Iran Unveils Its First UAV Bomber 574
ms_gen writes "Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad unveiled today the first UAV bomber produced by Iran. The drone, named Karrar (farsi for Striker) can carry various types of bombs. It can reach up to 900 km/h in speed and has a range of 1000 kilometers (620 miles). The Iranian president mentions that 'Karrar is a symbol of the progress of defence technology in Iran.'"
Left out the best part (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Funny)
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> (you know, like the palestinian practice of throwing kids on the street just before an Israeli jeep just so they can claim the IDF murders children)
Source?
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Funny)
The mental image of the Palestinians being given back the land they though was theirs, and finding it had been turned into trinitite, is just to apropos. The Palestinians, a people screwed over for millenia, finally get to make their homes out of glass, where they can't throw stones!
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Insightful)
> The Palestinians, a people screwed over for millenia, finally get to make their homes out of glass, where they can't throw stones!
Screwed over for millenia eh?
Is that a joke? Really. You go back millenia and there are other people to start playing violin over.
620 Miles? (Score:5, Interesting)
And a range of 620 miles? Isn't that about the distance between Iran and Israel? How sweet of them.
(This "coincidence" is the surest sign to me that it doesn't have nearly the claimed range.)
Re:620 Miles? (Score:4, Insightful)
And a range of 620 miles? Isn't that about the distance between Iran and Israel? How sweet of them.
(This "coincidence" is the surest sign to me that it doesn't have nearly the claimed range.)
"620 miles" is just the converted value from "1000 kilometers" which is a nice round approximate number. No coincidence is required. Just a lack of understanding of significant digits
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our US UAVs have names like "Predator" for what's supposed to be an "unarmed" platform. Our missile blocking system is named "Patriot". Our troop transport is named "Stryker".... everybody does it. Don't get started on the names of recent Middle East US military operations... they're almost oxymoron.
Frankly, I think the announcement is specifically to get Israel to take a shot at them the US doesn't want them too. Everybody will claim this is "offensive technology" and Iran is picking the fight even though
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Interesting)
I dont know how people believe this.
Israel doesn't want to take a shot at Iran. Knowing a few Israeli's the average Israeli doesn't want any more war, the government knows it's political suicide to start another war after what went down in Lebanon, still going down in the Palestinian territories.
The only people who think Israel is even considering a strike at Iran are the extremist right wing parties of the US.
If by everybody, you mean Fox News.
Now lets look at what's really happening. The Iranian's developed a reusable 60's era cruise missile, useless against the sophisticated defences of Israel, US, NATO, Russia and so forth. But Iran knows that the US, Russia, Israel, et al. will do nothing. What Iran is afraid of are pro-arab extremist groups from their immediate neighbours as well as a growing rift between Tehran and Damascus (Syria). People who have armed forces that are less technologically advanced then Iran's but are capable of waging an extended conflict with Tehran.
They are developing UCAV technology because its a cheaper way to fight a technologically inferior but more numerous foe which does not endanger hard to replace vehicles and pilots... Shock horror, just like everyone else who have developed UAV and UCAV technology.
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Israel and Iran are actually in quite similar positions. They are both surrounded by neighbouring countries that hate them and would happily invade if they perceive any weakness. The only way they survive is by looking sufficiently aggressive that no one attacks them.
Threatening each other works quite nicely for this, as a diplomatic strategy. Their neighbours would all be happy if both countries annihilated each other, so they won't take sides. Meanwhile, by focussing on each other, they don't look li
Re:Left out the best part (Score:4, Informative)
Don't get started on the names of recent Middle East US military operations... they're almost oxymoron.
I personally found the name "Operation Iraqi Liberation" quite straight-forward and descriptive.
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Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Funny)
Is Iran intentionally angling for Fox attention? Why?
I hear Ahmadinejad has the hots for Rupert Murdoch.
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Informative)
Looks like a German V1 if you ask me. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb [wikipedia.org]
Except the Germans had the sense to put the bomb inside.
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They are using what looks to be a 500 lb bomb on an ordinary mounting hard point. This opens them up to using the same UAV for many different missions. There are literally dozens of different bombs, missiles, sensors, extra fuel tanks, and electronic warfare equipment that could likely be simply mounted to this UAV platform and sent up without complicated mission re-tasking. Using a common platform for UAV and cruise missile type operations seems sensible and reasonable.
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Insightful)
Thing is, UAVs can be used offensively against low technology targets. For example dropping missiles on Taleban targets in the middle of the night. You can't use it against Israel because they know how to use radar, and a UAV will be easy to shoot down.
What Iran needs is a terrain hugging cruise missile. It needs to be fast enough to get ahead of observations phoned ahead along the ground track. Ballistic missiles are less effective now that ballistic defense is more mature.
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Informative)
looks more like Tu-143 or Tu-141 [youtube.com]
Re:Left out the best part (Score:5, Insightful)
Damn straight. Heaven knows naming your UAVs something ominous is a sure sign of evil. Killing a few hundred innocent civilians per month with the lilly-themed "Predator" drones is something entirely different...
