Yes. You may not be aware of the brutal suppression of the Green Movement. [wikipedia.org]

Any regime that suppresses free speech is an oppressive government.

They are great helicopters, and their size and simplicity are reasons the US Marine Corps still use both UH-1 and AH-1 variants.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_AH-1_Cobra [wikipedia.org]

SuperCobra are up to a Z variant.

That's something many people don't know about. The one place where Nazism, and it's blend of socialism and ethnic genocide is popular, is the middle east. The entire middle east, that is, including Turkey. It is very popular in Iran.

Iran sent their own children into minefields, walking slowly through them to clear a path by getting hit by mines, until the mines were exhausted. But no worries ! They gave them small little plastic keys, that the government claimed would take them to heaven "if" they died. They sent all the orphans they had. Why ? Because that's what muslim law says, orphans become slaves of the caliph, which Iran takes to mean they owe their lives to the government.

The keys called attention to the fact that, according to the highest authority of shi'a islam "to kill and be killed for allah is the purest part of islam".

http://www.themodernreligion.com/ugly/unholy.html [themodernreligion.com]

Islam is a barbaric, monstrous religion, and it's the real threat.

"In Afghanistan the Taliban have been pushed into Pakistan"

In case you haven't heard the U.S. and NATO are going to cut and run on Afghanistan in 2014, France is leaving sooner than that according to Hollande. The current Afghan government, which is completely corrupt and despised by the Afghan people, is unlikely to last a week on its own. When it collapses the Taliban will inevitably return to power and they will have won a war that cost NATO over 12 years, over a trillion dollars, and 3,000 dead so far.

I'm pretty sure NATO knows the Taliban will return to power, they apparently consider that to be a lesser evil than continuing to squander blood and treasure to prop up Karzai and the warlords that always take power when the Taliban is out of power. When faced with a similar situation in Vietnam the U.S. assassinated Diám to try to install a government that wasn't completely hopeless, it didn't work either.

The Taliban's predecessor, the Mujahideen, was "pushed" in to Pakistan too, when the USSR occupied Afghanistan, or actually they used the tribal areas of Pakistan as a base for a very successful insurgency that ended when the Soviet Union fled and the loss contributed to the Soviet Union's collapse soon after.

Iraq didn't exactly "defeat" NATO. The Sunni insurgency did heavily bleed the U.S. for a number of years. The U.S. and NATO lost in Iraq because the whole invasion was deeply flawed from the get go. As soon as the U.S. and NATO let the Shia majority vote they inevitably voted in a Shia government which promptly aligned with Iran and told the U.S. and NATO to get out. By invading Iraq, NATO eliminated the dominant counterforce to Iran in the region which was Saddam, and replaced him with a pro Iranian regime. They lost another 10 year trillion dollar war, not on the battlefield, but by following the Bush administrations wildly misguided plan. Bush's dad actually had enough brains to realize toppling Sadam was a horrible idea if you were trying to contain Iran's theocracy which is why he didn't do it when he had the chance in the first gulf war.

All in all you don't seem to have a firm grasp on history or the current state of war and politics in the world.

Did anyone even bother to check the date of this so called news? The photo thread shows May 2010 as the posting date.

Some of the photos in that thread are even 7-8 years old. The one about Pilot Helmet (post #21) show the defense minister of Iran in 10 years ago!!!

List of military equipments produced in Iran: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_equipment_manufactured_in_Iran [wikipedia.org]

Iran has built :

frigates: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Frigate_Jamaran [wikipedia.org]
fighter planes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sa'eqeh [wikipedia.org]
fully reverse engineered Bell 214: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_214 [wikipedia.org]
stealth drone: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofreh_Mahi [wikipedia.org]
Normal drones: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karrar_(UAV) [wikipedia.org] , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohajer [wikipedia.org], http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ababil [wikipedia.org]
long range radars like this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matla-ul-fajr [wikipedia.org]
copies of Hawk SAM upgraded with phased array radars: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mersad_(Air_Defense_System) [wikipedia.org]
copy of SM-1(RIM-66) SAM: http://www.irandefence.net/showthread.php?t=70624 [irandefence.net]
2nd country producing anti-ship ballestic missiles: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khalij_Fars [wikipedia.org]
Sina class missile boats: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_missile_boat_Paykan [wikipedia.org]
Three classes of submarines: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qaaem_Class_Submarine [wikipedia.org] , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghadir_(submarine) [wikipedia.org] , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nahang_1 [wikipedia.org]

To name a few.

