In a critical letter to government officials, signed by 62 out of 86 members of the country’s highest clerical body, the Assembly calls upon the negotiators to respect the Leader’s red lines. The statement is as follows:

1. We urge that, considering the experiences of past damaging negotiations, the negotiators will be extremely careful of the tricks of the deceitful and evil enemy and pay attention to the fact that observing the Leader’s red lines is a religious obligation and violating them is not permissible under any circumstances.

2. We emphasize the need to pursue revenge for the martyrdom of our dear Leader, and that Trump and Netanyahu must face justice by any means necessary.

3. Any breach of the MoU must be responded to immediately. Therefore, considering the continuation of ceasefire breaches by the Zionist regime in Lebanon, and the failure to withdraw from the occupied territories, the opening of the Strait of Hormuz is contrary to the obligations of the officials and is considered a major strategic mistake, and will only embolden the enemy to continue its breach of the agreement.

4. We remind you again that according to the obligatory guidance of the Supreme Leader, the country’s nuclear rights should not be discussed nor disputed, and should be completely excluded from the negotiations.

5. Establishing management over the Strait of Hormuz, receiving compensation for war damages, the release of frozen assets, lifting all sanctions, and the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the region are inviolable demands of the Supreme Leader and the people, and they must be pursued. Any negligence in this regard will be met with a fierce reaction of the nation.

6. Officials should avoid any statements that cause the enemy to become more arrogant and makes the country appear weak and helpless. Especially since the resistance of our self-sacrificing warriors has driven the arrogant America to despair, no statements should be made that suggests the country’s weakness or helplessness.

7. Everyone, especially the esteemed government officials, knows that in the system of Wilayat Al-Faqih (Guardianship of the Jurist), the opinion and perspective of the Leader is the final word, and when informed of his definitive opinion, no official can or should act contrary to his opinion.

8. Based on all evidence, the enemy is merely seeking an opportunity to deploy additional forces and buy time for some matters, including the upcoming Midterm elections. After that, there will be a high probability of a new attack, and the issues raised in the MoU should be resolved within the stipulated 30-day and 60-day deadlines.

9. We ask the dear nation to continue their steadfast presence on the streets, and while preserving sacred unity and avoiding any action that disrupts this unity, they should not pay attention to the divisive words of some ignorant people who seek to limit this divine mission. The presence of the people is essential and decisive as long as the Supreme Leader deems it necessary.

10. The Asssembly of Experts, as humble servants and part of the people, will remain with the esteemed Leadership and the entire nation, while wishing success to the respected government officials, awaiting the fulfillment of the conditions and promises, and will fulfill their religious duty when necessary.

Now, some of those wounded soldiers tell CBS News the injuries were far more serious than the official designation provided by the military. Chief Warrant Officer Rodney Bearman’s body was riddled with shrapnel in the early hours of the war on March 1 when an Iranian drone slammed into his work station in Kuwait. Medical records reviewed by CBS News show he also suffered a concussion, hearing and vision loss, and damage to his lungs. The Army has classified his condition as “not seriously injured.” “That assessment is unacceptable,” his wife, Amy Bearman, told CBS News in an interview. Chief Bearman, 57, was one of more than 20 hurt in the deadliest strike of the conflict on American soldiers and the worst attack on American troops since 2021. The Bearmans are also among several survivors and their families who told CBS News they weren’t being treated by the military as combat casualties for reasons they could not understand — a claim an Army spokesman strongly denied. In several cases, injured service members said they had been cleared for duty. But that “duty” involves active orders to recuperate from injuries in specialized “soldier recovery units.” (A Pentagon spokesperson told CBS News that soldiers in recovery units are not counted as having returned to duty.)

