A CNN investigation has revealed that the US Department of Defense website has reduced the official number of US military casualties in Iran from 482 to 420, despite reports of new clashes.
The figures showing a drop in casualties coincide with statements about wounded soldiers, and the names of four dead have also disappeared from the system, which has drawn criticism for covering up the facts.
The responsible institutions have responded with justifications for a software problem.
According to the revelations made public by CNN, the data in the registers has been reduced, and the names of specific dead fighters have temporarily disappeared from public records.
Representatives of the US Department of Defense have rushed to qualify what happened as a “technical failure in the system“. However, official explanations have failed to quell public discontent. Governors from the rank of New York Governor Kathy Hockle have expressed strong protest over the deletion of names of local soldiers who fell in battle, Yahoo News reports.
This is happening against the background of statements from the White House, which seeks to manipulate the public perception of the real cost of the operation.
Experts and media analysts note that the process of reporting the wounded and dead in the Middle East region often suffers from serious delays. While the military points to software and medical procedures that require weeks for documentation, critics counter that the administration is deliberately downplaying the scale of the damage to protect its political image on the eve of new negotiations.