All of these anti-war people complaining about the tens of thousands of dead civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan don't seem to understand: Iran has leaders who threaten violence, with really mean sounding words. How is it that they only seem to criticize America?
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That's probably due to the fact that Iran has never invaded another country, while it found itself attacked by Iraq without any valid justification. Back then Iraq was supported by pretty much the entire western world. I won't even go into how the CIA overthrew Iran's elected government to replace it with a dictatorship(the Shah)
End result: Iran has every reason to build up its defences. History has shown Iran that the western world's propaganda about justice and fairness only applies to them, not to other
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That's probably due to the fact that Iran has never invaded another country, while it found itself attacked by Iraq without any valid justification. Back then Iraq was supported by pretty much the entire western world. I won't even go into how the CIA overthrew Iran's elected government to replace it with a dictatorship(the Shah)
End result: Iran has every reason to build up its defences. History has shown Iran that the western world's propaganda about justice and fairness only applies to them, not to other countries, that the western world will support unjustified attacks on Iran and thus they need to be able to defend themselves.
Just one flaw in your logic: How is a UAV bomber a defensive weapon?
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There is no such thing as a "defensive" or "offensive" weapon.
For example a working ABM system is the most dangerous offensive weapon imaginable if introduced into a system of ICBM based MAD deterrence.
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Also (Score:5, Informative)
Air war is as much about intelligence these days as anything else. Long gone are the days of the dog fights. Now, at least if you are talking the US, you engage targets beyond visual range with extremely smart guided missiles.
So if you want to have an airforce that can deal with the US you need four things:
1) Something to counter their AWACS. It might be stealthy jets, it might be good jamming hardware, whatever the case you have to have something to stop that. Otherwise, they'll know ever every single thing in the air is, with pinpoint accuracy. This can be crossdecked directly to new fighters, or simply told to older ones, so their jets can come in without ever turning on a radar. They don't even need them on to fire with AWACS coverage.
2) Something to pick up their planes. The US has a bunch of stealthy craft these days. Even the F/A-18Fs aren't easy to pick up and the F-22As are close to invisible unless the fire, never mind the B2-Bs. You need to have some technology to be able to find those, otherwise they'll pick off your planes, destroy your bases, etc and you won't be able to do anything about it. I don't know if there is such a technology, but you'd need to have some reasonable way to find their craft to kill them
3) Good night fighting ability. The US loves night attacks, because they are really good at it and most people are really bad at it. So you need the equipment and the training to have your jets as effective at night as during the day. Otherwise they'll simply wait until your air cover becomes weak at night and destroy the air bases.
4) Long range, highly effective missiles. Even if you can find their craft and so on you still have to engage them at a long range. The US has long range missiles that are hard to jam, you have to have the same if you are to have a realistic chance in air combat.
Without those four things, the US WILL have air superiority. They'll simply shoot down any fighters, bomb air bases (which can be done with extreme accuracy) and then blast SAM sites.
Re:Also (Score:5, Interesting)
The Taliban et al. have already figured all this out. So they don't play this game.
Instead of trying to defeat us by conventional means, they've chosen to give us an autoimmune disease, something like AIDS: First, they damage us slightly via one or more (usually few) terrorist vectors. The initial damage is not particular great, but it causes the rest of the body (i.e. the government and the public) to overreact.
All of the body's defenses (i.e. treasure) are focused on eliminating the agent, but the agent retreats into a place where the autoimmune system is ineffective (i.e. caves). The continuing effort begins to sap the body of energy necessary for maintenance of the rest of itself (education, infrastructure, etc.). Eventually, the body begins to decay such that the nervous system (government) begins to break down and the logical part of the brain begins to fail. Psychosis takes in as the body begins to give in to strong, vacillating emotions.
Eventually, other vital organs begin to fail, leaving it open to opportunistic diseases (massive debt and possibly graft). The final prognosis is not promising.
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I couldn't agree less! Iran will *never* be able to compete with US in air superiority. The most they can expect is to make things more difficult.
I live in Australia. Our airforce will never be able to compete with U.S. air superiority either but I'm not worried about being bombed by the U.S. That's because as a country we're on good terms with most of the western world and my government doesn't do stupid shit like rattle its saber at the largest military force in the world. If Iran is worried about being threatened by nuclear powers then maybe it should seek out allies and build ties rather than trying to go toe to toe with vastly superior forces.
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Without an outside threat, the Iranian regime doesn't have a lot going for it. It's economic policies are more or less national socialism. It has a number of minorities but no political system to give them a voice and a sense that they aren't mere cogs in a wheel. Then their is the perceived threat that those naughty Sunnis will convert the Shi'ites and the Imams will be out of jobs. Without conjuring an outside threat, the Iranian regime is finished and they know it.