Sergeant First Class Cory Hicks, 37, also suffered severe shrapnel wounds from the blast and underwent multiple emergency surgeries at a Kuwaiti hospital. He said his wife was told by an Army official after the strike that his injuries were “minor.” “They said your husband was injured, he has a minor jaw injury, and he’s going to be returned to duty,” said Hicks. He told CBS News he “absolutely” believes the Army and the Pentagon have tried to downplay the incident. In a statement to CBS News, the Army strongly pushed back against that claim and said such military designations as “not seriously injured” and “combat casualty” had specific definitions that were being misconstrued by the families. “The care and well-being of our Soldiers is of the highest priority,” an Army spokesperson wrote. “Any assertion that the Army seeks to downplay a soldier’s injuries is simply not true.” Citing Army protocols, an Army spokesman explained that a soldier who is classified as “seriously injured” or “very seriously injured” is someone at risk of dying from their wounds within 72 hours.

A life-changing phone call

Amy Bearman said she knew to stay away from the TV when the U.S. launched Operation Epic Fury on Feb. 28. Her husband had left for Kuwait in September 2025 — his fifth deployment since they were married nearly 25 years ago. His unit, the Iowa-based 103rd Sustainment Command, relocated from Camp Arifjan to a small tactical outpost at Port of Shuaiba weeks before war broke out. “A lot of friends were calling, texting and wanting to know what I knew,” Bearman told CBS News. “From being a military spouse for the last almost 25 years, I knew that if anything ever happened to my husband while he was serving, I knew I would receive either an official phone call or an official visit.” On March 1, an Iranian drone slammed into the multi-trailer work station at Port of Shuaiba. The next day, Amy Bearman received an official call from Fort Knox. “They told me that my husband’s injuries were classified as NSI, and they described that, or they defined that, as ‘not seriously injured,’” she recalled. “He was treated and released back to duty. That was a huge relief. I think maybe that was the first time that I took a breath in 24 hours.” But her husband’s injuries turned out to be worse than she said the Army led her to believe. On March 3, Amy Bearman received another phone call, this time from her husband, Rodney, who had just spent the night in a Kuwaiti hospital. “I could just hear him breathing and then he finally said, ‘I’m going to be OK.’ I waited a few moments and then asked if he returned to duty. It seemed like forever before he answered me, and then he said, ‘I can’t go back.’” The strike on Port of Shuaiba killed six U.S. soldiers.

In April, a CBS News investigation revealed there were multiple warnings ahead of the strike, related to force protection. Soldiers told CBS News they were left unprotected from the drone attack despite intelligence showing Iran was targeting their position in Kuwait. The findings sparked an investigation from Senate Democrats. CBS News then spoke with other survivors of the blast who detailed requests to leadership for more resources ahead of the strike. Those requests focused on the number of medical personnel as well as the availability and accessibility of medical supplies. “This was a failure,” Major Stephen Ramsbottom said in an interview with CBS News last month, adding he believed Master Sergeant Nicole Amor, one of the six soldiers killed, could have survived her wounds had there been a doctor, a fixed aid station or more than one ambulance at the post. The soldiers, according to witnesses, instead triaged themselves with makeshift bandages, braces and tourniquets. They commandeered civilian vehicles to drive the wounded to two local Kuwaiti hospitals.

Doctors noted that Bearman perhaps should have stayed longer in the hospital in Kuwait, but the Army “pulled him out” because of security concerns, medical records show. The Army spokesperson said the investigation into “the facts and circumstances of the attack” has been completed, and findings from the probe will be released once next of kin have been briefed. “Our hope for the investigation is that an honest assessment by the Army will prevent this from happening again to other service members,” said Amy Bearman. Once stabilized, Hicks was airlifted to Landstuhl Medical Center in Germany and later to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland, where he required inpatient care for several weeks. Now nearly four months since the attack, he remains at Walter Reed in a soldier recovery unit with a “pretty severe” traumatic brain injury, and expects to stay there for at least the next six months. A spokesperson for Walter Reed declined to comment due to privacy laws. In a written statement to CBS News, an Army spokesman declined to comment on what was told to Hicks’ wife, but said, “What I can tell you is that SFC Hicks received the care and treatment necessary in theater to prepare him for evacuation outside of the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility to receive a higher level of care as dictated by his wounds.”

