Posted on 12/05/2011 8:42:02 PM PST by traumer
A U.S. super-secret spy plane believed to be in Iranian possession could be a major loss for the U.S. military -- and a major gain for Iran.
According to a senior U.S. military source with intimate knowledge of the Sentinel drone, the aircraft likely "wandered" into Iranian air space after losing contact with its handlers and is presumed to be intact since it is programmed to fly level and find a place to land, rather than crashing.
"This is a big prize in terms of technology," a senior U.S. military source told Fox News. The spy plane uses the same stealth technology as the drone used to monitor the compound during the raid that killed Usama bin Laden, U.S. military sources told Fox News on Monday. Military sources confirmed that the Iranians have the RQ-170 drone, which is so advanced that the U.S. Air Force has not distributed even a photo of it. However, they did not say that the Iranians shot down the spy plane, as was reported by Iran's official IRNA news agency.
IRNA quoted an unidentified Iranian military official saying Sunday that the spy plane was shot down by Iran's armed forces and suffered minor damage.. The official also warned of strong and crushing response to any violations of the country's airspace by American drone aircraft.
Earlier, the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan issued a statement saying the aircraft may have been a drone that operators lost contact with last week while it was flying a mission over neighboring western Afghanistan. A U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the classified nature of the incident, said the U.S. had "absolutely no indication" that the drone was shot down.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Put WiFi in that TV!!!
This remote crap is just that.... Crap. To easy for the enemy to block, or high jack transmissions.
What the hay?? It isn't programmed to self-destruct? It is programmed to courteously turn itself over to our enemies? At least 15 years ago it required Clinton to give our secrets away to the Chinese. Now our technology does it all by itself. This is insane. Or is this just Obama further gutting US defense?
This goes back to the "Who needs pilots anymore" argument. A military pilot would have thought of this kind of stuff.
Absolutely. This is Obama’s Loral Space and Technology moment where they feign a “malfunction”. Savage spent the bulk of his show on this topic today.
Why not simply self destruct?
I wonder two things:
1. I wonder if this was intentional and the bird in question is a spoof.
2. I wonder why drones are not equipped with a very small detonator which can be remotely activated to destroy the craft.
When Zero gets off his 17 day muslim vacation, he will apologize to the Iranians.
He’ll do that once Air Force One is flying over the Pacific.
Lest we forget the little tidbit that came out a couple of months ago- the flight control computers for these drones were found to nearly all be infected with computer malware/viruses/trojans that they military was not able to keep cleaned off. Is this connected? Who knows - but something smells very badly and its not just the funk of the rotten Obama administration (though there is little doubt that his crap is near the top of this pool of poo).
Well, the components were likely manufactured there.
Next time, the designers (who might as well be hanging their hats in China or India performing outsourced jobs) oughta read FR for great ideas on how these machines should be programmed, as evidenced by the great ideers on this very thread. Stupid designers! They should of!
You can blame that crap on the bean counters of the world.
You got to go with the lowest bidder, you got to prefer minority of female owned subcontractors...
Another issue is the propensity of these UAVs to crash on recovery. I hope this one is easier to land than the predator series.
It wasn’t that long ago the Obama administration simply ignored the green revolution riots in Iran while they shot their own in the streets. Then he goes on to support revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya as “popular uprisings”, the last with help from NATO. Now this technology transfer on a silver platter. If you connect the dots and stand back, you will see the likeness of the prophet Mohammed.
MI Ping
I picture a bunch of Iranians standing a round it and one of them saying, "Hey Abdul, is that your watch ticking?"
Perhaps it was supposed to be 'captured' intact. Bogus technology can throw off the enemy.
Perhaps.
A 'tamper' triggered destruct would not require any communication. That would be most effective.
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