US Stealth UAV RQ-170 downed in IRAN

[DarK-LorD]

Doesn't matter US will develop a more advanced drone.
Note:A number of US aircraft were shot down by USSR,so that did not mean that USAF was inferior to Soviet Air Force.

 

[Broccoli]

Washington (CNN) -- A U.S. stealth drone that crashed in Iran last week was part of a CIA reconnaissance mission which involved both the intelligence community and military personnel stationed in Afghanistan, two U.S. officials confirmed to CNN Tuesday.

The officials said they did not believe the mission involved flying the aircraft directly over Iran because the reconnaissance capability of the RQ-170 Sentinel drone would allow it to gather information from inside Iran while remaining on the Afghanistan side of the border. The officials also for the first time confirmed to CNN it was an RQ-170 drone that was lost.

A third U.S. official confirmed that when the drone crashed, the United States briefly considered all potential options for retrieving the aircraft or bombing the wreckage, but those ideas were quickly discarded as impractical. There was also satellite surveillance over the site, which helped confirm the location of the wreckage before the Iranians retrieved it.

Drone that crashed in Iran was on CIA recon mission, officials say - CNN.com

 

[longbrained]

Drone that crashed in Iran was on CIA recon mission, officials say - CNN.com

Interesting. But US statements do not match with each other. They have changed the story ten times now. If it was inside Afghanistan how come it came to be in Iran? There are so many conflicting reports on US side, which means they are lying.

 

[SinoChallenger]

Dude, Pentagon has admitted the drone is in Iran, they even were contemplating to go in Iran and recover it but then were scared of Iranian army so they just admitted the loss. As for pictures, I would like to see them too, but it is upto Iranians whether they want to show them or not. As for Serbia it was in the middle of a war and they needed the boosted morale the pictures provided. Here it is not the case. Anyway, in due time you would probably see the pictures of Iranian made RQ-170 flying over Tel Aviv.

So, the US actually intruded a second time. They must have launched some more spy drones to find out that Iranian army have already recovered the RQ-170. Considering how quickly the Iranian army arrived, it implies that it was an orchestrated electronic warfare attack by Iran, not just a malfunction.

 

[longbrained]

So, the US actually intruded a second time. They must have launched some more spy drones to find out that Iranian army have already recovered the RQ-170. Considering how quickly the Iranian army arrived, it implies that it was an orchestrated electronic warfare attack by Iran, not just a malfunction.

Well, as per CNN, US was looking down at the drone via satellite. But yeah, Iranians were there quick which means they were the ones who brought it down.

 

[longbrained]

US officials have again changed their story. Now they claim, the drone is very sophisticated and when it loses communication with controllers it lands where ever it is and that is why Iranians got it. They claim it just glided and landed in Iran when it lost its link. Very funny. See the link here: Iran recovers secret CIA spy drone — RT

 

[lt.fridz]

Lets analyze the facts of the matter:

1. The Iranians claim to have downed a US Stealth UAV RQ-170 with minimal damage.

2. NATO has acknowledged that one of their drone is missing, last seen near the Iranian border.

3. US Military Sources say to the media that they believe Iran has the missing drone.

There are a lot of interesting questions here:

Do the Iranians have the drone in a condition that allows them to reverse engineer it? Or did it crash in Iran so nothing spectacular can be gained by examination of the wreck?

Do the Iranians have the capability to take control of US drones? Did they develop this capability themselves or acquire it from a third nation eager to test it? Or did they manage to down it using conventional methods? Or did it just crash due to some malfunction?

Lets suppose for a moment that the drone was shot down using conventional methods or malfunctioned and crashed inside Iran. It would make much sense for Iran to announce to the world that they had the ability to take over US drones! If US took this seriously (and it would be prudent for them to do that) then this would cause them much headache. They would have to spend a lot of effort to inspect all their drones and their control systems for suspected malware. They would probably temporary down all their fleet pending such an inspection (I would be surprised to learn that they have some drones operating for at least few days after the announcement). They would then need to factor in the compromise of technology and even adjust their tactics to some level. Perhaps they are aware of some vulnerabilities of stealth technology that will come apparent to persons that have the oppertunity to reverse engineer an almost intact drone.

