Iran Claims USS Abraham Lincoln Hit by Missile — U.S. Navy Deploys E-6B Nuclear Command Aircraft

Iran has claimed five separate times in eight days that it sank the USS Abraham Lincoln. Iran's IRGC claimed to have struck USS Abraham Lincoln with ballistic missiles. Sentcom responded with one word, lie. The Lincoln was not hit. The missiles launched didn't even come close. Lincoln continues to launch aircraft in support of Sentcom's relentless campaign to defend the American people by eliminating threats from the Iranian regime. That is Sentcom's confirmed public statement posted on its official account in capital letters, not a press briefing, not a spokesperson reading from notes. The United States military's most senior regional command called Iran's claim a lie publicly and immediately. Five times on five separate days. Because Iran claimed it five separate times, each version slightly different, each one contradicting the last. But here's what happened simultaneously. While Iran was claiming to sink a carrier, it demonstrabably did not sink. And while Sentcom was publicly calling it a lie, the United States Navy quietly deployed something over the Persian Gulf that it almost never deploys outside American airspace. On March 4th, two E6B Mercury aircraft took off simultaneously. One from Tinker Air Force Base toward the Gulf, the other from Puxen River toward the eastern coast of the Gulf. Osent trackers confirmed both takeoffs. The E6B Mercury called the Doomsday plane. The aircraft exists for one purpose. To ensure that if every groundbased command center in America is destroyed, if every satellite link is severed, if the president and the entire chain of command are gone, the order to launch America's nuclear arsenal can still be transmitted to submarines hidden beneath the ocean. The United States sent two of them to the Persian Gulf on the same day Sentcom was publicly denying Iran's carrier claim for the third consecutive day. Here is the complete picture. Iran's five-day claim campaign, Sentcom's five-day denial, the fake videos were confirmed as video game footage, what Sentcom published on its own account to prove the Lincoln was still operating, and what the deployment of two E6B Mercury aircraft over the Gulf on March 4th actually signals, regardless of whether Iran hit the carrier or not. The IRGC claimed it had targeted the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier with four ballistic missiles, saying its strikes against US forces had entered a new phase and that land and sea will become the graveyard of terrorist aggressors. Day one, four ballistic missiles struck the carrier. Day three, the carrier was hit and forced to relocate. Day five. Iranian state media claimed the aircraft carrier had miraculously resurfaced and left the battlefield after encountering Iranian missiles and drones. Stop on that progression. Day one, Iran said it struck Lincoln with four missiles. Day three, it said Lincoln was hit and moving away. Day five, having claimed the Lincoln was hit, then retreating, then relocating. Iranian state media said the Lincoln had miraculously resurfaced after leaving the battlefield. The IRGC's own timeline contradicts itself. A carrier that was struck by four ballistic missiles on day one cannot miraculously resurface on day five. Either it was hit on day one, in which case it did not resurface, or it was never hit, in which case there was nothing to resurface from. Sententcom rejected what it described as shifting claims from Thran, noting that Iranian officials had repeatedly asserted in recent days that the carrier had been sunk before later suggesting it had left the battlefield after encountering missiles and drones. "Need we say more," Sentcom posted. Sentcom published the contradiction publicly, not in a classified briefing, not in a background statement to selected journalists, on its official social media account side by side with the shifting Iranian claims, asking its audience directly, "Need we say more." That is an extraordinary public communications decision by a military command. It means Sentcom was so confident in its denial that it chose public mockery over measured diplomatic language. A video claiming to show the USS Abraham Lincoln burning after being hit by Iranian missiles in 2026 is actually from a 2025 post during a different conflict and appears to be generated by the Arma 3 video game. US military officials confirmed on March 1st, 2026 that none of the missiles launched by Iran came close to hitting the American aircraft carrier, debunking the false claim made in the recycled video. Arma 3, a military simulation video game developed by Bohemia Interactive. The same developers who have been warning for years that their game footage is indistinguishable from real combat video to untrained viewers. The burning carrier footage that spread across social media in the first 48 hours of this war. The footage that received millions of views and was cited by Iranian state media as visual confirmation of the strike was video game footage recycled from a different claim made during the June 2025 12-day war between Iran and Israel. Robert Farley, University of Kentucky senior lecturer on diplomacy and national security told Politact that if such an attack occurred, people on board the carrier and neighboring vessels would have witnessed it. There have been no such witness reports. 5,000 sailors, multiple escort destroyers, support ships, surveillance aircraft. Every person on every vessel in the Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group would have witnessed a ballistic missile impact on a Nimitz class aircraft carrier. Not one witness report exists. Not one sailor confirmed it. Not one escort destroyer reported it. Not one military communication leaked it. Because according to Sentcom, the Nimits class aircraft carrier remains fully operational and continues flight operations in support of US military missions in the region. Sentcom shared photos on social media showing the carrier continuing normal flight operations as part of its deployment in the region. alongside a statement dismissing Iranian reports that the ship had been hit by missiles or forced to withdraw. Photos published publicly timestamped showing FA18 Super Hornets on the flight deck with launch crews in their color-coded jerseys, aircraft engines running, catapults armed. The visual evidence that the Lincoln was not hit came not from a classified briefing or a press conference, but from Sentcom's own social media feed where anyone in the world with internet access could see the carrier that Iran claimed it sank still launching aircraft the next morning. Now, here is the part of this story that nobody in mainstream coverage connected to the carrier claim. Because the deployment of two E6B Mercury aircraft to the Persian Gulf on March 4th is not just a footnote to the Lincoln story. It is the most strategically significant American military deployment of this entire war that most people have never heard of. The E6B Mercury operates under US strategic command and is flown by Fleet Air Reconnaissance Squadron 3 and Fleet Air Reconnaissance Squadron 4, both based at Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma. The