Report: Iran Shoots Down U.S. Spy Drone

TEHRAN, Jan. 16 (Xinhua) -- Iranian troops have shot down a U.S. pilotless spy plane recently, an Iranian lawmaker announced on Tuesday as the Islamic Republic was facing increasing military pressure from its arch rival -- the United States.

I think its came down to the final months till the US and Iran go at it.. April, maybe?

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Source: Fox News via xinhuanet

[edit on 17-1-2007 by VoXiSo]

What's even more interesting in that article is that according to it, the US is sending another carrier group to the region... the first time since the beginning of the war. The US is finally getting tough on Iran's meddling in Iraq. There will never be peace and we will never be able to leave a stable country behind if Iran and Syria don't stop stirring up trouble.

Claiming the attack will be launched from the sea and not from any country in the region, he said, "The United States and its allies will target the oil installations and nuclear facilities of Iran ensuring there is no environmental catastrophe or after effects."

LOL ensuring there is no environmental catastrophe ?? So Oil wells openly spewing and possible nuclear fallout are supposedly good for the environment now? Ugh this is going to be a nightmare.

I hope articles of impeachment are brought up before this happens. This administration is dangerous.

This reminds me of the U2 shot down over cuba.
Sure, times have changed and we no longer HAVE to have a pilot in the chair.. but imagine if we did in this case.
Would Iran still of shot us down?

Im thining maybe there's something on the ground now they DONT want us locating.
Could that be possible?

How will the US react to this?
Can they react being it was a spy plane?

This is a escalation in my mind.
You dont allow spyplanes for god knows how long, then all of a sudden start shooting them down.

But has anyone found any pictures of the shot down UAV?

Just seems logical that they would parade evidence like that out for the whole world to see?

The Soviets did it with the U-2 they shot down (since U-2's being shot down has been brought up), and I seem to remember aircraft parts being bandied about during the Kosovo fiasco.

I guess what I'm saying is "show me the wreckage."

Jerry Maguire Monkeys, not just for jumping up and down on Oprah's couch anymore...

Sounds like we need the Blackbird back in action.

Originally posted by Mirthful Me
But has anyone found any pictures of the shot down UAV?

Just seems logical that they would parade evidence like that out for the whole world to see?

Would there even be anything left of a UAV if it was blown up you think? Its pretty much just a juiced up RC plane isn't it?


Pie

Pretty much. A "slight bit" more than that, but in a sense yes.

Originally posted by Critical_Mass
Pretty much. A "slight bit" more than that, but in a sense yes.

Are these things remote controlled via Sattelite or are they launched from a nearby mobile unit or something? I would gather when you say its a slight bit more that the range of control must be a lot different from its docile cousin the RC plane that most hobbyists use.

It depends- if it was a Predator, it was most likely piloted from the US, if it was a smaller bird, like a Scan Eagle, it would've been much more local. My guess is that is was a larger bird, to have any sort of useful endurance.

Originally posted by ThePieMaN
Would there even be anything left of a UAV if it was blown up you think? Its pretty much just a juiced up RC plane isn't it?

Hmmm, just an RC plane (juiced)...

Dimensions:
length-27 ft.
span-48.7ft.
height- 6.9ft.
weight-1,130 lbs (empty)

www.globalsecurity.org...

Unlikely that they could even think of bagging one of these:

www.globalsecurity.org...

or these:

www.globalsecurity.org...

Yeah, there'd be something left... There's even something left when you're talking missiles and bombs.

[edit on 17/1/2007 by Mirthful Me]

I agree show some wreckage. I will not blindly follow a story without facts, and then let prejudices beat on America or Iran.

I say confirm the story. Don't be a fool of possible propaganda.

Hey, a plane completely disappeard when it hit the ground.. that was a BOEING.
this , compared to a boeing, is just a juiced up plane.

But im just being a smarta55, surely there'd be 'SOMETHING' left..

Will the US retaliate?

Originally posted by Mirthful Me

Dimensions:
length-27 ft.
span-48.7ft.
height- 6.9ft.
weight-1,130 lbs (empty)

Whoa!! Man I had no idea that were so big. Thats like as big as a 747 Jumbo Jet RC plane I saw fly once. Im thinking it was the size of a small model plane maybe slightly larger. I would have thought they would be looking for small and undetectable. That thing is almost as big as a trainer.


Pie

A predator, with a person for comparison



There'd be wreckage, but it might be scattered over who knows how many miles.


Recall that the Iranians claimed to have been able to pass one of their UAVs (which ARE more like supped up RV hobby planes) over a US carrier. At first no one beleived it. If I recall, the US government confirmed that there was an incident and that the US was able to send up some jets to chase it, but they wouldn't say if it passed over them (which would allow it, in wartime, to drop a bomb).

So if Xinhua is reporting correctly, and its usually a pretty trustworthy source if I recall, then we should take it as, at least 'probable'.

Having been overseas and worked with some of the UAVs, I can say it's more likely that there was an equipment failure and it crashed. They are probably just saying that they shot it down. It's not that easy to shoot one down, not to mention that just shooting AT it would probably cause an inexperienced pilot to freak out and crash. While I was in Iraq we had 4 Shadows go down and about 36 ravens. All of them were recovered though. I mean, we even have stickers on them in arabic that say "If recovered, bring to nearest american base for reward"

If the UAV was hit with a missile it will most likely be hit with a SA-2 which the Iranians use and those things have something like 180 to 200kg warheads which would turn the predator drone into dust.

Or if it was hit with a smaller missile the UAV landed on the ground and the Iranians probably just collected it and are reverse engineering the thing.

Or it just fell out of the sky becuase of an engine failure and the Iranians collected it anyway.

.

Show me the wreckage, a picture is worth a thousand words, even more so in this case considering it's Iran.

Anyway, it's unlikely they shot down a Predator (never mind a Global Hawk), it could have been a tactical UAV. If I had to put money on it I'd say that if it's a Predator it probably went down due to technical problems, if it's a tactical UAV it could have been shot down. But why would the US fly a Predator over Iran? A Global Hawk makes much more sense as Iran cannot touch them easily.

Originally posted by WestPoint23
A Global Hawk makes much more sense as Iran cannot touch them easily.

Not even with one of these?

To date there are no confirmed reports of Iran possessing the S-300. IF (and that's a very big if) they did they would not give such a capability (location, time to engage, radar frequency etc...) away by shooting down a UAV. In terms of the bigger picture that would be quite stupid.