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On the other hand shooting its own citizens is only an issue when the country happens to be at odds with the US. Compared with other countries in the region, Iran is much more open and free. The elections might be bogus but there is ample discussion and participation when compar
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Can you tell me this: did Iran invade USA to 'free' US people after the US police shot students [wikipedia.org]? Should some country have invaded USA to free its people from its brutal government?
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It is insightful because it is an excellent example of US government turning against its people, it was done on command of the President, no less.
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So the National Guard killing students for protesting against Nixon sending troops to Cambodia is propaganda?
Sure, the actual cops were sent by Governor Rhodes, I don't expect presidents to make calls to cops.
However the demonstrations started against Nixon's invasion of Cambodia and later the courts found nobody guilty of the murder, all this while Nixon was giving speeches about 'bums' causing trouble.
So this was done with knowledge and approval from the top level down, US government terrorizing and killi
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It's a stretch to say that Iran is Persia, but it is accurate to say that most Iranians are Persians first. An Arab minority controls the country. But the military is mostly Persian, and does not support the Muslim government. It is a strange place. They are in the middle of a cultural war, as Persian culture (which bears more similarity to European culture than Arab) fights with Arab culture for influence. Considering Persia's cultural survival for thousands of years, it seems unlikely that the mullah
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Remember the movie 300? Xerxes was Persian.
Hollywood movies are not historically accurate, they are entertainment not education.
Besides Persians are Iranians in the same way Romans are Europeans.
You are the worst person in the world. (Score:5, Insightful)
It just goes to show how morally bankrupt the Left has become, when they scoff and sneer at some poor illiterate woman who's facing death by stoning, claiming that her case is over-hyped and overblown. That's not the kind of liberalism I was raised to respect - kids these days (sigh).
How about this for a liberal value: LEAVE SOVEREIGN NATIONS ALONE. If we have to invade Iran for stoning women, we've got about twenty other countries with worse human rights records - including some of our biggest allies like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan - that we'd have to invade. And those other allies I mentioned are far less democratic than Iran.
Hezbollah did not appear out of Iran's magic crystal ball. It appeared directly as a result of Israeli and American forces invading Lebanon in 1982. If you'll remember at the time, Iran was fighting an all out war against the US backed henchman Saddam Hussein, because we didn't like their chosen government back then either. I don't think they had time to form a commando unit and invade Lebanon while they were losing that war. (Gee, and that was around the time that Reagan and some current Fox News personalities were committing treason by selling weapons to sworn enemies, taking the money to Colombia, and playing the other side of the drug war to fund the unconstitutional CIA. Fascinating!)
We like destroying secular Arab nationalism and getting absolutely shocked when it turns into extreme islamic fundamentalism. We destroyed the Iranian government in 1953 and ended up with the Islamic Revolution in 1979. We destroyed the marxist government of Afghanistan and eventually got the Taliban. We destroyed the PLO and got Hamas. We destroyed Lebanese movements and we got Hezbollah. We destroyed Iraq and I'll guaran-fucking-tee you we're going to get some crazy Shia elements there as well. Amazing! It's like if you subject people with war and misery for decades, they come out the other side with some kind of chip on their shoulder.
Can we see a pattern here? Just like if you invaded South Carolina and took out their army, you'd have a bunch of fanatical Christians blowing themselves up trying to take just a piece out of whoever invaded. It's a rational response when you have no options left.
So, seriously, shut the fuck up about Iran. You can get all offended and moral about their religious laws when you stop Catholic priests from using their separate religious rules to rape children and get away with it. Oh, but I guess child-rape is morally sound in your sad, fucked up world, huh? Either that, or you think it's easier to go halfway around the world and start another war in the same spot for the third time this decade to stop some injustice.
If you really think that's the case, I have only one thing to say: go. fuck. yourself.
Sincerely,
A "Liberal" Who Has Values,
Including Calling A Spade A Spade
Re:You are the worst person in the world. (Score:4, Interesting)
The US has the highest percentage of it own population incarcerated of any country in the world (at a bit above 100 per 10000).
So either the US has a much higher percentage of criminals that the rest of the world or the US is blantanly breaking the rights of millions of it's citizens (like by incarcerating people for victimless crimes).
If invasion to defend human rights is justified, the US is one of the better candidates for being invaded.
Re:You are the worst person in the world. (Score:5, Informative)
"Hezbollah did not appear out of Iran's magic crystal ball. It appeared directly as a result of Israeli and American forces invading Lebanon in 1982."
Bullshit. Hezbollah was born from the Shi'ite minority in Lebanon from the civil war they helped start.
Hezbollah first emerged in 1982 as a militia in response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, also known as Operation Peace for Galilee, set on resisting the Israeli occupation of Lebanon during the Lebanese civil war. [wikipedia.org]
The PLO imploded through their own ineptitude and inability to strike a deal with Israel.