Navy maintains a fleet of 16 E6B aircraft, ensuring at least one is airborne at all times through Operation Looking Glass, a continuous airborne alert mission that has been maintained since 1961. Since 1961, the United States has kept at least one E6B airborne continuously for 65 years. since the height of the Cold War when American military planners first concluded that a Soviet first strike could destroy every groundbased command center simultaneously and that the only survivable nuclear command link was an aircraft uh in the air that could not be targeted because its position was always changing. The E6B fulfills two critical missions. First, it serves as the take charge and move out platform, providing a survival communication link between the National Command Authority, the President and Secretary of Defense, and ballistic missile submarines operating deep beneath the ocean surface. Using very low frequency radio transmissions via a trailing wire antenna that can extend up to 5 miles, the E6B can penetrate seawater to reach submarines that would otherwise be cut off. 5 miles of wire trailing behind a modified Boeing 707 at 30,000 ft transmitting very low frequency radio signals that penetrate seawater deeply enough to reach Ohio class submarines carrying trident and tuling trying to nuclear missiles at depth. The physics of very low frequency radio require the antenna to be nearly vertical. So the E6B enters a steep continuous orbit called a Takamo bank near stall speed using gravity and aerodynamic drag to force the wire straight down. When an E6B is in a tacko bank over the Persian Gulf, it is in the physical configuration for transmitting nuclear launch orders to submarines in the Indian Ocean. In early March 2026, following the start of Operation Epic Fury, flight tracking data and regional observers confirmed the presence of at least two E6B Mercury aircraft operating in the vicinity of the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. This presence coincided with the deployment of a second aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS Gerald R. Ford to the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. By placing the Mercury in the same theater as the conventional conflict, the United States signaled that its strategic deterrent was not merely a background asset, but an active component of its regional posture. Active component, not background deterrence, not a distant signal from American airspace. Two E6B aircraft operating simultaneously in the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman. The exact waters where Iran has been firing missiles, where the Abraham Lincoln is operating, where the Strait of Hormuz has come to a near standstill. America moved its nuclear command aircraft into the same airspace as its conventional combat operations. That is a deliberate strategic signal designed to be seen, designed to be interpreted, designed to communicate something specific to Thran's remaining leadership. While the Pentagon has not officially confirmed these specific mission profiles, the reports have sparked a deep dive into the insurance policy of American nuclear deterrence. Military analysts emphasize that these movements do not confirm a nuclear alert. The E6B fleet must fly regularly to ensure readiness. Routine training missions are designed to look identical to emergency operations. The aircraft cannot tell you which. That ambiguity is the deterrent. The ambiguity is the deterrent. That single sentence from a military analyst quoted in nation's time is the most precise description of what the E6B deployment achieves strategically. Iran's remaining leadership sitting in hardened facilities or underground bunkers across Thran cannot determine from flight tracking data whether two E6B Mercury aircraft over the Persian Gulf are on a training mission or an active nuclear command posture. They cannot tell the difference. That inability to tell the difference is precisely what the deployment is designed to create. While the deployment does not automatically indicate imminent US nuclear use, it underscores contingency planning for worst case scenarios such as threats to command infrastructure, radiological incidents, or further major escalation involving nuclear capable actors. The US Navy and Pentagon have not issued official statements confirming the exact purpose, but such movements are typically tied to exercises, deterrent signaling, or crisis response. Deterrence signaling. That is the confirmed analysis from a source tracking the deployment in real time using OSENT flight data. The E6B deployment is not preparation for nuclear war. It is a message delivered through the flight path. A message that says whatever you are planning to do next, whatever target you are considering after the Lincoln claim, after the Aludade radar, after the fifth fleet headquarters, after the THAAD system in Jordan, we've already moved the aircraft that makes the ultimate response possible into the same airspace as this war. So, here is where this stands. On March 8th, 2026, Iran claimed it struck the USS Abraham Lincoln five times in 8 days. Sentcom emphasized that the Lincoln was unaffected and continued normal flight operations, stressing that the Lincoln was not hit and incoming missiles did not come close. The videos Iran circulated were confirmed as video game footage recycled from a previous conflict. Sentcom published photos of the carrier still launching aircraft and Politact confirmed the burning carrier videos as pants on fire, its highest rating for false claims. Iran possesses ballistic missiles that can reach US bases in the region. It proved this with attacks toward Israel and Turkey. The logical extension of this capability, even if limited, targets the command infrastructures on which the US depends to conduct this war. The US does not wait to activate nuclear command continuity only after a command center is hit. Does not wait. That is the strategic logic of the E6B deployment published in confirmed analysis this week. America lost a $ 1.1 billion dollar radar at Aluade on day one. Iran destroyed a Thead radar system in Jordan on day three. Iranian bombers came within 2 minutes of aloud on day two. The command infrastructure that America depends on to conduct this war has been systematically targeted from the first hour. The E6B deployment is the American response to that targeting, ensuring that even if every fixed command node in the Gulf is hit, the nuclear command link survives airborne over the Persian Gulf. The deployment of the United States Navy E6B Mercury aircraft over the Gulf in March 2026 is a significant escalation in strategic signaling. As the major combat operation with Iran steps up from regional skirmishes to a broader confrontation, the presence of this specific airframe tells us that the United States has moved beyond conventional deterrence. Beyond conventional deterrence, the Lincoln was not hit. Iran's claim was a lie confirmed by every available evidence. And while Sentcom was posting the word lie in capital letters on social media, two aircraft designed for nuclear war were already airborne over the Persian Gulf. Both things are true. The carrier is fine and the doomsday plane is watching.