Luckyo has already commented on your inaccurate assertion that Arabs and/or Arabic Muslims have far more genocide than others. Let me comment on your wildly and provably incorrect assertion that (paraphrasing) "history tells us that nuclear war will start in a matter of months if these people get nuclear weapons".

Now, if I interpret "these people" as Arabic Muslims, then Iranians are generally Persian Muslims (yeah, yeah, there are non-Persian and non-Muslims minorities in Iran, but "Persian" is way more accurate than "Arabic"). So unless (with all due respect) you're a inbred moronic racist who has commented before knowing the facts at hand, then surely that's not what you mean.

Therefore, you surely meant "Muslims" by your phrase "these people". In which case, then Pakistan (also a country with Islam as its state religion and majority Muslims) has had nuclear weapons as well as the means to launch them for about 14 years. Which -- because you probably can't count beyond your fingers/toes -- is 168 months, a tad more what is considered "a few" months in adult English in the civilised world.

I'd also like you to cite evidence that Iran has a history of aggression (Iraq attacked Iran first and Iran merely kicked out a non-democratic puppet dictator in 1979), but given the rest of your post, I reckon it's a tossup whether you're a 7 year old posting on his dad's computer or just a mental patient trying to pass the time away.

considering they have 70 or so million people, which is about on par with France or the UK (actually slightly larger) you would expect them to be able to quite a diverse range of equipment.

Given sanctions and their GDP you expect it to not necessarily be as good as comparable western productions, but it can still be in quantity and respectable quality.

... So they poorly attack a military outpost and that gives us a reason to kill women, children, and old people. You are shit excuse of a human being.

Say the warcrimes in China and Korea that the Japanese committed, but Pearl Harbor...

Sorry, Muslim genocides - starting from the time of Mohammed and going on to this day, far dwarfed anything done by the Mongols, the Crusaders, the Conquestadoras, the Nazis and the Communists - all of them put together. In India alone, some 100 million non-Muslims died at the hands of Muslim conquerors over 700 years (1000AD to 1761AD). The GP AC is correct - overall, some 270 million people people died in the Muslim jihads - and that was before 9/11.

Luckyo is also full of shit regarding 'Arabic numbers'. They were called Hindu numerals, and originated in India. In fact, almost everything the Muslims claim to have invented was already invented elsewhere, like China, India, (pre-Islamic) Persia and Egypt, and so on. The Arab 'contribution' to this was taking some of it and spreading it around. This meme about a golden age of Islamic civilization is a complete myth, and what's more, it flies in the face of the logic of apologists who claim these as being Muslim/Islamic achievements, while claiming that Islam is not a monolyth when it comes to exhibits of their savagery. Never mind that that savagery is common to Arabs, Turks, Farsis and Afghans, and driven by exhortations to jihad in both the Qur'an and Sun'nah.

Except:
- these are copied part by part and upgraded electronics and guns
- USA armed forces still use Cobra extensively. So no, they are not too old and they are usable.

