Iran Shows Video Of Captured U.S. Drone...

[paulitician]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uEmq5wl6hU]Captured US drone (RQ-170) - Iran TV - YouTube[/ame]


Iranian state TV broadcast video Thursday of what it said was the high-tech U.S. drone that Tehran says its forces downed earlier this week, and lodged a diplomatic complaint over the violation of its airspace.

The more than two minutes of footage showed Iranian military officials inspecting what state TV identified as the RQ-170 Sentinel drone, and offered the first evidence that Tehran had captured the aircraft. The beige-colored drone appeared intact and undamaged.
The chief of the aerospace division of Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards, Gen. Ami Ali Hajizadeh, claimed Iranian forces brought down the surveillance aircraft with an electronic ambush, causing minimum damage to the drone.

“It was downed through a joint operation by the Guards and Iran’s regular army,” he told state television.

Tehran appeared to be using the video footage to score propaganda points, and a banner at the foot of the drone in the video read “The U.S. cannot do a damn thing” — a quotation from Iran’s late supreme leader, Ayatollah Rouhollah Khomeini. Another banner was printed to look like the American flag, but had skulls instead of stars.



Read more: Iran | Video | US Drone | The Daily Caller

 

[paulitician]

This is a big blunder. I know this Administration is down-playing it but it really is a blunder.

 

[kyzr]

I can't fault the Obama admin. I fault the military for risking such a valuable asset on such a stupid mission. WTF do we need such a sophisticated drone for over AFG or Iran?? Tell the Pentagon they will in-fact get a 10% budget cut and they deserve it. Next time use the cheap drones in the ME and the good ones on the Mexican border until they don't crash. Stupid fucking military.

 

[paulitician]

I can't fault the Obama admin. I fault the military for risking such a valuable asset on such a stupid mission. WTF do we need such a sophisticated drone for over AFG or Iran?? Tell the Pentagon they will in-fact get a 10% budget cut and they deserve it. Next time use the cheap drones in the ME and the good ones on the Mexican border until they don't crash. Stupid fucking military.

Get onboard the War Machine. War with Iran has already begun.

 

[TruthSeeker56]

No big deal. Notice how they have the BOTTOM of the drone covered? Let the dirty little Iranian yaks have their fun. There's NOTHING in that drone that is "top secret" technology.

How is this a "blunder" by the Obama adminstration? I'm glad that we are keeping an eye on our enemies, WITHOUT risking American lives. And believe me, I am NOT an Obama fan. I am just that rare breed of American who is INTELLECTUALLY HONEST.

 

[paulitician]

No big deal. Notice how they have the BOTTOM of the drone covered? Let the dirty little Iranian yaks have their fun. There's NOTHING in that drone that is "top secret" technology.

How is this a "blunder" by the Obama adminstration? I'm glad that we are keeping an eye on our enemies, WITHOUT risking American lives. And believe me, I am NOT an Obama fan. I am just that rare breed of American who is INTELLECTUALLY HONEST.

It is top secret technology. You are wrong. And it is a blunder.

 

[waltky]

Hmmm, guess now dey know what we been spyin' on...

Lost U.S. drone's sensors could hold vital data
8 Dec.`11 - A stealthy drone, alleged to be a American, unveiled by Iranian officials would be more valuable to U.S. adversaries for its onboard sensors than for its radar-evading capabilities, defense experts said Thursday.

Another intriguing question, said John Pike, executive director of Global Security.org, is what the drone's mission in Iran would have been. The same model drone was reportedly used to spy on Osama bin Laden's compound before the raid that killed him in May. Drones can provide round-the-clock surveillance that satellites cannot. U.S. officials are concerned that Iran is developing nuclear weapons. "What can I learn from a drone?" Pike said. "The best day and time to bomb an office park if I was trying to kill people there. A drone is going to stake the place out."

The Air Force released few details and no photos of the RQ-170 Sentinel, one of its most advanced unmanned spy planes. Iranian authorities on Thursday displayed what they claimed was the drone their forces brought down. The drone is alleged to have crashed last week in Iran. The NATO military command in Afghanistan has acknowledged it lost control of an unarmed, unmanned spy plane near Iran. A senior Pentagon official, who requested anonymity because he is not authorized to discuss intelligence matters, said the spy plane was on a mission for the CIA.

The plane's shape and coatings allow it to evade radar detection. Russia and China are testing their own stealth planes, so the technology is known to them. The prize on this lost drone, said Peter Singer, director of the 21st Century Defense Initiative at the Brookings Institution, is the advanced radar and other sensors it can carry. The RQ-170 has carried the same radar that will be used in top U.S. fighter jets — the F-22 and the new F-35, Singer said. The Chinese are a generation behind in developing such capability, he said, and would be keenly interested in obtaining it.

"This is the jewel for them," he said. The drone may also have carried an advanced sensor for monitoring nuclear sites, Singer said. "Bottom line, it's never easy to reverse-engineer anything, let alone something like a radar, but having a working or even damaged system in hand to study up-close makes it a heck of a lot easier to both defend against it in the future or build your own derivative," he said. It's unclear what would have survived in a crash, Pike said. The drone Iran unveiled didn't convince him that it was an RQ-170. "What they showed looked like a parade float," Pike said. "It's remarkably intact-looking for something that crashed."

Source

 

[zzzz]

If you can't use the technology then whats its purpose. The real question here is not that we lost a drone, we've lost several over the years, and the possible technological uses the Iranians may be able to get out of it.

The real issue is how did they in essence take over a drone in flight? This poses a dilemma for other aircraft, not just drones, in the theater of operations. To hijack a drone would require some sophisticated equipment and training, something the Russians or Chinese might have. And if a shooting war did develop could they take over or screw around with our fighters and bombers? Those are the big questions.

 

[imbalance]

Has anyone considered yet that the drone crash was intentional and that particular drone technology likely isn't even close to our most advanced? I've learned to assume that literally everything happens for a reason.

 

[Salt Jones]

Has anyone considered yet that the drone crash was intentional and that particular drone technology likely isn't even close to our most advanced? I've learned to assume that literally everything happens for a reason.

And it contains a virus that takes down their military computer system?

 

[Avorysuds]

Grats Progressives and Neocons.

 

[imbalance]

Has anyone considered yet that the drone crash was intentional and that particular drone technology likely isn't even close to our most advanced? I've learned to assume that literally everything happens for a reason.

And it contains a virus that takes down their military computer system?

Well what better way to surveil/sabotage Iran's military projects than from within their own computer systems amirite?