Lets now suppose on the other hand that Iran did actually down the drone using some take-over method. They have the drone in prime condition and can look at it all they want. It would not really make sense for them to advertize this fact to the world, would it? It would be very easy for them to just say that they vaporized a spy plane that invaded their airspace and warn that other planes would receive the same fate. They could then, in secret start to reverse engineer what they have and gain further tech from it.
They could also keep their capability of taking over drones a closely guarded secret. It is entirely likely that this capability would come in handy some day and then the element of surprise will be most welcome.

Based on this, and the lack of any visual evidence, I think it is more likely that they are bluffing, that they do not have the capability to take over drones. And further more it is more likely than not that they just have a crater with some bits of drone in it. Lack of pictures supports this theory.

Then again, if they had this capability and wanted to test it, and wanted to hide this fact from the US, perhaps it would make sense for them to behave in this way. Whether the Iranians have the drone or not and whether they have the downing capability or not, I think the best action for Iran is to produce no pictures of the crash. This will drive the US intelligence people (gambit?) nuts until they get confirmation on the capability (or the lack thereof) by some other means.

This is starting to sound like a poker game and Iran is probably playing their cards the best way they can. I Wish I had the oppertunity to look at their cards over their shoulder

Bottom line is, we are not going to see any pictures of the downed plane any time soon. This would not in Iran's interest regardless of whether they have it or not. Why do I say that?

I. If they have the drone (almost) intact it would be in their interest to have US believe they are bluffing.

II. If they don't have the drone, or just wrecked pieces of it, it would be in their interest to have the US believe otherwise.

Of course the comments by the US military sources saying that yes, they believe that Iran has the drone must have some purpose. I guess they are trying to get Iran to produce some photos so they can now for certain. The uncertainity is probably much worse for them than actually knowing which it is.

Releasing pictures at this point by Iran would be stupid, and I don't think that the Iranian military is run by stupid people.

 

[Arman-Shahr]

till now Americans were saying their drone is missing, now they say they knew the location of it and it is largely intact

 

[Omar1984]

Drone that crashed in Iran may give away U.S. secrets

Drone that crashed in Iran may give away U.S. secrets - latimes.com

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.


Reporting from Los Angeles and Washington— 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.

Other aviation experts weren't so sure.

"I don't think this is a dagger pointed at the heart of democracy," said Loren Thompson, defense policy analyst for the Lexington Institute in Arlington, Va. "A lot of information about this aircraft was already known by foreign military intelligence officials."

On Sunday, Iran's armed forces said they brought down a Sentinel drone that violated the country's airspace along the eastern border. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization's U.S.-led force in neighboring Afghanistan said Iranian authorities might be referring to an unarmed U.S. reconnaissance plane that went missing during a mission in western Afghanistan late last week, but did not confirm what kind of aircraft was downed.

The NATO force's statement was ambiguous about who was flying the aircraft.

"The operators of the UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] lost control of the aircraft and had been working to determine its status," the statement said.

Spokesmen for the CIA, White House, Pentagon and congressional intelligence oversight committees declined to comment.

Although the Sentinel's capabilities remain largely classified, it is believed to carry the latest in cutting-edge cameras and sensors that can "listen in" on cellphone conversations as it soars miles above the ground or "smell" the air and sniff out chemical plumes emanating from a potential underground nuclear laboratory.

Ever since it was developed at Lockheed Martin Corp.'s famed Skunk Works facility in Palmdale, the Sentinel drone has been cloaked in tight secrecy by the U.S. government. But now the drone that the Iranian military claims to have brought down for invading its airspace might be made far more public than the Pentagon or Lockheed ever intended.