Let's see what some other sources say:

'Tyranny of Clichés' Excerpt: The Truth About the Crusades [breitbart.com]

. . . Until fairly recently, historically speaking, Muslims used to brag about being the winners of the Crusades, not the victims of it. That is if they talked about them at all. “The Crusades could more accurately be described as a limited, belated and, in the last analysis, ineff ectual response to the jihad—a failed attempt to recover by a Christian holy war what had been lost to a Muslim holy war,” writes Bernard Lewis, the greatest living historian of Islam in the English language (and perhaps any language).5 Historian Thomas Madden puts it more directly, “Now put this down in your notebook, because it will be on the test: The crusades were in every way a defensive war. They were the West’s belated response to the Muslim conquest of fully two-thirds of the Christian world.”6

At first the larger Muslim world didn’t much care about the Christian reclamation of Jerusalem and the Holy Land. The jihad to repel the crusaders didn’t start in earnest until the European forces pressed on into the Muslim Holy Lands approaching Mecca and Medina. Even then the Muslim world considered the fight to reclaim Jerusalem a sideshow. The real fight was in the East, where caliphs were rolling up victory after victory in the old Byzantine Empire. In 1291, the Muslims expelled the last of the crusaders, and all remaining Christians and Jews in the Islamic world lived as second-class citizens (though often better than Muslims or Jews might have in many parts of Christendom). By the sixteenth century, Islam’s empire covered all of North Africa, Asia Minor, Arabia, and much of southern Europe. Had Islamic forces not been turned back outside the Gates of Vienna, Christianity itself may not have survived. (The battle ended in victory for the Christians on September 12, but it was the day before, marking the apex of Muslim rule, that would stick in the minds of many Muslims for the next 318 years.)
   

The Truth about Islamic Crusades and Imperialism [americanthinker.com]

The Status of Non-Muslim Minorities Under Islamic Rule [dhimmitude.org]

The Golden Age of Islam is a Myth [frontpagemag.com]

a rough estimate of 270 million killed by jihad. [politicalislam.com]

The atheist Communists killed 100,000,000 people in the last 100 years. [harvard.edu]

Tears of Jihad [politicalislam.com]

These figures are a rough estimate of the death of non-Muslims by the political act of jihad.

Africa

Thomas Sowell [Thomas Sowell, Race and Culture, BasicBooks, 1994 [amazon.co.uk], p. 188] estimates that 11 million slaves were shipped across the Atlantic and 14 million were sent to the Islamic nations of North Africa and the Middle East. For every slave captured many others died. Estimates of this collateral damage vary. The renowned missionary David Livingstone estimated that for every slave who reached a plantation, five others were killed in the initial raid or died of illness and privation on the forced march.[Woman’s Presbyterian Board of Missions, David Livingstone, p. 62, 1888] Those who were left behind were the very young, the weak, the sick and the old. These soon died since the main providers had been killed or enslaved. So, for 25 million slaves delivered to the market, we have an estimated death of about 120 million people. Islam ran the wholesale slave trade in Africa.

120 million Africans

Which numbnuts modded this drivel up?

using depleted uranium munitions is actually a great cost saver for US taxpayers. It's a cheap way to dispose of nuclear waste while irradiating a foreign civilian population

Um. No. DU has all the nice and very slightly radioactive U235 removed. It isn't nuclear waste.

U-238 has a half life of 4.5 billion years. If you ate it, the problems from heavy metal poisioning would be much worse than the radioactivity.

It's not like they're firing shells filled with Cs-137 which is what the parent is blatantly trying to imply.

Erm, talk about half the story?

"Pearl Habor was no rationale at all for doing anything to Japan. The U.S., Britain and the Dutch had embargoed Japan's oil supplies in July 1941. Japan made it quite clear then that they considered that an act of war since it was going to completely strangle Japan militarily and economically."

Have you never heard of the rape of nanking? Japan was war mongering well before even the war in Europe had gotten underway, it was an imperialist nation no different to the Western nations you criticise for provoking them, it's whole purpose for war against China starting primarily in 1937 was because it wanted to take it over.

That's why Japan was under embargo - because it had rolled into China, before Hitler had even rolled into Poland.

Christ, I'm probably one of the least pro-American people you'll meet but Pearl Harbour WAS rational for doing something to Japan, because it was a further extension of Japan's military aggression in the Pacific.

