A chilling intelligence bulletin has put California law enforcement on notice that Iran may have been eyeing a drone strike on the US mainland — launched not from Iranian soil but from an unidentified ship sitting off the American coastline.

The warning, contained in a bulletin reviewed by ABC News, described a scenario in which Tehran allegedly considered unleashing unmanned aerial vehicles against unspecified targets in California if Washington moved against the regime.

“We recently acquired information that as of early February 2026, Iran allegedly aspired to conduct a surprise attack using unmanned aerial vehicles from an unidentified vessel off the coast of the United States Homeland, specifically against unspecified targets in California, in the event that the US conducted strikes against Iran,” the alert read.

“We have no additional information on the timing, method, target, or perpetrators of this alleged attack.”

Which sites Iran may have had in its sights — and how a drone-laden vessel could have approached the US shoreline undetected — has not been addressed by officials.

‘Whipping up hysteria’

The bulletin’s credibility was almost immediately contested, reported The Sun. Law enforcement insiders who spoke to NBC News were dismissive, describing the underlying intelligence as “raw” and unreliable. One source said the reports were “scaring people for no reason” and “whipping up hysteria” — a characterisation that put significant distance between the bulletin and any genuine operational threat assessment.

Both Gavin Newsom and Donald Trump moved quickly to tamp down the alarm. The California governor took to X to say he was in “constant coordination with security and intelligence officials” and was “not aware of any imminent threats at this time,” while Trump said he had no concerns about Iranian attacks on American soil.

The California bulletin did not emerge in isolation. US intelligence has been wrestling for months with the possibility that weaponised drones could reach American territory from unexpected quarters. According to the report, a separate bulletin from September 2025 flagged the possibility that Mexican drug cartels had weighed up explosive drone strikes against American law enforcement and military personnel along the southern border — a scenario described as “unprecedented but plausible.”

A threat from two directions

Former Department of Homeland Security intelligence chief John Cohen reportedly said the convergence of Iranian capability, regional presence and fresh motivation made the threat landscape more dangerous than it had ever been.

“We know Iran has an extensive presence in Mexico and South America, they have relationships, they have the drones and now they have the incentive to conduct attacks,” he said in the report.

Cohen backed the FBI’s decision to push the warning out regardless of its reliability rating: “The FBI is smart for putting this warning out so that state and locals can be better able to prepare and respond to these types of threats. Information like this is critically important for law enforcement.”

The underlying anxiety is one that security planners have carried for years — that drones or strike equipment could be quietly staged in advance, whether on land or at sea, waiting for the moment a conflict with Iran tipped into something that required an answer on American soil.