The governing PLO was viewed as a terrorist organisation by Israel and the U.S. and was constantly undermined and accused of corruption. The people were subject to sanctions. Israel and the U.S. refused to negotiate with the PLO and said there would be no "additional Palestinian state..." (Jordan already being a Palestinian state), and "no change in the status of Judea, Samaria and Gaza other than in accordance with the basic guidelines of the [Israeli] Government". Maybe it is hard to strike a deal when the other side refuses to negotiate?
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If I had to choose between a Shah run Iran vs that of an Islamic Republic, I would choose the Shah.
1. When the US intervened, it wasn't the choice between Shah and mullas. It was a choice between absolute monarchy and a true democratic republic. The US just didn't like that Iranians voted in a "socialist".
2. Unless you're Iranian, I don't see why your opinion on which choice is preferable should count. It's their nation, for them to run and to live in with consequences for their choices, good and bad.
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2. Unless you're Iranian, I don't see why your opinion on which choice is preferable should count. It's their nation, for them to run and to live in with consequences for their choices, good and bad.
Put it this way - if Iran or whoever had been the size of the U.S. and the U.S. had been the size of Iran, I'm pretty sure they would have intervened when Bush Jr. was elected. Although of course if they had, we wouldn't be having this debate now because they wouldn't just have interfered, they would have wiped the U.S. off the map. This 'lets try not to totally annihilate these other dudes' movement is a nicety that most of the States' opponents don't follow.
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Evil like naming attack helicopters after an indigenous tribe they wiped out and stole their land from. Those wicked bastards.
Wait, there are attack helicopters that wiped out an indigenous tribe, then took their name? Man, I need to start watching the news again, I'm totally out of the loop!
Standing and fighting is for glass makers (Score:5, Interesting)
This thing is a gimmick. It is a small cruise missile with remote capabilities. The bomb on it is a tiny little dumb thing that isn't going to hurt anyone unless it hits them directly, and I am going to go out on a limb and say that the avionics on that drone don't amount to much more than a camera bolted on. In defense against the presumed target, the US, this thing is a novelty. The US gets giddy over electronic warfare and this thing is asking have its connection severed. The fuel and explosives are better spent on a missile that doesn't bother to return home and doesn't need an operator to guide it in. This does nothing to help the defense of Iran against the style of combat the US uses.
If you are going to fight the US, and you are not China or Russia, you need to fight dispersed, hidden, and from cover. The only time it is worthwhile to fully stand and fight is if the victory you achieve is worth the destruction of the force you are having stand and fight. It is worthwhile to launch a massive simultaneous missile on a US carrier battle group with everything you have knowing that force will be destroyed. If you kill a carrier, the fact that you just destroyed your missile force is worth it. Outside of that though, you need to fight with the understanding that the US has the capability to glass the shit out of any arbitrary size of land using just conventional weapons. Your goal as the defender is to make it so that your forces are concealed and doing hit and runs, and so never standing around waiting to be glassed, or to fight from a position the US is unwilling to destroy. Namely, if you fight from a city the US won't level the city World War II style. They might knock down the buildings one by one trying to take out suspected military units, but the won't just level the place in one swipe like they could with a few MOABs. This glorified cruise missile doesn't help this style of fighting. It can't be launched by field units, and even if it could, it is going to lead the US back to your position assuming it even makes it back. You are better off to launch a missile that isn't expected to return or, even better, save the money to arm your city bound army with more and better RPGs.
Personally, if I had to organize the defense of Iran from the US, the only conventional forces I would bother with would be sea mines and easily concealed cruise missiles. The only point of those forces would be to try and sacrifice themselves in doing damage to the ocean going invasion force. The rest of my defense would involve the army stripping down into civilian clothing the second the invasion hits and dispersing into the population with a plan, and giving everyone a (civilians included) gun. Train the army in guerrilla tactics, cache weapons and explosives all over the place, and never even make the pretense of fighting with uniforms on. Encourage the civilians to fight in their own amateurish way not to inflict any real harm, but to blur the line between military and civilian in the eyes of the enemy as much as possible. The only military tech worthwhile would be the kind useful to guerrilla forces. Bike bombs, all manner of concealed explosives, easily concealed weapons, concealed body armor, methods of communicating across cells and receiving orders, methods of smuggling, modified civilian vehicles (that still look civilian) with military applications, and that sort of thing are the techs worth developing in earnest. You still need the capacity to fight a conventional war against your neighbors, but the real threat, the US, is a fight you don't want to do standing up. The US loves nothing more than to see massive troop formations all lined up nice and orderly in a big open desert. See Iraq War part 1 for what happens to armies that stand.
Re:Standing and fighting is for glass makers (Score:5, Insightful)
The rest of my defense would involve the army stripping down into civilian clothing the second the invasion hits and dispersing into the population with a plan, and giving everyone a (civilians included) gun.
Iran would never want their people to have weapons. The Iranian people would only use them to revolt against their own government.