Army defends “not seriously injured” designation

Chief Bearman returned to the United States on March 18, still injured and still with pieces of shrapnel throughout his body. Bearman himself then applied for and was granted a request to be assigned to a soldier recovery unit at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, which was within driving distance from his wife, Amy, and their home in West Virginia. On March 26, Republican Sen. Shelley Moore Capito wrote to the Army on Bearman’s behalf, seeking clarity and answers on what happened to him in Kuwait and why Amy was told her husband was “not seriously injured.” Nearly two months later, on May 13, Major General Michael J. Leeney responded to Capito and Bearman, defending the [not seriously injured] designation but noting “this technical classification is in no way intended to minimize [Chief Warrant Officer] Bearman’s contribution and sacrifice.”

One reason is that research funds are being diverted to operations. The Pentagon’s “research, development, test, and evaluation (RDT&E) infrastructure is deteriorating and weakening the Department’s ability to maintain a technically advanced warfighting capability,” warned the report by the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering. “Authorized major military construction (MILCON) projects for modernization of critical joint-mission RDT&E infrastructure continually slip due to the services’ reprioritizing of scarce MILCON funds toward other operationally relevant priorities.” The study examined government laboratories as well as federally funded think tanks and university research centers. Investigators visited 30 of these sites — or about one-third of total facilities — in what the report termed “unprecedented data collection.” The report presented a mixed picture of the Pentagon’s research backbone. It found the defense research enterprise, or DRE, “is fundamentally sound.” However, it also “needs to rapidly adapt to a new environment moving at the accelerating pace of commercial technology and driven by a broader set of global security threats.”

Research has been hampered by backlogged security clearances, limited funds to build or refurbish labs and a slow and difficult hiring process that discourages younger skilled personnel. Nor does DoD have a clear handle on its research infrastructure, including a comprehensive list of specialized facilities, such as the Triaxial Earthquake and Shock Simulator in Illinois. Pentagon research facilities don’t even speak a common language, the report states. “For example, a single technical domain may be variously labeled as ‘Human-Machine Teaming,’ ‘Autonomy and Teaming,’ or ‘AI Agent Development’ depending on the reporting entity,” the report noted. “This semantic variability ensures that high- level titles alone are insufficient for determining the true depth or specificity of the work being performed.” Further, the Pentagon is not taking full advantage of its own discoveries. DoD’s “vast intellectual property remains underutilized due to passive marketing and the lack of a centralized discovery mechanism,” said the report. “Current administrative burdens for transition agreements often exceed the funding timelines of startups, hindering innovation and collaboration.”

This results in delays in new technologies reaching the field. “The Department’s ability to rapidly transition technologies from knowledge producers to capability fielders is severely degraded by structural and cultural barriers, specifically bureaucratic stovepipes, fragmented funding streams, and misaligned mechanisms, authorities, and incentives,” the report said. The report took care to state that it is not calling for Pentagon research centers to be closed. “The evidence in this report does not support consolidating or eliminating institutions: Most overlap is driven by mission need,” the report says. “The findings suggest that the way to reform the DRE is to fix the system around its institutions — how authority, money, and decisions flow, and how the institutions are funded, measured, and governed.” The study points to China as an example for DoD’s research infrastructure, including partnering with the commercial sector. “China has solidified its civil-military fusion model and is investing on a scale and at a pace that requires the United States to develop a new Government-industry paradigm — one that advances and protects critical defense research while extending the technical reach of the DRE through industrial and academic partnerships the DRE itself does not own.”

The report made numerous recommendations, including easing budgetary limits on lab refurbishment, using AI to speed up security clearances and creating a searchable database for DoD intellectual property. “Without a robust, agile, and properly resourced DRE, the department cannot rapidly onramp innovative capabilities or deliver the advanced capabilities the warfighter requires to deter and, if necessary, defeat emerging threats in an era of intense strategic competition,” the report concluded.