US - Iran Flare Up

A UFO Or America's Newest Stealth Plane? Iran Just Saw Something Fly By At Mach 10

A UFO Or America's Newest Stealth Plane? Iran Just Saw Something Fly By At Mach 10

Key point: It’s unlikely that the new UAV is capable of Mach-10 hypersonic flight—the Pentagon is still struggling to reach Mach five.

Iran is the only other country besides the United States to operate arguably history’s most powerful interceptor aircraft, the F-14 Tomcat. And the Islamic republic has worked the twin-engine, swing-wing fighters hard.

The F-14s played a major role in Iran’s war with Iraq from 1980 to 1988. Iranian Tomcat pilots were the only ones to successfully employ the F-14’s long-range, heavyweight AIM-54 Phoenix missile to shoot down enemy planes.

In the decades after the war, Tehran repaired and upgraded the surviving F-14s, scouring the globe for parts in defiance of a U.S. government embargo.

The Americans retired their F-14s in 2006, but around 40 of Iran’s Tomcats remain active. Their main role is defending Iran’s nuclear sites. It’s a mission that has brought the interceptors in close contact with some very mysterious aircraft, according to a bizarre and fascinating 2013 story in Combat Aircraft magazine by reporter Babak Taghvaee.

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The Iranians believed the objects were spy drones belonging to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, sent to sniff out Tehran’s suspected atomic weapons program. But they attribute to these alleged unmanned aerial vehicles flight characteristics and capabilities far beyond what any known drone can achieve.

And in 2012 one of the alleged flying robots reportedly also shot down an F-14 attempting to intercept it. Or at least some Iranians seem genuinely to believe so.



Over the decades Tehran has built three major nuclear facilities that could, in theory, be used to assemble atomic weapons: reactors at Bushehr and Arak and an enrichment plant at Natanz.

This infrastructure became public knowledge in 2002. No doubt the CIA took a strong interest, potentially long before that date. “A number of reconnaissance UAVs were sent to collect intelligence to prepare for a possible attack” by Western forces, Taghvaee wrote.

To protect the nuke facilities, in 2004 Iran deployed a task force composed of eight F-4E fighters and eight F-14s plus a former 707 airliner and a C-130 cargo plane outfitted with sensors and radios for command and control. The task force encountered what it believed were CIA drones with “astonishing flight characteristics.”

The UAVs could jam radars and disrupt interceptors’ navigation systems. They flew “outside the atmosphere” at speeds of up to Mach 10. They could hover. Flying at night, they emitted a telltale blue light that led to their nickname: “luminous objects.”

“In several cases … F-14s faced them but were unable to operate their armament systems properly,” Taghvaee wrote. One Tomcat taking off to intercept a luminous object on Jan. 26, 2012 mysteriously exploded, killing both crewmen. Taghvaee implies the alleged UAV was somehow responsible, as the F-14 in question was “one of the fittest” of the 40 or so Tomcats then in service.

It should go without saying that the CIA and the Pentagon most likely fly reconnaissance aircraft near—and even over—Iranian nuclear sites. In 2012 and 2013, Iranian fighters tried to intercept American Predator drones outside Tehran’s airspace. In the 2013 incident, a U.S. Air Force F-22 stealth fighter blocked the intercept with some Top Gun-style theatrics.

In 2009, the Air Force copped to the existence of a new, previously secret drone operated in conjunction with the intelligence agency. The RQ-170 Sentinel was based in southern Afghanistan within short flying distance of Iran. In December 2011, a Sentinel crashed on the Afghanistan-Iran border and was captured by Iranian troops.

Neither the Predator nor the Sentinel is particularly high-flying nor can hover or glow blue. And neither has the electrical power to scramble radars and navigation gear.

Rumors abound that the Air Force and CIA operate a stealthy new drone that has not been disclosed to the public. Even if they do, it’s unlikely that the new UAV is capable of Mach-10 hypersonic flight—the Pentagon is still struggling to reach Mach five.

So if Iranian F-14s truly are chasing around super-fast, super-high-flying and lethal UFOs, what exactly are they? Who knows.
 
The United States will not allow Iran to purchase conventional arms after a U.N. prohibition on this expires in October, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Wednesday.

“We’re not going to let that happen,” Pompeo told reporters at a news briefing. “We will work with the U.N. Security Council to extend that prohibition on those arms sales and then in the event we can’t get anyone else to act, the United States is evaluating every possibility about how we might do that.”


I doubt they will be able to do anything to stop Russia from selling arms to Iran.

Iran is in need of aircraft of different types and modern communication systems. They are still stuck without their own communications satellite.
 
 
So Iran's arms trade sanctions lifts tomorrow.


Speaking at a cabinet session on Wednesday, Rouhani congratulated the Iranian nation on the termination of the arms embargo that would take effect on coming Sunday.