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It's all good and great, but it's not going to do much damage to the US forces. The REAL way to fight the US is from inside the US.
What you do is you buy a few nukes and disperse them in the most important cities and then blow half of them and promise to blow the other half if the US doesn't stop with its invasion.
That's the only true way to actually STOP an attack by US, nothing else will stop them, they can only be stopped from inside US itself.
The problem with US is that it is too far from the Middle Eas
Re:Standing and fighting is for glass makers (Score:5, Insightful)
Yep, it's a cruise missle from the 60's with RTB functionality.
But lets look at who it will be used against.
1. United States and coalition forces in Afghanistan. No, They are theocratic, not stupid. Their war against the US is propaganda only. Even weakened, NATO could crush them like a paper cup if given any motivation.
2. Israel. No, aside from having the most advanced air defence network in the middle east, attacking Israel is stupid for political reasons. The Persians and the Israeli's get along like a house on fire, giving Israeli Persians a reason to liberate their former homeland is suicide for the Islamic Republic. So again their war is purely propaganda.
3. Remnants of Iraq. Quite possible if things get even more out of hand there, which is likely. If more extremist pro-Arab groups take root Iran becomes threatened (as does Saudi Arabia).
4. Syria, also possible. Despite getting along in the past, relations between Damascus and Tehran have become strained in recent years.
5. Pakistan, maybe. Pakistan is having it's own problems with extremist Muslim groups. Pakistan the state is no threat to Iran but if that state falls who is to say.
6. The other Stans (Tajikistan, Uzbekistan), not likely, they dont have the money or organisation to strike Iran but still possible.
So this weapon was not designed to deliver righteous death to the western capitalist pig-dogs but rather to defend against Iran's real threats, Syria, Former Iraq and possibly the Stans. It is Iran's neighbours who have the capacity, motivation and gumption to draw Iran into a lengthy and costly conflict where such weapons will be needed.
Re:Standing and fighting is for glass makers (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the way to go, and beats suicidal gestures by conventional forces.
The US is sufficiently beholden to modern laws of war (whose goal is to outlaw effective war and whose outcome is frequently PROTRACTED war) that it can't fight unconventional wars without spending too much money. The US can reduce own-side casualties to historically trivial levels, and can stay as long as it will spend money, but it can't fight economically.
This wouldn't work against a genuinely unconstrained opponent (who could cheerfully destroy the whole country) but genuinely unconstrained nation-state forces haven't existed since WWII.
There IS a conventional bomb suitable for fighting urban warfare. The FOAB ensures Russia has a much nicer option than fighting in cities, which didn't work out so well. The best way to fight in urban areas is to destroy them and kill everyone in them, which until recently required inconvenient and embarrassing nukes. The US can't ever use such a thing, but it is impressive:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3Cpnq4wFx0&feature=related [youtube.com]
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The rest of my defense would involve the army stripping down into civilian clothing the second the invasion hits and dispersing into the population with a plan, and giving everyone a (civilians included) gun.
Yeah, in general, your post makes a lot of sense. But if you were in charge of Iran's defenses, and I were in charge of the US invasion, I would press full-speed ahead until the moment where you gave every civilian a gun, then turn around and leave ;-)
Re:Standing and fighting is for glass makers (Score:4, Insightful)
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Farsi?? (Score:2, Insightful)
It's called Persian. You don't go around saying "in espanol it's called..." do you?
Re:Farsi?? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's called Persian. You don't go around saying "in espanol it's called..." do you?
THANK YOU! Here's a PDF [iran-heritage.org] that lays out some of the arguments against calling the language Farsi. We don't go around calling the English that people from Boston speak as "Bostonese", do we?
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Nah, I just call Bostonese, Bostonese. I wouldn't call it English.
Karrar is not Farsi OR Persian (Score:5, Informative)
Typical (Score:2, Insightful)
Just what I'd expect from Iran, the use of UnAmerican Vile Bombers. So unlike the Righteous Holy American Bombers used by our own beloved military. It's like how Iraq stooped to deploying weapons of mass destruction; something we'd never dream of doing. At this rate we're going to have to liberate the entire world.
Ok really... (Score:3, Insightful)
V-1 with turbojet (Score:5, Informative)
Video of a test launch and production.
http://vodpod.com/watch/4282312-iranian-karrar-drone [vodpod.com]
Looks alot like a V-1 or Loon but with hard points on the wings and turbojet instead of pulse jet. So late 50s technology designed with CAD. Probably a 30-40% failure rate on them too, that's standard for first or second generation cruise missiles/drones.
Re:V-1 with turbojet (Score:4, Funny)
I guess that the Germans in 1940 made a whole lot of comments of that sort when they started to see Russia's T-34s entering action. How did that went out?
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The Germans were impressed with the T-34, especially the gun and suspension. They were not impressed with the build quality and never did wrap their heads around volume over quality.
The Americans too built inferior tanks in greater numbers which overwhelmed them in Africa and the Western Front.
