An ongoing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a deadly Tomahawk missile attack on an Iranian elementary school, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the preliminary findings.
The Feb. 28 attack on the Shajarah Tayyebeh Elementary School building was the result of mistargeting by the U.S. military, which was conducting strikes against an adjacent Iranian base of which the school building was formerly a part, the preliminary investigation found.
U.S. Central Command officials created target coordinates for the attack using outdated data provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, people briefed on the investigation said.
Officials stressed that the findings are preliminary and that there are important unanswered questions about why outdated information had not been double-checked.
Attacking a school full of children will surely go down as one of the most devastating military mistakes of recent decades. Iranian officials have said the death toll was at least 175 people, most of them children.
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While the overall finding was largely expected (the United States is the only country involved in the conflict to use Tomahawk missiles), it has already cast a shadow over the US military operation in Iran.
President Donald Trump’s attempts to deflect blame for the attack have also complicated the investigation, leaving officials who have reviewed findings showing U.S. guilt expressing concern. People interviewed for this story spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the sensitive nature of the ongoing investigation and Trump’s assertion at one point that Iran, not the United States, was responsible.
“As The New York Times acknowledges in its own reporting, the investigation is still ongoing,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.
People briefed on the investigation said there were still many questions to be answered about why outdated information was used and who did not verify the data.
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Still, the error has not surprised current and former officials.
The school, in the city of Minab, is on the same block as buildings used by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Navy, one of the main targets of US military attacks. The school site was originally part of the base.
Officials briefed on the investigation said the building was not always used as a school, although it is unclear exactly when the school opened at the site.
A Times visual investigation showed that the building housing the school had been fenced off from the military base between 2013 and 2016.
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Satellite images reviewed by the Times showed that guard towers that once stood near the building had been removed, three public entrances to the school were opened, the land was cleared and play areas, including a sports field, were painted over asphalt, and the walls were painted blue and pink.
“Target coding” provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, the military intelligence agency that helps develop targets, labeled the school building as a military target when it was passed to Central Command, the military headquarters that oversees the war, according to people briefed on the investigation’s preliminary findings.
Investigators still do not fully understand how the outdated data was sent to Central Command or whether the Defense Intelligence Agency had updated information.
Military objectives are very complex and involve multiple agencies. Many officers would have been responsible for verifying that the data is correct, and Central Command officers are responsible for verifying information they receive from the Defense Intelligence Agency or another intelligence agency. But in a rapidly changing situation, like the early days of a war, sometimes information is not verified.
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In addition to the Defense Intelligence Agency and Central Command, investigators are examining the work of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, known as NGA, which provides and examines satellite images of potential targets.
U.S. officials and others emphasized that the investigation was ongoing and there was more to learn, according to people briefed on the investigation. Central Command officials declined to comment.
Defense Intelligence Agency officials referred questions to the Pentagon, which declined to comment, saying the incident was under investigation. The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency have dozens, even hundreds, of analysts in combatant commands who work with military operational planners and intelligence offices to develop targets.
When Defense Intelligence Agency target data is older, intelligence officials are expected to use imagery or data from the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency to update and verify the target.
While Trump has made attacking Iran’s navy a top war priority to prevent it from interfering with global trade in the region, it has not historically been a priority of the Defense Intelligence Agency, which has focused more on Iran’s missiles and other priorities such as China and North Korea.
Officials conducting the investigation have examined whether any artificial intelligence models, data processing programs or other technical means of intelligence gathering were to blame for the mistaken attack on the school, according to U.S. officials.
While Claude, the big language model created by Anthropic, does not create targets directly, it works with the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency’s Maven Smart System and other software to identify points of interest for military intelligence officers.
But officials said it was unlikely the error had been the result of new technology. Instead, they said, it probably reflected a common, but sometimes devastating, human error in times of war.
The main finding of the internal military investigation reflects a growing body of public evidence that clearly suggests US responsibility.
Satellite images, social media posts and verified videos collected by The Times’ visual investigation team indicate that the school was severely damaged by a precision strike that occurred around the same time as the attacks on the naval base. A Times analysis showed the base was attacked again about two hours after the first attacks.
A video uploaded Sunday by Iran’s semiofficial Mehr news agency and verified by the Times also shows a Tomahawk cruise missile hitting the naval base next to the school in Minab on February 28.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other administration officials declined to comment on the attack other than to say it is under investigation. Despite this, the president has sometimes tried to shift the blame to Iran.
“In my opinion, from what I’ve seen, that was done by Iran,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Saturday, with Hegseth at his side, adding: “They’re very inaccurate, as you know, with their munitions. They’re not accurate at all. It was done by Iran.”
On Monday, a Times reporter asked Trump why he was the only official in his administration to blame Iran. “Because I just don’t know enough about it,” Trump responded, incorrectly claiming that Iran could also have Tomahawk missiles, but adding that he would accept the results of the investigation into what happened.
While most presidents might refrain from commenting or speaking out while an investigation is underway, Trump has not hesitated to intervene and has not backed down completely, even as evidence of U.S. guilt has mounted.
On Tuesday, Leavitt reiterated that Trump would accept the investigation’s conclusions.
While the investigation into the school is not complete, the use of old data evoked the biggest misstep of the Kosovo war.
In 1999, old, outdated maps and poor technique led the CIA to provide erroneous targeting data to the military, resulting in an airstrike on the Chinese embassy in Belgrade that killed three Chinese nationals. The CIA wrongly assessed that the building was the headquarters of a Yugoslav arms agency.
“Database maintenance is one of the basic elements of our intelligence effort, but it is also one that has been affected in recent years as our workforce has dispersed,” George Tenet, CIA director at the time, told a congressional committee in 1999.
Military planners assumed that the intelligence agency had verified the location and ordered the attack.