They weren't some innocent country who we just embargoed because we thought it'd be a bit of a laugh, we did so because they were a major destabilising force in the region, we attempted political pressure through embargos and it didn't work. From that point on the only option was full out war against Japan - they started the war in the Pacific long before the west really got involved. The West gave them 4 years to give up their imperialist ambitions and during that time they committed countless massacres, mass-rapes, and general destruction of Chinese cities and infrastructure, when they finally hit Pearl Harbour it was no fucking wonder the West decided enough was enough. No rationale? seriously? You think Japan should've just been allowed to go on destroying, raping, and pillaging the whole Pacific, extending it's war it started in 1937?

You realize that in Red vs Blue combat exercises, F-22s are so dominant against F-15e aircraft (and everything else) that they don't allow the F-22s to engage BVR anymore and actually start a lot of the sorties with multiple "red" aircraft behind each F-22 to give them a chance? Most Gen4 aircraft have a very hard time locking an F-22 even if it's sitting right in front of them.

During Exercise Northern Edge in Alaska in June 2006, 12 F-22s of the 94th FS downed 108 adversaries with no losses in simulated combat exercises. In two weeks of exercises, the Raptor-led Blue Force amassed 241 kills against two losses in air-to-air combat; neither Blue Force loss was an F-22. Shortly after was Red Flag 07-1 in February 2007. Fourteen F-22s of the 94th FS supported Blue Force strikes and undertook close air support sorties themselves. Against superior numbers of Red Force Aggressor F-15s and F-16s, 6-8 F-22s maintained air dominance throughout. No sorties were missed because of maintenance or other failures, and only one Raptor was judged lost against the opposing force's defeat. F-22s also provided airborne electronic surveillance.

According to Lt. Col. Larry Bruce, 65th AS commander, aggressor pilots turned up the heat on the F-22 using tactics they believe to be modern threats. For security purposes these tactics weren't released; nonetheless, they said their efforts against the Raptors were fruitless.

"We [even] tried to overload them with numbers and failed," said Colonel Bruce. "It's humbling to fly against the F-22." This is a remarkable testimony because the Red Flag aggressor pilots are renowned for their skill and experience. Lt. Col. Dirk Smith, 94th Fighter Squadron commander, said the aggressor forces represent the most lethal threat friendly forces would ever face. http://www.acc.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123041725 [af.mil]

The F-22 is an air dominance aircraft. You don't fly F-22s against Iraq (where there's no air force) or Afghanistan (where there's no air force). You fly them against countries fielding Gen4 aircraft that could actually give F-15s some trouble. You do that because the F-22 will shoot down everything in the sky that isn't friendly before the unfriendlies know there's an enemy in the area. The F-22 is the hedge against a country using Russian, Chinese, or French built aircraft.

If you want to talk about costs, you need to look at the costs of an AIM-120D ($700,000) vs the cost of one of those Russian/Chinese/French aircraft ($40 Million - $60 Million). Add to that the cost of training a modern fighter pilot ($2.5 Million) and I'd say we're stupid to not have these things in play. The F-22 dominates anything on any drawing board anywhere in the world. With the time and expense of designing and building modern aircraft, that means we could sit by without doing any upgrades on the F-22s for the next 15 years and still dominate any airspace on the globe. The simple fact is, there isn't a nation on Earth with aircraft that can do anything but die horribly against the F-22. So let's throw our $700,000 missiles at their $50 Million planes and bring our pilots home to their families. Or we can try it your way: mass produce slightly cheaper aircraft and lose tons of them the next time we face someone with an actual air force.

The F-35 tries to do too many things. I'd be happy to see that thing scrapped in favor of more specialized (and functional) replacements, but we can't because it'd piss off everyone who put money into the program (which is just about all our allies). Typical stupid political crap. The same is said for the scrapping of the F-22. First they cut production to a fraction of what it was supposed to be, then they rolled up all the R&D costs and complained about how much each plane cost the country. That'd be like a major pharmaceutical company spending $30 Billion on R&D for a drug that cures cancer, then deciding to only make 10 pills and bitch that each pill cos