The provocative proposal is likely to cause outrage in the US and be seized on by Republicans opposed to President Barack Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran.

Commander Ali Fadavi, the head of the Guard’s naval forces, said the monument of the surrendering Americans would be a “tourist attraction”.

“There are very many photographs of the major incident of arresting US Marines in the Persian Gulf in the media and we intend to build a symbol out of them inside one of our naval monuments,” he told Iran’s Defense Press news agency.