Another U.S. official with access to intelligence said that losing the Sentinel is a major security breach. The official, who was not authorized to publicly speak about the information, wouldn't say how the drone fell into Iranian hands, but confirmed that the downed drone was largely intact.

"It's bad — they'll have everything" in terms of the secret technology in the aircraft, the official said. "And the Chinese or the Russians will have it too."

Photographs of the Sentinel first surfaced online in 2009 at a remote airfield in Kandahar, Afghanistan. The drone received the nickname "the beast of Kandahar."

The drone resembles a miniature version of the B-2 stealth bomber. The bat-wing design is meant to make it less likely to pop up on enemy radar screens. Also like the B-2 bomber, the Sentinel is thought to have high-tech coatings that act like a sponge to absorb radar waves as they strike the plane.

The Sentinel's design is a quantum leap from the MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper drones well-known for hunting terrorists in the Middle East. Those drones, made by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc. of Poway, Calif., are propeller powered, non-stealthy and not designed to be flown in contested airspace.

The Pentagon first publicly acknowledged the Sentinel's existence in late 2009. The craft is known to be an unarmed spy drone.

Kevin Gambold, director of operations for Unmanned Experts, a British company that specializes in unmanned aerial vehicles, said the Sentinel, carrying an array of classified surveillance systems, would have a self-destruct mechanism to disable or destroy it if operators lost control.

He said it's difficult to believe that Iran could have brought down the aircraft with electronic jamming or by taking the controls through a cyber attack as the country claims it did. "You never say never, but I would be gob-smacked and amazed if they even knew how," Gambold said.

John Bumgarner, chief technical officer for the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit, an independent nonprofit research institute, said it's technically possible to jam the communication used to control a drone.

But in such cases, the drone should have a fail-safe mechanism that enables it to retrace its flight path and return to the base where it was launched, he said.

The most likely reason that the Sentinel didn't self-destruct or safely return is that it was lost because of an onboard mechanical malfunction, said Thompson of the Lexington Institute.

"That means what the Iranians have is a pile of wreckage — many small and damaged pieces from which they could glean little in the way of technological insights," he said.

Still, pieces of stealth technology may have found their way into foreign military hands before.

This year, China said it had developed and built a stealth fighter jet, dubbed Chengdu J-20. U.S. military officials believe that the Chinese used technology collected from a F-117 stealth aircraft that was shot down over Serbia in 1999 during the Kosovo war. Chinese agents were said to have purchased parts of the plane, covered in high-tech stealth coating, from local farmers.

"The cat's already out of the bag with stealth technology," said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a website for military policy research.

"The materials have already been widely disseminated. One little drone isn't going to make a difference either way."

By: Los Angeles Times

Iranians must work with Chinese and Russian friends. They can make Uncle Sam think twice before messing around in our region.

 

[longbrained]

till now Americans were saying their drone is missing, now they say they knew the location of it and it is largely intact

They are big liars. When Iran broke the news, this is how they responded:

Timeline:

1- We have not lost any drone
2- A drone is missing and we are looking for its status
3- Drone was flying in Afghanistan and we lost contact with it last week
4- Drone was not downed by Iranians
5- Drone is in Iran but it is useless since it is in small pieces
6- Drone is in Iran and is intact
7- Drone got lost and its smart autopilot landed it safely in Iran
8-

 

[Obambam]

US officials have again changed their story. Now they claim, the drone is very sophisticated and when it loses communication with controllers it lands where ever it is and that is why Iranians got it. They claim it just glided and landed in Iran when it lost its link. Very funny. See the link here: Iran recovers secret CIA spy drone — RT

It definitely sounds better than it being shot down by a nation that is under heavy sanctions.

 

[gambit]

It definitely sounds better than it being shot down by a nation that is under heavy sanctions.

And much more technically plausible, too.

 

[unicorn]

YOU bringing up 'common sense' in this debate? So far there has been nothing but baseless assumptions on your part about Iran's alleged role in this event. And YOU have the gall to bring up 'common sense'?

