US drone shot down by Iran taken to be analyzed

[pvsi.]

(CNN) -- A U.S. drone was shot down in eastern Iran, state media reported Sunday, citing a military source.

Press TV reported that the drone was "seized" by authorities after "minimum damage."

Attempts to reach U.S. officials for comment were not immediately successful.
Iran shoots down American drone, state media says - CNN.com

 

[waltky]

Yea, it was onna Nightly News tonight - dey got one o' the stealth drones...

... an' dat Ammerjabberjob's just goofy enough...

... he liable to have `em reverse engineer it...

... an' send a Hellfire missle...

... uppa Obama's wazoo.

(possum thinks dey oughta double the number o' Secret Service agents around him.)

 

[Mr.Nick]

Iran doesn't have the capabilities to reproduce it...

Understanding the technology is only half the war.....

 

[Sirkarl101]

This is pretty serious in my opinion. Iran will view this as a huge victory. They will also use this to further fuel the anger over the United States involvement in their country. The official word out of the United States is the operator lost control and it and flew into Iran. Even I do not buy that one.

The technology and reproduction I believe is possible with the help of outside sources. Never underestimate someones capability. However, I believe the United States never produces and uses any sort of military hardware without a counter piece of technology.

We were caught plain and simple. We should offer no explanation, be the country we always have been and tell them to return it within a couple days or face the consequences. We are doing just about anything to start a conflict with them anyways, or at least that is how it appears to me. Perhaps this will be the straw that broke the camels back. (pun intended ) Only time will tell.

 

[Mr.Nick]

Like I said it doesn't matter...

They don't have the funds or even the capabilities to even have a viable military and they're going to replicate a stealth drone???

We could turn Iran into a nuclear waste dump if we wanted to and they would never see us coming.

 

[Mr.Nick]

This is pretty serious in my opinion. Iran will view this as a huge victory. They will also use this to further fuel the anger over the United States involvement in their country. The official word out of the United States is the operator lost control and it and flew into Iran. Even I do not buy that one.

The technology and reproduction I believe is possible with the help of outside sources. Never underestimate someones capability. However, I believe the United States never produces and uses any sort of military hardware without a counter piece of technology.

We were caught plain and simple. We should offer no explanation, be the country we always have been and tell them to return it within a couple days or face the consequences. We are doing just about anything to start a conflict with them anyways, or at least that is how it appears to me. Perhaps this will be the straw that broke the camels back. (pun intended ) Only time will tell.

Ahmadinejad is about as radical and insane as Kim Jong-il...

I'm quite sure they have understood the technology since before the turn of the century but they don't have the means to replicate it.....

 

[Mr.Nick]

Not to mention I'm sure every part of that drone has a GPS chip...

 

[Mr. H.]

Where would they take it? Achmed's Drone and Dime?

 

[Conservative]

Iran claimed they have a cure for cancer, and would share it with the world. Never happened.

Iran claimed they shot down a US drone several months ago. Never produced proof.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

 

[Sallow]

This is pretty serious in my opinion. Iran will view this as a huge victory. They will also use this to further fuel the anger over the United States involvement in their country. The official word out of the United States is the operator lost control and it and flew into Iran. Even I do not buy that one.

The technology and reproduction I believe is possible with the help of outside sources. Never underestimate someones capability. However, I believe the United States never produces and uses any sort of military hardware without a counter piece of technology.

We were caught plain and simple. We should offer no explanation, be the country we always have been and tell them to return it within a couple days or face the consequences. We are doing just about anything to start a conflict with them anyways, or at least that is how it appears to me. Perhaps this will be the straw that broke the camels back. (pun intended ) Only time will tell.

Quite honestly there is little they can do with it. Even if they could make one..then what? You need a safe base to launch them from. The range on them..isn't all that far.

The tech on the drones isn't really rocket science. They were developed after a failed project to create robot planes. Some guys around the same lab were goofing off with model planes and cameras. That's when they had an epiphany.

 

[JoeB131]

Well, an interesting thing when I was watching the "Chris Matthews" show yesterday.

After the five liberals got done bemoaning the fact that Republicans voters weren't picking Mitt Romney like they've been saying we should, they went on to talk about how Iran is the next big threat, and President Obama might need to do something about it.

So I'm not surprised that they are beating the war drums just in case Barry needs a distracting thing in the 2012 cycle.

 

[DaGoose]

Well, an interesting thing when I was watching the "Chris Matthews" show yesterday.

After the five liberals got done bemoaning the fact that Republicans voters weren't picking Mitt Romney like they've been saying we should, they went on to talk about how Iran is the next big threat, and President Obama might need to do something about it.

