U.S. Military Sources: Iran Has Missing U.S. Drone

[Purveyor]

Iran appears to be in possession of one of America's most sophisticated weapons, a super-secret spy plane whose stealth technology is the same as the drone used to monitor the compound during the raid that killed Usama bin Laden, U.S. military sources told Fox News on Monday.

Military sources confirmed that the Iranians have the RQ-170 drone, which is so advanced that the U.S. Air Force has not distributed even a photo of it. However, they did not say that the Iranians shot down the spy plane, as was reported by Iran's official IRNA news agency.

IRNA quoted an unidentified Iranian military official saying Sunday that the spy plane was shot down by Iran's armed forces and suffered minor damage.. The official also warned of strong and crushing response to any violations of the country's airspace by American drone aircraft.

Earlier, the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan issued a statement saying the aircraft may have been a drone that operators lost contact with last week while it was flying a mission over neighboring western Afghanistan.

MORE...

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/12/05/us-military-sources-iran-has-missing-us-drone/

[Purveyor]

1. READ: What Secrets Can Iran Learn From Intercepted US Drone?

As Iranian officials bragged Sunday that they had taken down a US spy drone equipped with top secret stealth technology, defense analysts in Washington began scrambling to assess just how harmful such a scenario would be for US national security.

In the first phase of damage control, Pentagon officials were quick to deny Iran’s claim. “We have no indication that was brought down by hostile fire,” one senior US official assured reporters.

But despite the semantics – perhaps it crashed rather than being shot down, for example – it seems quite possible that the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) may indeed be in Iranian hands, analysts say.

--CLIP
What does Iran stand to learn from the intercepted drone?

The US military keeps a close hold on the technological feats and intelligence-gathering capacities of these drones, but what is clear is that “any stealth technology is remarkably sophisticated in design,” notes Anthony Cordesman, a national security analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

MORE...

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Military/2011/1205/What-secrets-can-Iran-learn-from-intercepted-US-drone

[msongs]

2. dear stupid US Military - when you attack people they have a right to self defense nt

[PFunk]

3. Actually I think by now Russia and China techs are in Iran looking at it in detal now...

count on it.

[atreides1]

5. Those techs were probably already there

If, as rumor has it, the Iranians were able to take control of this UAV, then the Russians and Chinese were likely already in country and assisted with this little experiment.

Just a theory on my part, but very possible.

[xchrom]

4. invisible rec? -- hmmmmmmm. nt

[Hugabear]

6. Couldn't this be considered an act of war by the US?

The United States has NO RIGHT to be violating the territorial sovereignty of another nation. Flying spycraft over Iranian territory could be construed as an act of war, who would be well within their rights to retaliate.

[bananas]

7. we're in a cold war with Iran, and they said they'll retaliate outside their borders

According to state
run Press TV the source added that "due to the
clear border violation, the operational and
electronic measures taken by the Islamic
Republic of Iran's Armed Forces against
invading aircraft will not remain limited to the
Iran's borders."
www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x640184

[bananas]

8. EU ambassadors are being pulled

www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x318839

[malthaussen]

9. For some reason, I am reminded of Gary Powers...

... seems to me the whole of our history since 1990 could be entitled "From Reds to Ragheads."

-- Mal

[cpwm17]

10. After the Soviet Union collapsed the US immediately found a new enemy in Iraq

The US then started the first Iraq war (which never really ended). Our politicians need their enemies, and they make sure the public thinks their enemies are our enemies.

[USA_1]

11. Now the Warmongers Can Say Iran Has WMD

... yup - still another ready excuse for starting yet another war that will give the wealthy plutocrats lots of money and war profits.

[a simple pattern]

12. Dey Terk Are Derrrn

terk er derr

[yurbud]

13. translation: we must attack Iran to rescue or destroy the drone

[yurbud]

14. how long can you cry wolf before people stop giving a shit? On Iran, I think we passed that point

7-10 years ago minimum.

Iran is not a threat to us.

Even with a nuke, they would not be a threat to Israel or Saudi. They would simply be a check on the regional ambitions of those two players and our own financial elite.

Likewise, the same people who piss and moan about Iran supporting Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Israel don't give a shit about all the times Israel invaded Lebanon or their ongoing violence against Palestinians that made it difficult for groups less militant than Hamas to appear legitimate to their own people.

More broadly, if we invade or use covert means to overthrow their government and install a compliant one, that would mean we would have our thumb on the countries with the top three oil reserves in the world: Saudi, Iraq, and Iran, as well as all the Southern routes for pipelines for oil and gas out of Russia and the former Soviet republics.

If you were Russia and China, would you want to see that kind of monopolization of the world's energy supplies?