Let us begin...

In robotics where the device stands with the potential of losing contact with the controller, you must have a 'safe' or 'default' condition available in the event that such a loss does occur. These drones are engineered with such conditions. They are programmed with autonomous flight programming to continue on current heading, or enter an orbit, or self destruct. The last option is least desirable because there could be a chance that contact and control would be reestablished.

Iran did made a similar claim back in July about shooting down a US drone. Nothing to back up that claim. So why should we place anymore credibility on this one?

Cracking into the encrypted communication links in real time is as valid as saying Santa Claus exist. Just as only children believe in Santa Claus, only gullible people like you here would believe that Iran could do such a thing. Equally implausible is the 'virus' tale. If true, then the quickest way to shut down the entire US drone program would be to provide visual confirmation of that takeover of control. The aircraft must be intact and repeatedly flown by Iranian controllers.

And YOU have the gall to bring up 'common sense'...???

I don't understand why you guys are chest thumping for not getting it shot down.

The real price will be it's fuel efficient engine, that only Americans have mastered over the years.That is why it can fly for days and not hours.Making a copy of it is more plausible.

I think it is very much possible that what the Iranians are saying to be correct about capturing the drone in good condition.Because Pentagon officials have initially said that they lost the link with the drone so it is very much possible it run out of fuel and descend to the ground crash landed but with out fuel in its belly it only dis integrate but not get burnt.

In my opinion it is really a big blow to Pentagon.

 

[Abii]

can somebody explain why an stealth drone would be used in AFG? Last I checked, the mountain apes with AKs didn't have AA.

This was spying in Iran and no, it didn't run out of fuel, nice try. If Iran got to it within hours, as Pentagon is saying, then they were tracking it and knew its pinpoint location when it crashed (unless god came down to earth and told us there is a stealth drone on these coordinates, go and get it). If it was being tracked and now it's in Iranian hands, it didn't go down by itself nor did it "run out of fuel" lol

 

[gambit]

I don't understand why you guys are chest thumping for not getting it shot down.

The real price will be it's fuel efficient engine, that only Americans have mastered over the years.That is why it can fly for days and not hours.Making a copy of it is more plausible.

The reason why these drones can stay up for so long is indeed because of fuel efficiency. But fuel efficiency involve more than just a good engine, it take into consider the payload. The lighter the load, the less fuel the engine will use. The aircraft's design being mostly 'wing' also help because we have known since the early days of aviation that the so-called 'all-wing' design is the most efficient in terms of range and altitude.

I think it is very much possible that what the Iranians are saying to be correct about capturing the drone in good condition.Because Pentagon officials have initially said that they lost the link with the drone so it is very much possible it run out of fuel and descend to the ground crash landed but with out fuel in its belly it only dis integrate but not get burnt.

See...

http://www.defence.pk/forums/world-...th-uav-rq-170-downed-iran-22.html#post2364728
http://www.defence.pk/forums/world-...th-uav-rq-170-downed-iran-22.html#post2365022

In my opinion it is really a big blow to Pentagon.

Serious? Yes, but enough to set US back in this area of military aviation? No. Keep in mind that whatever is built and deployed, be it an automobile or a jet fighter, there is already something else better ready to replace it.

---------- Post added at 04:49 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:47 PM ----------

can somebody explain why an stealth drone would be used in AFG? Last I checked, the mountain apes with AKs didn't have AA.

Do much critical thinking? I guess not. Sensors can look ACROSS borders.

This was spying in Iran and no, it didn't run out of fuel, nice try. If Iran got to it within hours, as Pentagon is saying, then they were tracking it and knew its pinpoint location when it crashed (unless god came down to earth and told us there is a stealth drone on these voordinates, go and get it). If it was being tracked and now it's in Iranian hands, it didn't go down by itself nor did it "run out of fuel" lol

For now, you would be better off believing in Allah's intervention. No difference than the 'virus' speculation.