The RQ 170 Sentinel shot down over Iran. (Image: Wired)
(UPDATE w/video: Iran airs footage of US drone intact)
It’s most likely Iran downed and acquired a U.S. stealth drone over the weekend. Implications abound. There have been plenty of mixed messages going on about this in the last few days. I imagine the last thing the US wants to admit is we lost cutting edge defense technology of this advanced nature …. to Iran.
Yesterday, after days of hemming and hawing there are reports that for “the first time US officials have conceded the lost drone was, in fact, an advanced RQ-170 Sentinel.”
Listen to the UK’s Telegraph’s framing: Iran capture of stealth drone ‘a concern’
‘Capture’ eh. Hmm. But the US is having none of it.
US military officials said they are concerned that Iran may have an opportunity to acquire information about the classified surveillance drone programme after one of the stealthy aircraft crashed in Iran while patrolling in western Afghanistan
……
U.S. officials have acknowledged that the military lost control of one of the stealthy drones while it was flying a mission over western Afghanistan. Iran’s official IRNA news agency has said that Iran’s armed forces shot it down.
Today Business Insider reports:
While officials still refute the Iranian claims that they took the drone down electronically, Tehran did receive this mobile Russian jamming device six-weeks prior to the incident.
I’d like to direct you once again to Moon of Alabama (you might recall how tech savvy b. brilliantly busted wide open the IAEA dud report last month). Monday morning b. offered his usually prescient analysis, explaining how a mobile jamming system works. It’s a completely awesome read even if you skip the all the techie stuff like I sometimes do. But he clinches it and spills the beans on what our government doesn’t want us to know and believe me, if b’s analysis is accurate, it has sweeping implications.
Having acquired an only slightly damaged state of the art stealth drone Iran will be able to copy a lot of its technology as well as to find new measures against such drones. There will also be a lot of interests from other sides into this technology. We can bet that the military attaches from the Russian, Chinese, Indian, Pakistani and other embassies are already queuing up in the Iranian Defense Ministry and ready to make some very lucrative offers.
What’s the chess term for that? (really, i am drawing a blank)
“western afghanistan” – haha. sure.
Well, the chinese made out like bandits after a F-117 went down over Serbia in the 90’s
Im sure the stealth blackhawk that crashed in Pakistan during the Bin Laden murder is getting the same treatment, and now a stealth drone…. glad to know that the US taxpayer isnt just subsidizing war profiteers in this country, now we’re the R&D for the worlds “war department”
Seymour Hersh wrote a fair amount about US and Israeli special forces on the ground in Iran about six years ago and then again just a few years ago.
Assasination of Iranian scientist, Stuxnet, 18 unexplained explosions at Iranian energy sites over the last year (heard this one on Diane Rehm’s show yesterday during an Iran focus). US drone down and captured in Iran. Seems like the US and Israel have all ready committed acts of war against Iran
Spending a bunch of time with my large Catholic family around the Dayton Ohio area. Out of my mothers 11 brothers and sisters 6 worked at Wright Patterson Air Force base. About half are dead. Out of the three uncles surviving 2 worked on aircraft and spacecraft technology. The one who graduated long long ago from MIT worked on stealth aircraft technology during the late 60’s… 70’s. The other uncle (graduate of Amherst) total math, science brainiac worked on computer simulation for pilots who would be refueling mid air. So interesting to hear about what they can share about their work now that they are retired and debriefed. Also very interesting to hear their opinions about the invasion of Iraq. All three were against. I had assumed having been standing outside of WPAFB protesting the Vietnam war in the late 60’s and many of my aunts and uncles driving into their work at WPAB that they would have been supporting the invasion back in 2003. They had not. Always interesting to find out how many lifetime military people do not support these by choice wars.
Called in to C Span the other day when Barbara Slavin [at 18.40 min Anna my middle name] was guest on Washington Journal? I urged viewers to visit RaceforIran!
Slavin was actually somewhat reasonable about the situation with Iran. Unusual for her. She did object to the opinions that I expressed that were pulled from what I have read at Race for Iran and expressed by Flynt and Hillary Mann Leverett and former weapons inspector Robert Kelly at REAL NEWS about the most recent IAEA report about Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program.
Was also able to get a question through yesterday on the Diane Rehm show while they were discussing Iran. The line up of guest was seriously tilted. With warmongering liar Reuel Marc Gerecht on and Robin Wright pushing the bad bad bad Iran mantra. And Trita Parsi who was far more balanced and fact based. I brought up how Iran has been trying to negotiate with the US for years( according to Flynt Leverett a good 30 years)
All three of the guest had extended responses to my question about negotiations with Iran
New Concerns About U.S.- Iranian Relations
With U.S. forces set to exit Iraq by the end of the year, there are rising concerns about security in the volatile region. Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the downing of a U.S. surveillance drone, and last week’s rampage on the British embassy by Iranian protesters have elevated tensions with the West. The U.S. Senate voted unanimously last week to impose the toughest sanctions yet on Iran, as Europe considered an oil embargo. Yesterday, Iran’s revolutionary guard troops were placed on high alert, and Tehran warned crude oil prices would double with a European embargo. Guest host Steve Roberts and a panel of experts explore the latest developments in the region and whether Israel and the U.S. are engaged in a covert war against Iran to disrupt its nuclear program.
Guests
Trita Parsi president, National Iranian American Council; author of the forthcoming book “A Single Roll of the Dice – Obama’s Diplomacy with Iran.”
Reuel Marc Gerecht senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, former Middle East specialist for the CIA
Robin Wright journalist, foreign policy analyst at the U.S. Institute of Peace and the Woodrow Wilson International Center, and author of “Rock the Casbah:Rage and Rebellion Across the Islamic World”
Part of my question about direct negotiations with Iran at 45:07. The whole show is worth listening to. Reuel Marc Gerecht completely dismissed negotiations. Which he has always done. I have heard Diane Rehm allow Gerecht to repeat all sorts of unsubstantiated and dangerous bull about Iran on past shows. No challenges coming out of Diane in the past when false claims about Iran are repeated. Deja vu folks deja vu vu
It is a very pretty airplane. Very angel-like.
Is it the angel of death?
********
I foresee a holocaust. An angel of death descending to destroy the human race…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGtJ8WR5Shc
I’ve seen a fire start in frisco
The day that the earth quaked
I’ve seen buildings a-blazing
Throwing up in flames
I heard men, women and children
Crying out to their god for mercy
But their god didn’t listen
So they were burned alive
They went down, down, deep underground
In the great disaster
I was hanging out in berlin
In the year one thousand nine hundred and thirty nine
I’ve seen hitler’s storm troopers
March right across the maginot line
I’ve seen two world wars
I’ve seen men send rockets out into space
I foresee a holocaust
An angel of death descending to destroy the human race
Down, down, deep undergound
A great disaster
In the sixteenth century there was a french philosopher
By the name of nostradamus
Who prophesised that in the late twentieth century
An angel of death shall waste this land
A holocaust the likes of which
This planet had never seen
Now, I ask you
Do you believe this to be true?
I was standing by the bedside
The night that my father died
He was crying out in pain
To his god he said, “have mercy, mercy!”
His body was riddled with a disease
Unknown to man so he expected no cure
But before he died that night
He was lost, insane
He went down, down, deep underground
A great disaster
You’ll go down, down, deep underground
A great disaster