By Iran is now offering cash for dead or captured American soldiers.
The Iranian military announced Sunday that it will pay the equivalent of $30,000 to anyone who kills or captures a member of the U.S. military, according to Iranian state media. Women who carry out the act will receive twice as much.
Army chief Amir Hatami said the program was created in response to “the large number of requests” from Iranians seeking to participate in the initiative.
“Anyone who kills or captures and hands over an invading American military personnel will receive a reward equivalent to $30,000 or 5 billion tomans from Iran’s Army,” Hatami stated.
“Courageous Iranian women who carry out such an action will receive double the reward.”
That puts the bounty at roughly $60,000 for an Iranian woman who kills or captures an American servicemember.
Hatami did not explain where participants are expected to encounter American troops. There has been no known deployment of U.S. ground forces inside Iran during the current conflict, aside from an April rescue operation to recover a downed American pilot.
But the announcement adds to a long-running pattern of explicit Iranian threats against Americans and American political leaders.
Iranian officials have repeatedly threatened President Donald Trump over the 2020 U.S. strike that killed Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Qassem Soleimani. Senior Iranian official Mohammad-Javad Larijani last year suggested Trump could be targeted by a drone while sunbathing at Mar-a-Lago, while Iranian-linked campaigns have promoted financial rewards for killing the president.
The threats have not been limited to rhetoric. Federal prosecutors have also charged alleged Iranian operatives in plots targeting Trump and other former U.S. officials, with the Justice Department accusing the IRGC of directing assassination efforts on American soil.
The latest bounty comes as Washington and Tehran remain locked in a conflict that began Feb. 28, when the United States and Israel launched strikes against Iran.
A ceasefire took hold in April following nearly 40 days of fighting, but a framework for peace talks reached in June later collapsed. Sporadic fighting has continued, particularly in southern Iran and around the Strait of Hormuz.
The strategic waterway has become one of the central flashpoints of the conflict.
In June, the U.S. military struck 10 targets inside Iran after Iranian forces attacked an oil tanker traveling through the Strait of Hormuz. U.S. Central Command said the strikes targeted Iranian surveillance, communications, air-defense, drone-storage and minelaying capabilities.
Trump warned Tehran at the time that continued attacks could bring a much larger American response.
“There may come a point when we are no longer able to be reasonable, and will be forced to militarily complete the job that we very successfully started. If that happens, the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist!” Trump said.
Iran has continued asserting control over traffic through the Strait of Hormuz as the United States and its allies push to keep one of the world’s most important energy corridors open.
Now Tehran is adding another escalation: putting an explicit cash price on American servicemembers.
And in one of the more bizarre details of the offer, a regime notorious for restricting the rights of women has found one area where it is willing to offer them a premium: killing Americans.
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