AI-generated clip and old video shared in false posts about Iran striking USS Abraham Lincoln
- Published on March 12, 2026 at 03:50
- 2 min read
- By Jeff LI, AFP Hong Kong
Iran claimed it struck a US aircraft carrier with drones as it retaliated against a joint US-Israeli attack in late February that has triggered a regional war, but two videos circulating on social media do not show purported damage to the USS Abraham Lincoln. The United States has said the ship was not struck by Iranian drones -- one of the videos is AI-generated, while the other depicts a fire on a US warship in 2020.
"The United States has suffered massive losses so far. Iranian missiles were used in direct ballistic attacks on the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier," reads the traditional Chinese caption of a video of a large ship on fire that was shared on Facebook on March 8, 2026.
Another video of a warship on fire was shared in a March 7 Douyin post making a similar claim about the Abraham Lincoln.
Similar posts sharing the two clips alongside a similar claim spread across social media in various languages as Iran repeatedly claimed to have struck the USS Abraham Lincoln after the United States and Israel launched a massive military campaign against the Islamic republic on February 28 (archived here and here).
The United States has two aircraft carriers in the Middle East taking part in the war, and has denied the Abraham Lincoln was struck.
US Central Command -- which is responsible for American forces in the Middle East -- shared photos of the ship on its official X account on March 1 and March 7, saying the missiles "didn't even come close" (archived here and here).
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes from the first circulating video found it matches an Instagram post on August 27, 2025 that says it was made using AI (archived link).
"I'm just experimenting to create crazy unimaginable shots that look like real life disasters but all made with AI," the post says.
The account's bio says it makes "AI characters and voices" and regularly shares AI-generated videos of accidents and disasters (archived link).
The account's owner also told AFP the video was made using Google's Veo 2 AI model.
A separate search on Google found the second clip has been cropped from a video uploaded by the US Navy on its official YouTube channel and shows a fire on the amphibious assault ship, the USS Bonhomme Richard, on July 12, 2020 (archived link).
The video's description says the fire broke out while the ship was moored at Naval Base San Diego.
Local broadcaster CBS 8 San Diego published footage of the ship from the same angle on July 18, 2020 after the fire was extinguished (archived link).
AFP reported the following year that a crew member on the warship was accused of starting the fire, which injured 17 sailors and four civilians (archived link). The navy had planned to repair the ship but it was so damaged it had to be discarded in early 2021.
AFP has debunked other misinformation related to Iran here.
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