft had raced to rescue the missing weapons-system officer of a two-seat F-15E after the pilot ejected and was rescued under fire.
The president said the injured second airman was stuck 'in the treacherous mountains of Iran, being hunted down by our enemies, who were getting closer and closer by the hour'. In an extraordinary feat, US commandos sent to his rescue slipped into Iran under the cover of darkness, scaled a 2,100 metre ridge and took the specialist back to safety, moving him toward a secret rendezvous point before dawn on Sunday.
The rescue mission encountered fierce resistance from Iran, with the Iranian military claiming to have taken down several American warplanes while the CIA focused on distracting them with a targeted deception campaign. Trump said no casualties were reported from the mission, which he described as the first time in US military history that two pilots had been rescued, separately, deep in enemy territory.
The announcement came just hours before the president doubled down on his threats to strike Iranian infrastructure as soon as Tuesday in an expletive-laden rant on social media, before negotiators hashed out a new proposal for an immediate ceasefire. On Monday, Trump and his top defence aides further detailed the risky mission during a news conference at the White House, with the president outlining how the US relied on dozens of aircraft, hundreds of personnel, secret CIA technology and a dose of subterfuge.
The F-15E Strike Eagle – an all-weather jet designed for air-to-ground and air-to-air missions – was shot down by Iranian defences on Friday morning, according to Iran. Two crew members were on board the jet, callsign 'Dude 44', when it was downed: a pilot and a weapons-system officer in the back, responsible for selecting targets and making sure the weapons are properly calibrated to targets.
The lost airman was trapped some 200 miles inside Iran with only a handgun to defend himself, according to US officials. Trump told the Wall Street Journal that the colonel, despite having sustained injuries, was able to climb up into a crevice to await extraction as Iran began their own hunt. The airman radioed in 'God is good' upon reaching the ridge, a message that was reportedly met with suspicion in Washington, fearing an Iranian trap. A senior Trump administration official told NBC that the rescue was made possible by the support of the CIA, alerting the Pentagon and the White House to the airman's location.
