The Pentagon has quietly raised the official count of American service members killed in the war with Iran to 21, according to an update made late Friday, October 9, to its Defense Casualty Analysis System — the department’s public database of military deaths.
The revision, reported over the weekend, adds two noncombat deaths to the tally: Army National Guard Maj. Sorffly Davius, 46, who died in Kuwait on March 6, and a Navy sailor who died in September and has not been publicly identified.
According to the updated database, 15 of the deaths are listed under Operation Epic Fury, the operation that began with American and Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28, and six are classified as military deaths during overseas operations dating back to July 7. At least 865 service members have been wounded in the fighting, according to reports.
The correction follows a report published in September that said the Pentagon’s public database was undercounting the true death toll. At the time, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth rejected that reporting, calling it “fake” and “a complete lie.”
Two members of Congress who had pushed for a review of the figures — Reps. Adam Smith and Chrissy Houlahan — said there was “no excuse for a mistake of this magnitude,” according to reports. The department has not publicly explained how the two deaths were omitted from the database for months.