Iran claimed it struck the USS Abraham Lincoln 5 times in 8 days. CENTCOM responded with one word: LIE. "The Lincoln was not hit. The missiles didn't even come close." Photos published. Videos confirmed as Arma 3 game footage. The carrier is still launching aircraft right now. But while CENTCOM was posting that denial — the US Navy quietly deployed two E-6B Mercury aircraft to the Persian Gulf on March 4. The Doomsday Plane. The nuclear command aircraft. The aircraft that exists to transmit nuclear launch orders to submarines if every ground command center is destroyed. Both things happened on the same day. CENTCOM denied Iran's claim. America sent the Doomsday Plane. In this video I break down: ✅ Iran's 5-day shifting claim campaign — each version confirmed ✅ CENTCOM's public denial — the exact words, the exact statement ✅ Arma 3 game footage confirmed — PolitiFact's Pants on Fire rating ✅ CENTCOM published photos proving Lincoln still operational ✅ What the E-6B Mercury actually is — TACAMO and Looking Glass ✅ Two E-6B aircraft deployed March 4 — OSINT flight tracking confirmed ✅ The 5-mile trailing wire antenna — how it reaches submarines ✅ Why the ambiguity of the deployment IS the deterrent ✅ "The US has moved beyond conventional deterrence" — confirmed analysis Every fact confirmed. Every quote from named primary sources. CENTCOM official statement linked directly below. 📡 CONFIRMED SOURCES: - CENTCOM Official X — LIE confirmed denial (March 1): https://x.com/CENTCOM/status/2028124242273767557 - Naval Today — CENTCOM rejects IRGC claim confirmed (March 4): https://www.navaltoday.com/2026/03/04/us-strikes-iranian-drone-carrier-denies-missile-hit-on-uss-abraham-lincoln/ - Naval Today — CENTCOM shares Lincoln photos confirmed (March 7): https://www.navaltoday.com/2026/03/07/us-shares-photos-of-uss-abraham-lincoln-at-sea-after-irans-claims-it-was-struck-by-missile/ - PolitiFact — Videos fake Arma 3 confirmed (March 2): https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2026/mar/02/social-media/uss-abraham-lincoln-fire-missile-iran/ - Yahoo/Lead Stories — Arma 3 video game footage confirmed: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/fact-check-video-does-not-032329144.html - James Marinero Substack — E-6B Mercury Gulf deployment (March 5): https://jamesmarinero.substack.com/p/us-e-6b-mercury-deployed-over-the - NationsTime — E-6B Looking Glass Gulf reports confirmed (March 6): https://www.nationstime.com/2026/03/iran-war-reports-track-us-nuclear.html - Elliott Middleton Substack — E-6B TACAMO deployment confirmed (March 8): https://elliottmiddleton.substack.com/p/united-states-has-deployed-a-us-navy - Banking News — Two E-6Bs March 4 OSINT confirmed (March 6): https://www.bankingnews.gr/en/index.php?id=860482 - The Defense Watch — E-6B technical confirmed analysis: https://thedefensewatch.com/aerospace-aviation/doomsday-planes-e-6b-e-4b-nuclear-command-jets/ - Wikipedia — 2026 Iran war full timeline (Updated hourly): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Iran_conflict ⚠️ DISCLAIMER: This channel provides news analysis for educational and informational purposes only. All claims are sourced to named primary publications with direct links. The E-6B deployment does not confirm nuclear alert status. Nothing constitutes an endorsement of any military action. #AbrahamLincoln #E6B #DoomsdayPlane #CENTCOM