More than 140 US troops have been wounded in the Iran war, the Pentagon has confirmed. 

‘The vast majority of these injuries have been minor, and 108 service members have already returned to duty,’ spokesman Sean Parnell said Tuesday.

Parnell said that eight of the injuries were considered severe. US Central Command defines ‘seriously wounded’ as troops facing imminent death or who may die from their injuries.

Seven US service members have been killed after Donald Trump launched strikes against Iran on February 28.

The human toll comes amid mounting concerns over the financial cost, the Pentagon having burned through $5.6 billion worth of munitions in the first two days of the war. 

Gas prices have rocketed to an average of $3.5 per gallon from $2.9 before the war began, as oil prices hit levels not seen since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. 

Trump has said he is hoping for a swift end, as advisers privately urge him to look for an exit ramp. 

‘We’re way ahead of schedule,’ Trump told reporters in Florida on Monday, adding he thought the war would be over ‘very soon.’ 

Oil prices retreated late Monday and into Tuesday as Trump backed away from his maximalist regime-change demand of ‘unconditional surrender’ issued last week.

The retreat came despite an embarrassing episode earlier in the day, in which Energy Secretary Chris Wright falsely claimed on social media that the US Navy had escorted a tanker through the Strait of Hormuz. 

‘The US Navy has not escorted a tanker or a vessel at this time,’ White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters. Prices had fallen more than 17 percent immediately after Wright’s post before his account deleted it.

The stock market ticked up slightly in volatile trading as investors attempted to keep up with the president’s rapidly changing positions.

‘We want a system that can lead to many years of peace, and if we can’t have that, we might as well get it over with right now,’ Trump said. 

He said he was not pleased with the appointment of Mojtaba Khamenei, son of the slain Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as Iran’s new supreme leader.

Trump will not stop fighting until he can claim a victory, particularly as the US holds the upper hand, a senior administration official told the Wall Street Journal. 

Advisers told the President to discuss plans to extract US troops from the war and sell the idea that America’s aims had been achieved.

Officials expressed concerns that a protracted war will erode conservative support. 

Anxious Republicans called the White House on Monday as oil prices surged past $100 a barrel. 

Trump’s top team concluded in recent days that it needed a more aggressive communications strategy to convince the public of its motivations for the war. 

‘When the price of gas and oil rise, so does everything else. Given affordability was already an issue, this leads to real challenges,’ said Stephen Moore, an economic adviser to Trump.