NEWS
Iran Claims Capture of Advanced US Underwater Drone Near Strait of Hormuz as Washington Confirms Vehicle Malfunction
Tensions around the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz have intensified after Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Navy announced that it had seized an advanced American unmanned underwater vehicle during an operation near the waterway.
The IRGC said on Tuesday that its naval forces captured the unmanned submarine at the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz following what it described as a complex intelligence and operational mission carried out at dawn.
According to the Iranian military, the vehicle was among the most technologically advanced unmanned submarines operated by the United States and had been delivered to the US Navy in 2025. Tehran said the vessel was now under Iranian control and that images would be released publicly.
The IRGC identified the captured system as the Dive-LD, an autonomous underwater vehicle manufactured by US defence technology company Anduril Industries. The platform is designed for extended underwater missions and can be configured to carry different sensors and mission equipment.
The reported seizure comes against the backdrop of heightened military tensions in and around the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most strategically important maritime corridors. Any confrontation involving American and Iranian forces in the area could have wider implications for regional security and international shipping.
The United States, however, has offered a different account of what happened to the underwater vehicle.
A US official told Reuters that the vehicle involved was an older model and did not carry classified sonar equipment. Separately, a spokesperson for US Central Command said the unmanned underwater vehicle had malfunctioned during a water-survey mission in the region more than a day before Iran announced its alleged capture.
The competing accounts have left key questions unanswered, particularly over whether Iranian forces physically recovered the American vehicle after it became disabled and, if so, how it came under their control.
Images released by Iranian sources appear to show a large autonomous underwater vehicle partially submerged in the water. Open-source analysts have noted that its shape and several distinctive physical features closely resemble the Anduril Dive-LD, including its flood holes, external fastenings and a small transparent mast positioned toward the front.
While the Iranian claim has not been independently verified, the visual similarities have added credibility to the possibility that the vehicle displayed by Tehran is an American-built Dive-LD.
The Dive-LD is a large autonomous underwater vehicle measuring approximately 5.8 metres in length and about two metres in diameter, with a weight of roughly three tonnes. It is designed for long-duration missions in deep waters and can operate with limited or no direct human control.
Its modular design allows different sensors and mission systems to be installed depending on the task. Potential applications include intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, maritime surveying and mine-countermeasure operations. The exact equipment carried by the vehicle allegedly seized by Iran remains unclear.
The platform is known to have entered US Navy service, including with units involved in unmanned undersea operations, although relatively little public information is available about its operational deployments.
The incident could prove particularly significant for Iran because the Dive-LD represents a more sophisticated class of underwater autonomous technology than many of the systems developed domestically by Tehran.
Iran has nevertheless built considerable expertise in underwater drones and has developed several autonomous and remotely operated systems, including platforms associated with naval warfare and mine operations. Some Iranian-developed underwater systems have also reportedly reached Iran’s regional allies.
If Iran has successfully recovered an operational or partially intact Dive-LD, the vehicle could provide valuable information about American underwater technology, sensors, communications, navigation and autonomous capabilities.
The development could also raise concerns in Washington about the possibility of sensitive technological information being examined by Iranian engineers or potentially shared with other countries aligned with Tehran.
For now, the precise circumstances surrounding the vehicle remain disputed. Iran maintains that its forces captured the American underwater drone in a deliberate intelligence and operational action, while Washington describes the incident as the malfunction of an unmanned vehicle during a regional survey mission.
What happens to the alleged captured vehicle and what information Iran may be able to extract from it could become a significant new point of tension between Tehran and Washington.