The Pentagon raised the number of US service members killed during operations against Iran to 21 on Friday, revising casualty figures that officials said had undercounted deaths.
Six US officials told The Washington Post in September that information in the Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS) was underreporting fatalities. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called that report a “complete lie.”
The revised figure includes two noncombat deaths, according to a US official who spoke to the Post on the condition of anonymity. Maj. Sorffly Davius, 46, an Army National Guard member, died in Kuwait on March 6. The other death was an unidentified Navy suicide in September.
Updated DCAS figures also show that 865 service members have been wounded.
Separately, the military added the death of Sgt. Devin A. Seibel, 26, who was killed in a training accident in Iraq in May. The military said his death was not connected to ongoing operations against Iran and now lists it in DCAS under Operation Inherent Resolve.
Democratic members of the House Armed Services Committee welcomed the revised casualty figures but criticized the Pentagon over the inaccurate count.
“There is no excuse for a mistake of this magnitude,” the committee’s top Democrat, Rep. Adam Smith (Washington), and Rep. Chrissy Houlahan (Pennsylvania), the top Democrat on the military personnel subcommittee, said in a statement, calling the fact that Congress had to get involved to have the Pentagon correct its numbers “an embarrassment” for the military.
The Pentagon did not acknowledge in a statement to The Post that the casualty numbers had been changed. It said, however, that additional revisions are being made to the way DCAS records casualties.
Those changes include the creation of a “pending adjudication” category as the military works through casualty reporting. Defense Scoop first reported the addition of the new category.