American tanks had better radios, higher speed and better engines. Germans had good guns, good optics and really good armor.
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American tanks had better radios, higher speed and better engines.
Better engines... You must be kidding. Sherman tank was gasoline powered and was nicknamed "torch on wheels" for bursting in flames much more easily compared to its diesel counterparts.
Re:V-1 with turbojet (Score:5, Informative)
Shermans were much more commonly nicknamed "Ronsons" for their likelyhood to brew up when hit yet Shermans won the great majority of their fights against the "better designed" Panzers. As a captured german tank commander one said: Each of our Panzers is better than 10 of yours. Unfortunately for us, you always seem to have a dozen to every one of ours.
The reason that the US had so many Shermans is that they froze the design early and ramped up production. The Germans were continually tweaking their designs, making them "better" and more complicated thereby slowing production to a relative crawl.
The one thing most returning tank commanders regretted about the shermans after the war was not the motor & it's gasoline engine but that it was undergunned. Had they produced more Fireflys with the british 17 pounder many fewer US tanks would have been lost as they would not have had to close to short range (& take the neccesary casualties) to finish off the panzers.
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Oh goody, so 60-70% of them will hit their target?
As for late 50s technology designed with CAD, doesn't that describe NATO planes these days? Has there been a major breakthrough since the jet engine? Apart from fly by wire guidance systems which they wi
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There have been alot of break throughs.
Engine technology has really taken off since the late 1950s.
F-4E, so a late 1960s aircraft powered by J79-GE-17A - 11,905 lbf (52.9 kN) dry; 17,835 lbf (79.3 kN) with afterburner and weighs 3,850 lbs.
Now F-22 has a F119-PW-100 - 23,500 pound feet of thrust 35,000+ lb with afterburner (156+ kn) weighs 3,900 lbs.
So more then double the thrust at the same weight.
F119 allows for supersonic flight up to Mach 1.35 without afterburner, the J79 required afterburner for super
Re:V-1 with turbojet (Score:5, Informative)
No.
Turbofan engines, composite construction, FBW, advanced avionics. And F-22 or even F-15 really is in a totaly different class then an Mig-19, F-8, of F-105.
UAV heaven (Score:5, Funny)
The AI has been promised 72 virgin iPads after it completes it's mission.
Direct result of the Pentagon's smaller budget. (Score:4, Funny)
Can we just... (Score:3, Insightful)
Has anyone ever studdied the Iran-Iraq War?! (Score:4, Interesting)
Iran's core military strategy is to send one guy with a rifle and ten unarmed guys behind him. The Iranians' grand military plan is to refight the Battle of Stalingrad. Even deploying this strategy, they basically fought Iraq to the ugliest stalemate since the trenches in France in 1915. A full-on war between the US and Iran would result in the equivalent of a one-sided Verdun every single week.
A couple missiles aren't going to mitigate the fact that Iran has no strategic petroleum reserve and zero refining capacity. Its transport would fail in the first week of any war and agriculture couldn't last a year. Probably less if the attacker(s) launched a prolonged ground war in late winter (as is US tradition in the region) before crops go in the ground.
A couple missiles are also not going to mitigate the fact that Iran would mostly depend on imported Hezbollah fighters to train its army how to fight a ground war the right way. And, frankly, you can't take a military modeled on the Red Army and convert it into a competent guerilla force like Hezbollah without years of advance planning. That planning hasn't happened. Iran doesn't have any commando force of any international reputation.
In short, Iran is not prepared to fight the war it would need to fight to take advantage of its rough terrain.
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Great. So now we'll get a story about Turkey or Romania fielding its first UAV?
I can't wait.
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#1) Iran has demonstrated (via press release) the equivalent of a model airplane with a camera. They don't have the military data network capability to reliably deliver these anywhere outside their borders. Furthermore, Turkey has one of the largest and most powerful air forces outside of the major superpowers with approximately a thousand aircraft, and over 200 F-16's (mostly modern CCIP variety, and the ability to produce them locally). I wouldn't take Iranian air a
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I think this falls under "Stuff that Matters".
You know, since this is yet another "antagonize the West" type of action by Iran.
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So, when Iran defends itself from what they see as an imperialist nation, they're antagonizing the West?
OK.
But it's still not newsworthy.
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Iran can and has struck first. Iran can and has recently used chemical weapons.
Fully expect Iran to move into Iraq once US troops leave. they will do so under the same supposed reason the USA did, to stablize the region, and defend the shites from the kurds and sunni's.
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So, when Iran defends itself from what they see as an imperialist nation, they're antagonizing the West?
OK.
But it's still not newsworthy.
Oh my, yes it is. This particular UAV doesn't have the range to threaten Israel (that would require another 500km at least), but you can bet that Iran wants the world to think that the next one will. Militarily, a UAV would be an less-than-ideal delivery mechanism for a nuclear weapon, but it might prove viable if it were able to fly low-and-slow with a negligible radar profile.
