CENTCOM rejects Ali Azmayi's claim: the IRGC Navy commander does not control the sea

US Central Command (CENTCOM) on Wednesday, 14 October 2026, rejected the claim by Ali Azmayi, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Navy, that his force controls the Strait of Hormuz. In a post headed "Fact check" on its Persian-language account on X, CENTCOM wrote: "The commander of the IRGC Navy does not control the sea." The response followed Azmayi's threat to sink American warships, which DIAR reported earlier.

In the same post, CENTCOM stressed that US forces and regional partners hold full control of the Strait of Hormuz. The command had previously announced that on Monday, 12 October, US forces helped their partners in the Persian Gulf move more than 19 million barrels of crude oil through the Strait of Hormuz.

The war of narratives in the Strait of Hormuz

On Tuesday, 13 October, Ali Azmayi had claimed that the IRGC dominates the Strait of Hormuz, that American warships avoid approaching it, and that any warship that comes close will be sunk. This is not the first time CENTCOM has answered such claims; in late September, responding to a similar claim by one of the Islamic Republic's commanders, it said the Islamic Republic's navy had been destroyed in the war and had no control over the strait.

Still, attacks on commercial ships in the strait continue. On Wednesday the IRGC claimed that a container ship south of the Strait of Hormuz had sunk after hitting a mine, and reports point to a change in the Islamic Republic's tactics in attacking ships in order to keep oil prices high ahead of the US election.

Background

The United States has kept Iran's ports under a naval blockade for months, and the Islamic Republic's crude oil exports have fallen to zero. Azmayi's threat to sink American warships came as Donald Trump said he will soon make a decision on the Islamic Republic.

In response to the IRGC's threat, CENTCOM said full control of the Strait of Hormuz is in the hands of the United States and its partners.