“As of Sunday, we’ll be able to sell our weapons to whoever we’d like, and buy arms from anybody we’d want,” he said, adding that Iran struggled for four years for the termination of the embargo.

The US made every effort to impede the removal of the arms embargo on Iran, but the Iranian nation’s resistance yielded results, he added.

The president also reminded the critics of the JCPOA that the termination of the arms embargo on Iran is one of the results of the nuclear deal.

The US suffered an embarrassing diplomatic defeat in August when the United Nations Security Council rejected a proposal to indefinitely extend the arms ban.

The embargo on conventional arms is due to expire on October 18 under the terms of a resolution that blessed the Iran nuclear deal, signed in July 2015 and officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
 
So Iran's arms trade sanctions lifts tomorrow.


Speaking at a cabinet session on Wednesday, Rouhani congratulated the Iranian nation on the termination of the arms embargo that would take effect on coming Sunday.

“As of Sunday, we’ll be able to sell our weapons to whoever we’d like, and buy arms from anybody we’d want,” he said, adding that Iran struggled for four years for the termination of the embargo.

The US made every effort to impede the removal of the arms embargo on Iran, but the Iranian nation’s resistance yielded results, he added.

The president also reminded the critics of the JCPOA that the termination of the arms embargo on Iran is one of the results of the nuclear deal.

The US suffered an embarrassing diplomatic defeat in August when the United Nations Security Council rejected a proposal to indefinitely extend the arms ban.

The embargo on conventional arms is due to expire on October 18 under the terms of a resolution that blessed the Iran nuclear deal, signed in July 2015 and officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

I wonder how will India respond if Iran asks India for Artillery Guns or Pinaka Rockets or Prithvi Missiles

On One Hand We want to export weapons and on the other , we cannot antagonise the US
 
I wonder how will India respond if Iran asks India for Artillery Guns or Pinaka Rockets or Prithvi Missiles

On One Hand We want to export weapons and on the other , we cannot antagonise the US
Why they will ask India, they will ask China and Russia.
And China will surely supply them everything.
 
I wonder how will India respond if Iran asks India for Artillery Guns or Pinaka Rockets or Prithvi Missiles

On One Hand We want to export weapons and on the other , we cannot antagonise the US

I doubt we are interested in doing that in the first place.

Anyway, Prithvi may still be sanctioned right now, for 3 more years. They can only buy manned systems now, like tanks, SAMs, ships, submarines and fighter jets. So all this stuff will have to come from Russia and China. No ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and drones until 2023.
 
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5 years after nuclear deal took effect, ‘all restrictions on transfer of arms terminated,’ Islamic Republic says, hailing world’s position ‘in defiance of US regime’s efforts’​


A longstanding UN embargo on arms sales to and from Iran expired early Sunday in line with a 2015 landmark nuclear deal, the Iranian foreign ministry said.

“As of today, all restrictions on the transfer of arms, related activities and financial services to and from the Islamic Republic of Iran … are all automatically terminated,” the ministry said in a statement.

The embargo on the sale of arms to Iran was due to start expiring progressively from Sunday, October 18, under the terms of the UN resolution that blessed the 2015 nuclear deal between the Islamic republic and world powers.

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“As of today, the Islamic Republic may procure any necessary arms and equipment from any source without any legal restrictions, and solely based on its defensive needs,” the ministry added in the statement sent out on Twitter.

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This photo released by the semi-official Fars News Agency shows Iranian troops participating in a military drill near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, Iran, Thursday, Sept. 10, 2020. Units from the navy, air force and ground forces are participating in a nearly 2 million-square-kilometer (772,200-square-mile) area of the Gulf of Oman. (Mehdi Marizad/Fars News Agency via AP)
It insisted that under the terms of the deal, struck with the United States, China, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and the European Union, “the lifting of arms restrictions and the travel ban were designed to be automatic with no other action required.”

US President Donald Trump withdrew his country from the deal in 2018 and has unilaterally begun reimposing sanctions on Iran.

But Washington suffered a setback in August when it failed to win support from the United Nations Security Council to indefinitely extend the arms embargo.

AP20232135751018-400x250.jpg

In this July 20, 2015, file photo, members of the Security Council vote at United Nations headquarters on the landmark nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers. (AP/Seth Wenig, File)
It was “a momentous day for the international community,” the Iranian ministry said on Sunday, adding the world had stood with Tehran “in defiance of the US regime’s efforts.”

But it stressed that “unconventional arms, weapons of mass destruction and a buying spree of conventional arms have no place in Iran’s defense doctrine.”

Despite pulling out of the deal, the Trump administration insists it is still a “participant” and can therefore go ahead with reimposing sanctions.

Washington has said it has decided to unilaterally reinstate virtually all of the UN sanctions on Iran lifted under the accord.