So I'm not surprised that they are beating the war drums just in case Barry needs a distracting thing in the 2012 cycle.

That's exactly what the GOP was accusing Clinton of doing when he was trying to kill Bin Laden.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DI7u-TytRU]Bill Clinton Kicks the Crap out of Fox News Part 1 - YouTube[/ame]

 

[USArmyRetired]

Actually it was a cyber attack that brought the new stealth drone down. Probably using Chinese technology. If they can do this then Isreal is probably thinking twice now about sending military hardware into their airspace for a attack on their nuke sites.

 

[Sallow]

Actually it was a cyber attack that brought the new stealth drone down. Probably using Chinese technology. If they can do this then Isreal is probably thinking twice now about sending military hardware into their airspace for a attack on their nuke sites.

Israel doesn't use drones..they use their ace pilots to do the dirty work.

 

[Sallow]

Well, an interesting thing when I was watching the "Chris Matthews" show yesterday.

After the five liberals got done bemoaning the fact that Republicans voters weren't picking Mitt Romney like they've been saying we should, they went on to talk about how Iran is the next big threat, and President Obama might need to do something about it.

So I'm not surprised that they are beating the war drums just in case Barry needs a distracting thing in the 2012 cycle.

That's exactly what the GOP was accusing Clinton of doing when he was trying to kill Bin Laden.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DI7u-TytRU]Bill Clinton Kicks the Crap out of Fox News Part 1 - YouTube[/ame]

That..was a great interview.

It's amazing the amnesia the GOP has about this. They were laughing at Clinton's attempts to kill the guy..calling it "wagging the dog".

 

[JoeB131]

Well, an interesting thing when I was watching the "Chris Matthews" show yesterday.

After the five liberals got done bemoaning the fact that Republicans voters weren't picking Mitt Romney like they've been saying we should, they went on to talk about how Iran is the next big threat, and President Obama might need to do something about it.

So I'm not surprised that they are beating the war drums just in case Barry needs a distracting thing in the 2012 cycle.

That's exactly what the GOP was accusing Clinton of doing when he was trying to kill Bin Laden.

And in that case, it was true. Because he launched this airstrike based on bad intelligence the very same week he had to come clean and finally admit he was playing hide the sausage with Monica.

And then he oddly never talked about the subject again. Until 9/11, anyway.

Incidently, Clinton was the first guy to go around claiming that Bin Laden and Saddam were BFF's...

 

[techieny]

"yes habib we will reverse engineer just like we did with thigh master!"

 

[DaGoose]

Well, an interesting thing when I was watching the "Chris Matthews" show yesterday.

After the five liberals got done bemoaning the fact that Republicans voters weren't picking Mitt Romney like they've been saying we should, they went on to talk about how Iran is the next big threat, and President Obama might need to do something about it.

So I'm not surprised that they are beating the war drums just in case Barry needs a distracting thing in the 2012 cycle.

That's exactly what the GOP was accusing Clinton of doing when he was trying to kill Bin Laden.

And in that case, it was true. Because he launched this airstrike based on bad intelligence the very same week he had to come clean and finally admit he was playing hide the sausage with Monica.

And then he oddly never talked about the subject again. Until 9/11, anyway.

Incidently, Clinton was the first guy to go around claiming that Bin Laden and Saddam were BFF's...

Uh-huh.

Scroll back up, watch the posted youtube interview, and tell me again how it was a mistake for Clinton to try and kill Bin Laden, even after being accused by the GOP for not doing enough to get him!!

Listen, Bush screwed up and it costs thousands of our soldiers their lives for no good reason. No matter how much tail wagging and finger pointing you do you simply cannot change that fact.

 

[waltky]

Holy Shiite batman, dey done shot our bat-drone down...

US Drone on CIA Mission Before Crashing Into Iran: Officials
Dec. 6, 2011 - The American stealth drone that fell into the hands of the Iranian military late last week was on a mission for the CIA when it went down, US officials told ABC News today.

The officials said it was unclear what mission the RQ-170 Sentinel unarmed aircraft was performing when it went down and where exactly it was flying. While Iranian officials were quoted in local media as claiming the drone had entered Iranian airspace, the International Security Assistance Force said in a statement Monday that the drone had been flying over western Afghanistan when its operators lost control. U.S. military officials contradicted Iranian officials who also reportedly claimed the drone had been "shot down" and that the Iranian military's electronic warfare unit had helped bring the RQ-170 down with little damage.

Pentagon Capt. John Kirby told reporters Monday there was no indication the drone was shot down, nor was it brought down by "hostile activity of any kind" -- ruling out possible cyber attack or electronic jamming. The military considered the incident strictly an unfortunate accident with a malfunctioning drone, Kirby and Pentagon spokesperson George Little said. One U.S. official said today that after the drone's crash, a host of courses of action were considered, including possibly going into Iran to recover the craft. However, that option was dismissed, as well as several others.