Iran's closer neighbours, meanwhile, have all been served notice, too. This is Iran's way of saying, 'Don't fuck with us.' Remember
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Or at the very least an attempt to keep up with western technology, a month ago the UK unveiled the Corax for example (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAE_Corax), the french have the Dassault nEuron (Dassault nEUROn) or any of the many other armed UAV's.
What a country like iran doing this is show us how easy it is to do half decent version of this technology, and if it comes to a shooting war, how easy they are to hack.
Re:wtf (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, just to clear this up: the fact they've developed their own UAV bomber is purely to spite the 'West' whereas any similar defense technology development by a western nation should never be construed as antagonising the Middle East, let alone Iran. Furthermore, Iran should not by any means be allowed the same fear sodden defense industry that the West so covets and they should simply accept that.
OK, thanks, I think I've got it now - you're schlepping the same drag-and-drop late-night-international-espionage-TV-drama idiocy that practically defines the geo-political arrogance of our precious West in the eyes of others.
You ought to remember that many countries see the supposed leader of the West, The U.S, as a terrible and amoral aggressor, having willfully used WMDs against civilians (carpet bombing, nuclear weapons), continues to stockpile nuclear weapons munitions while chastising the rest of the world for doing so using trade and political embargoes, trades big-brother-style protection rackets to arm-bend smaller countries into accepting U.S military bases, has camps in which they not only 'disappear' but spiritually and psychologically humiliate the prisoners using methods not seen since Vietnam (the list goes on). This is the stuff they see in talk shows on their TVs, read in their opinion columns in their newspapers, talk about in political science classes at high-school, etc...
Just to point you to the other side of the coin where the opinions of 6 or so billion other people may differ from your picture of it all.
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Right, just to clear this up: the fact they've developed their own UAV bomber is purely to spite the 'West' whereas any similar defense technology development by a western nation should never be construed as antagonising the Middle East, let alone Iran. Furthermore, Iran should not by any means be allowed the same fear sodden defense industry that the West so covets and they should simply accept that.
No, it's because we didn't announce that we had the things until a decade after we started using them to maintain their legitimate strategic advantage in battle (just like nearly every other military tech in the last 30 years). They're using this as saber rattling, not as a genuine strategic advantage.
You ought to remember that many countries see the supposed leader of the West, The U.S, as a terrible and amoral aggressor, having willfully used WMDs against civilians (carpet bombing, nuclear weapons), continues to stockpile nuclear weapons munitions while chastising the rest of the world for doing so using trade and political embargoes
As if the number isn't being gradually decreased, used as a bargaining chip to get other nations, one of which has many more nukes than we do, to do the same.
trades big-brother-style protection rackets to arm-bend smaller countries into accepting U.S military bases
Citation please?
has camps in which they not only 'disappear' but spiritually and psychologically humiliate the prisoners using methods not seen since Vietnam (the list goes on)
I don't agree with Guantanamo, but
Re:wtf (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, to be honest, it does seem like more of a "we can do that too!" type of gesture. The US employs UAVs because, right or wrong, our military presence is effectively everywhere.
The UAV does seem to be the poster-child of US military power in the region. Whether or not the Iranian weapon system is effective on the battlefield probably isn't as important as the propaganda it will generate.
Translation (Score:2)
Re:Limited Value (Score:4, Informative)
I don't know about this particular area, but Iran's industrial sector is more advanced than you might think. There is an extensive auto industry. Though it manufactures under licenses from foreign companies (the most common vehicle is a variant of the Peugeot 206), modifications have been designed and implemented in Iran. Iran is no banana republic.
Not really, I've driven those cars (Score:3, Informative)
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Seriously?! (Score:3, Informative)
"Iran's industrial sector is more advanced than you might think"
To be clear, you're talking about a country that sits on a giant reserve of oil, but has to import gasoline because they have no refining capacity. Iran's industrial sector is a fucking embarrassment.
You're talking about Tehran, a city whose building codes will be cited as the cause of the worst single humanitarian disaster in history when the big one finally hits NW Iran. 10 million dead is going to be an interesting psychic moment for the I
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They've succeeded in getting a nuclear reactor opened and unveiled a UAV bomber without making any explicit threats at all.
You mean other than promising to wipe Israel off the map as soon as they are able?
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They have been doing most of their moves quietly. There is a 'public' flight from Venezuela airline that move between Venezuela, Syria, and Iran. The only problem is that when the publica tries to book a flight, you can not get on it.
Yeah, this hit the 'news' recently, and its a load of twaddle. The actual route is a circular route between Tehran-Beirut-Damascus-Caracus (Iran Air flight 744) and the 'issue' of not being able to book a seat on it was raised by an Israeli intelligence operative.
The problem is, you can certainly book a flight on it, there are even aviation enthusiasts that have published trip reports (http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/trip_reports/read.main/107603).