But the US legal argument has been rejected by almost the entire UN Security Council, with European allies of the United States saying the priority is to salvage a peaceful solution to Iran’s nuclear program.

Moscow said in September that it was ready to boost its military cooperation with Tehran, while Beijing has also spoken of its willingness to sell arms to Iran after October 18.

Washington maintained it will seek to prevent Iran from purchasing Chinese tanks and Russian air defense systems.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said in a tweet that the international community had “protected” the nuclear deal and Sunday marked the “normalization of Iran’s cooperation with the world.”
 
I wonder how will India respond if Iran asks India for Artillery Guns or Pinaka Rockets or Prithvi Missiles

On One Hand We want to export weapons and on the other , we cannot antagonise the US
They themselves have a huge inventory of ballistic missiles,cruise missiles and SAM's. They won't need anything from us because we don't have any unique capability to sell to the Iranians. The entire Iranian arsenal is basically reverse engineered Soviet and Chinese ballistic missiles and air defence systems. Their entire focus has been on that which in my opinion has resulted in a much better return on investment because it's pretty difficult to invade Iran because of the amount of area denial assets and standoff munitions they can throw at the enemy...
 
They themselves have a huge inventory of ballistic missiles,cruise missiles and SAM's. They won't need anything from us because we don't have any unique capability to sell to the Iranians. The entire Iranian arsenal is basically reverse engineered Soviet and Chinese ballistic missiles and air defence systems. Their entire focus has been on that which in my opinion has resulted in a much better return on investment because it's pretty difficult to invade Iran because of the amount of area denial assets and standoff munitions they can throw at the enemy...

With their current capability, it's not a threat to the US. They will become a threat based on where they are headed at their current pace. Look at their pinnacle technologies in air defence, both Bavar-373 and 15th Khordad are where the Americans and Russians were back in the 90s, or where the Chinese were in the late 2000s.

If they want to compete with the US, which they can 10 years down the line with the right investments, they need to first start with SAMs like the S-400, S-350 and Pantsir-S2 and then make their way to developing systems in a similar categoy as the S-500 within the next 10 years. SAMs have a smaller gestation period than fighter jets, so the transition is the fastest. And they need to do this with foreign assistance.

Impressive as their current capability appears to be, they are nowhere near where they should be if they want to stop an advanced nation invading their country. First they need an air force, quite literally. Then they need "modern" air defences, like the systems I named above. And they also need a proper comm network that can tie all of it down together, which they currently completely lack, including a comm satellite in GTO and military access to GLONASS/BEIDOU. These are a minimum.

As for India, although the govt is unlikely to assist them with weapons, we can provide non-weapon systems like helicopters, which are unlikely to be under sanctions from the US. Indian companies can provide weapons systems of their own volition, if they feel they can navigate through the sanctions. Also, if Iran does end up on a modernisation spree, then the US will encourage India to get some marketshare in Iran and not simply surrender it entirely to Russia and China, which will not leave Iran any other way out for decades.
 
With their current capability, it's not a threat to the US. They will become a threat based on where they are headed at their current pace. Look at their pinnacle technologies in air defence, both Bavar-373 and 15th Khordad are where the Americans and Russians were back in the 90s, or where the Chinese were in the late 2000s.

If they want to compete with the US, which they can 10 years down the line with the right investments, they need to first start with SAMs like the S-400, S-350 and Pantsir-S2 and then make their way to developing systems in a similar categoy as the S-500 within the next 10 years. SAMs have a smaller gestation period than fighter jets, so the transition is the fastest. And they need to do this with foreign assistance.

Impressive as their current capability appears to be, they are nowhere near where they should be if they want to stop an advanced nation invading their country. First they need an air force, quite literally. Then they need "modern" air defences, like the systems I named above. And they also need a proper comm network that can tie all of it down together, which they currently completely lack, including a comm satellite in GTO and military access to GLONASS/BEIDOU. These are a minimum.

As for India, although the govt is unlikely to assist them with weapons, we can provide non-weapon systems like helicopters, which are unlikely to be under sanctions from the US. Indian companies can provide weapons systems of their own volition, if they feel they can navigate through the sanctions. Also, if Iran does end up on a modernisation spree, then the US will encourage India to get some marketshare in Iran and not simply surrender it entirely to Russia and China, which will not leave Iran any other way out for decades.
I would steer clear away from helping the Iranians. If ever the Pakistani problem gets solved those might be the next guys we might face as adversaries. They won't buy shit from us. It's either going to be Russia,China or some European player like Sweden. The rest of the West will follow American diktat not because of some fear of the Americans but because of Iranian behaviour. India doesn't have any good system to sell to the Iranians. They are self sufficient in most things though technological inferior. We could at best sell some brahmos but the Russians will sell the oniks instead and take the profit for themselves. So it's just a waste of time...