Does Iran Have a Navy Left? What Survived the 2026 War

Because the Islamic Republic built a second military beside the one it inherited from the Shah. The Islamic Republic of Iran Navy, part of the regular armed forces, ran the frigates, corvettes, submarines and supply ships, and before the war it had about 18,000 sailors. The navy of the Revolutionary Guards, founded in the 1980s, was built for the narrow waters of the Gulf: fast attack boats, missile boats, mines and coastal missile batteries.

The split survives the war. Rear Admiral Ali Ozmaei, named head of the Guards’ navy on August 10, 2026, says his force holds the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf, while the regular navy covers the Gulf of Oman. Our explainer on what the IRGC is sets out how the Guards answer to the Supreme Leader rather than to the elected government.

The United States and Israel destroyed most of it in the first five weeks. The air campaign that opened on February 28, 2026, struck Bandar Abbas, where both navies have their headquarters, and then Konarak, Jask, Chabahar, Bushehr and the island of Qeshm.

The US count rose week by week. Adm. Brad Cooper, the commander of Central Command, said on March 5 that more than 30 Iranian navy vessels had been sunk or destroyed. On March 11 he said the number had passed 60 and that the last of the Guards’ four Soleimani-class warships had been hit, taking “an entire class of Iranian ships” out of the fight. By March 16 the US military put the total above 100, and in early April Central Command said more than 155 Iranian vessels had been damaged or destroyed. On April 8, the day the ceasefire took hold, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said 16 entire classes of Iranian warships had been destroyed. Those are US figures; Iran has published no count of its own losses.

Almost none that can go to sea. The best-known loss is the frigate IRIS Dena, sunk on March 4, 2026, about 20 nautical miles south of Galle, Sri Lanka, by a torpedo from the US submarine USS Charlotte. The ship was sailing home from a naval review hosted by India. Sri Lanka’s deputy foreign minister, Arun Hemachandra, said 80 Iranian sailors died; 32 were rescued from a crew of about 180. War Secretary Pete Hegseth called it the first sinking of an enemy ship by torpedo since World War II.

Ships tracked by open-source analysts tell the rest. The frigate Jamaran was sunk at its mooring in Chabahar on March 1, the frigates Alvand, Sabalan and Sahand were sunk at Bandar Abbas, and the Makran, a converted tanker the navy used as a floating base for long voyages, was left burning in port. On March 18 Israel struck Bandar Anzali, the regular navy’s northern headquarters on the Caspian Sea, in its first attack there. The frigate Deylaman, the largest ship of Iran’s small Caspian flotilla, was among those hit, along with missile boats in the harbor. Silent Dossier’s Iran military strength index now counts zero to two frigates and zero to two destroyers, and no seagoing warship is reported afloat.

Few or none of any size, and the exact number is unknown. Before the war Iran had three Russian-built Kilo-class submarines, a small number of the home-built Fateh class, and a flotilla of about 20 to 23 Ghadir-class midget submarines, 125-ton boats with a crew of seven built for the shallow Gulf.

The one Kilo that could still sail, the Taregh, was sunk at its pier in Bandar Abbas in early March, and satellite images taken days later showed its berth empty and scorched. The other two Kilos had been in dry dock for refits since 2021. On April 8 Leavitt said Iran “now has zero submarine vessels.” Silent Dossier’s estimate is more cautious. The Ghadir boats are small, easy to hide and hard to count from the air, so our index carries a wide range of 11 to 20 that may survive. The yards at Bandar Abbas that kept them running have been struck again and again.

No. Iran has never had an aircraft carrier. The nearest thing was the Shahid Bagheri, a drone carrier the Guards converted from a container ship of about 42,000 tons and put into service in February 2025. US strikes disabled it on March 2, 2026; Cooper described it as “roughly the size of a World War II aircraft carrier.” Other navies on our aircraft carriers by country list operate real carriers that fly fixed-wing jets; the Shahid Bagheri was built to launch drones.

Enough to frighten shipping, though not to fight a navy at sea. The Guards dispersed their boats along a coast of inlets, islands and harbors, and many small craft survived the strikes. Silent Dossier estimates that 100 to 300 fast attack craft and missile boats remain. They have kept fighting since the ceasefire: Cooper said US forces destroyed six small Iranian boats on May 4, 2026, during clashes near the strait.

The other weapon is the mine. Cooper told the Senate Armed Services Committee in written testimony on May 14, 2026, that Iran held about 8,000 naval mines before the war; how many survived is set out in our explainer on how many naval mines Iran has. Fast boats, a few hidden submarines, shore missiles and mines do not make a navy that can protect Iran’s own trade, which is why the US blockade of Iran’s ports, reimposed on July 14, 2026, has held. They are enough to keep insurers and shipowners out of the strait.