The RQ-170, developed by defense contracting giant Lockheed Martin and dubbed "The Beast of Kandahar" by Aviation Week's Bill Sweetman, is one of America's most sophisticated surveillance drones and was only acknowledged to exist by the Air Force in 2010. The bat-wing shaped craft is designed to dodge enemy radar and slip unnoticed into hostile territory to gather information or support operations on the ground. It was reportedly used to keep tabs on the man believed to be Osama bin Laden during the Navy SEAL mission that took out the terror leader in Pakistan in May. NBC News first reported the role of the CIA in the downed drone Monday.

Source

See also:

Drone that crashed in Iran may give away U.S. secrets
December 6, 2011 Reporting from Los Angeles and Washington — The Sentinel drone has cutting-edge stealth and surveillance technology that other nations could exploit. One of the aircraft crashed in Iran, and a U.S. official says it was on a CIA mission.

The radar-evading drone that crash-landed over the weekend in Iran was on a mission for the CIA, according to a senior U.S. official, raising fears that the aircraft's sophisticated technology could be exploited by Tehran or shared with other American rivals. It was unclear whether the drone's mission took it over Iran or whether it strayed there accidentally because of technical malfunctions, the official said. Though the drone flight was a CIA operation, U.S. military personnel were involved in flying the aircraft, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the secrecy involved.

The jet-powered, bat-winged RQ-170 Sentinel drone is considered one of the most advanced in the U.S. arsenal, with stealth technology and sophisticated computer systems that enable it to penetrate deep into hostile territory without detection. Its capabilities were demonstrated during the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound in Pakistan, where it provided surveillance of the operation. The aircraft's full abilities are a closely guarded secret, and the Pentagon has not revealed its price tag, size or top speed. But it has acknowledged this: The Sentinel may now be in Iranian hands.

"I think we're always concerned when there's an aircraft, whether it's manned or unmanned, that we lose, particularly in a place where we're not able to get to it," Navy Capt. John Kirby, a Pentagon spokesman, said to reporters Monday. Peter W. Singer, author of "Wired for War," a book about robotic warfare, said it's not new to have drones downed in enemy territory, but the RQ-170 represents the next generation of drone aircraft. "It carries a variety of systems that wouldn't be much of a benefit to Iran, but to its allies such as China and Russia, it's a potential gold mine," Singer said.

MORE

 

[waltky]

Granny says now Obama gonna have to kiss Ammerdinerjob's butt just to get dat drone back...

Loss of plane peels back layer in U.S.-Iran spying
10 Dec.`11 WASHINGTON (AP) – The loss to Iran of the CIA's surveillance drone bristling with advanced spy technology is more than a propaganda coup and intelligence windfall for the Tehran government. The plane's capture has peeled back another layer of secrecy from expanding U.S. operations against Iran's nuclear and military programs.

Just as the Soviet Union's downing of the American U-2 spy plane revealed a hidden aspect of the Cold War, Iran's recovery of the drone has shed light on the espionage that is part of U.S.-Iran hostilities. Iran has charged the U.S. or its allies with waging a campaign of cyberwarfare and sabotage, and of assassinating some Iranian scientists. The U.S. has accused the Iranian government of helping kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan and plotting to murder the Saudi ambassador in Washington. "It's beginning to look like there's a thinly-veiled, increasingly violent, global cloak-and-dagger game afoot," Thomas Donnelly, a former government official and military expert with the American Enterprise Institute, said at a Washington conference.

The covert operations in play are "much bigger than people appreciate," said Stephen Hadley, former national security adviser under President George W. Bush. "But the U.S. needs to be using everything it can." Hadley said that if Iran continues to defy U.N. resolutions and doesn't curb its nuclear ambitions, the quiet conflict "will only get nastier." Some historians and foreign policy experts compared the drone incident to the Soviet Union's 1960 downing of the U-2 spy plane and pilot Francis Gary Powers. While those two countries sparred publicly on many issues, the world only occasionally glimpsed each side's secret operations.

"When I first heard about the drone, my first thought was thank goodness there wasn't a pilot in it," said Francis Gary Powers Jr., the son of the U-2 pilot and founder of the Cold War Museum. "They were both on intelligence-gathering missions. They were both doing photo reconnaissance. They were both supporting the U.S. government's intelligence-gathering to find out intelligence about our adversaries," Powers said. The difference this time, Powers said, was that "there are no family members that have to be notified, there's no prisoner in a foreign country."

MORE