The Russian news agency Tass (as we write this on 6 March 2026) is one of many worldwide media publishing the following in the past 48 hours.

Though we find it hard to feel truly sad about the death of Khamenei (other than the grief we share when any sinner dies without salvation), we understand why Larijani is upset and vows vengeance upon the evil Great and Lesser Satans ™ of the US and Israel. We suspect that the Creator (even or perhaps especially if He exhibited any of what is claimed for Allah’s character) will give short shrift to the Ayatollah at Judgment Day. And we do believe that Khamenei, like his predecessor and his designated successor (who did not survive the committee meeting at which he was to be anointed), will be disappointed by the lack of 72 virgins waiting for him in paradise: 72 Virginians, perhaps (as one person joked).

At the same time, we find The Donald’s rhetoric (about avenging the so-far-reported six Americans killed by Iran’s vengeance attacks) deplorable. Just as we find his actions in waging war to be wrong and as unconstitutional and inappropriate as the same actions carried out by several dozen POTUS going back a very long time.

But back to the Iranian security guy’s claims:

Please don’t take this as supporting the attack, but we heard exactly this same sort of thing during Desert Storm more than three decades ago – that the Pentagon was hiding the true number of US casualties and that thousands of soldiers had been killed. And the same thing about military casualties in the Afghan war.

No matter how good the IRGC’s spy network in these various locations is, whatever they are reporting back to Tehran is almost certainly bogus. Assuming that the numbers weren’t made up in Tehran itself, to help “morale.” After all, we have centuries of evidence about how the number of enemy troops killed is constantly exaggerated. Together with false estimates of how much land is occupied, the speed of advance on the offensive, and the slowness of the retreat when losing. Certainly, American forces have more than once been caught doing the same thing. If not as often or as extreme of what Uncle Joe (Stalin), Uncle Adolf, and even dear Comrade Benito have done.

That kind of lie is far harder to get away with these days. Not just because we have virtually instantaneous satellite photography and near instant communications.

Of course, there are negative reasons, also. Bad as our American, Brit, and European media is, but given the hatred they have for Trump, they would be highly sensitive to such a large number of casualties and spread it quickly. Ditto-plus for Al Jeezera. Any of them would love to splash pictures of blood-and-guts on our monitor and TV screens.Even today, we are confident that governments have enough power to suppress that kind of news.

And frankly, US troops are far too poorly disciplined (a problem since the French and Indian War) to allow things like hiding hundreds of KIA and many more WIA to remain secret. Men and women from PFCs up to gals and guys with flag rank would squawk. They would be blowing whistles all over the place.

What is sad is that the media, which splashes info about the six known dead American troops all over the place, does not report and show sorrow over the men and women killed by the American and Israeli strikes. Or for that matter, those dying in Galilee and Lebanon. Or, for that matter, how many Kurds, now rising up against the IRI, and fighting on the ground, have and will die?

(The one exception to that is the 80 or so reported to have died when a US submarine torpedoed an Iranian warship returning around Ceylon from a training or symbolic mission in India; that, we are told, is a war crime because it was done in international waters and supposedly the ship and its crew were “unarmed.”)

We can expect more of this in the immediate future. By all sides: we must be both vigilant and ever careful to examine the evidence and not trust governments, media, or popular opinion.

So far, at least, fewer American military personnel have died or been wounded (injured) in this attack and the retaliation than die and are injured in US military training.