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Re:Irrelevant (Score:4, Informative)
What are you talking about? You do understand that there are many other countries with nuclear weapons, right? First, there's that funny litte country out east
War breeds more war, diplomacy can keep peace. Look at WWI which bred WWII
What are you talking about? It was diplomacy that bought Germany enough time to gear up for WWII. Google for "peace in our time" just for a refresher.
WWII which bred the Cold War
Have you actually ever studied any of this? The Cold War was between, essentially, the Soviet Block and everyone else (primarily the US and NATO allies). This wasn't about anything that happened in WWII, it was about the communist totalitarians running the USSR looking to forcibly model the rest of the world in the same fashion. It was the deterrent threat of an unwinnable nuclear war that ended that horrible regime.
And I'm sure if you looked further you could see that there were conflicts which caused WWI
You're completely missing the point. It wasn't previous conflicts (as is, past battles/wars) that "caused" WWI. It was fundamental differences between regional cultures, economies, resources, etc. Physical conflict errupted as a means by which to resolve those differences - because talking about them did not, of course, actually change anything. The entire history of Europe involves thousands of years of territorial, religious, and familial squabbling over turf, power, and resources. War (against the Germans, twice) was what ended that. War with the Soviets never happened, and their system collapsed under its own ponderous, confiscatory, non-productive, Nanny State weight.
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Look at the Treaty of Versailles
The Rhineland will become a demilitarized zone administered by Great Britain and France jointly. German armed forces will number no more than 100,000 troops, and conscription will be abolished. Enlisted men will be retained for at least 12 years; officers to be retained for at least 25 years. German naval forces will be limited to 15,000 men, 6 battleships (no more than 10,000 tons displacement each), 6 cruisers (no more than 6,000 tons displacement each), 6 destroyers (no more than 800 tons displacement each) and 12 torpedo boats (no more than 200 tons displacement each). No submarines are to be included. The manufacture, import, and export of weapons and poison gas is prohibited. Armed aircraft, tanks and armoured cars are prohibited. Blockades on ships are prohibited. Restrictions on the manufacture of machine guns (e.g. the Maxim machine gun) and rifles (e.g. Gewehr 98 rifles).
Because of these restrictions, the Germans were pissed because they could not defend their country which was surrounded by hostile powers. Because of this, they turned to extreme nationalism and the Nazi party which lead to WWII.
Have you actually ever studied any of this? The Cold War was between, essentially, the Soviet Block and everyone else (primarily the US and NATO allies). This wasn't about anything that happened in WWII, it was about the communist totalitarians running the USSR looking to forcibly model the rest of the world in the same fashion. It was the deterrent threat of an unwinnable nuclear war that ended that horrible regime.
The Cold War was basically caused
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Appeasement didn't work because Germany was trying to expand its borders, not simply maintain a military. Iran is not trying to expand its rule, Iran just wants to have a larger military force. In fact, treaties from WWI that prevented Germany from having a strong military force was the very reason Hitler could ris
Re:Irrelevant (Score:5, Insightful)
And yet, in the fifty-five years since the two times they were used, we've managed to avoid sliding down that slope. So far, we've done something right; I just hope we can keep it up.
Re:Oh, the timing of this (Score:5, Interesting)
His behavior only appears to be irrational if you believe that either Israel would win a quick victory in a war with Iran by itself or that the US would quickly enter the fight to defend Israel in a war that it started against the express advice of the US. I don't think either is very likely to be the case. Iran clearly has a much higher tolerance for civilian casualties. They can accept casualties in the hundreds of thousands while the Israeli government could hardly survive if Israeli casualties reached the low thousands in an unprovoked war that it began without any immediate threat.
China is heavily dependent on Iranian oil. Both China and Russia would come out with uncompromising condemnations of Israeli aggression. The choice facing Obama would be to force an Israeli ceasefire or start World War 3.
it is a fairly obvious trap and it is highly unlikely that Israel is going to fall for it. The consequences would be catastrophic if it did.
Instead, Israel appears to be trying to invite a preemptive strike by Iran on Israel which would be disastrous for Iran for much the same reasons.
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An Israeli attack isn't going to be a "war". It's going to be a hit and run attack like the attack on Saddam's Nuclear reactor. They will probably fly a few dozen planes into Iran and bomb the snot out of every facility they have intelligence on. Given Iran's preparations it will probably only destroy about 50% of the institutions in a best case scenario and likely have little to no effect other than a slight delay in production.
The solution to the Iranian problem is to bring their people to power and an at
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We shouldn't underestimate Iran, nor should we compare ourselves to the wonderfully brave but horribly under-equipped British.
In actual war with Iran, for example, those pre-positioned bases we built to defend the region against it might be used for their intended purpose.
They were built years before they were used in the Gulf War, with prepositioned equipment enough for a serious effort. They still exist, they are unsinkable, and (literally) generations of airmen and sailors have deployed to and fought fro