Tehran prods and pokes CIA drones
By Heather Maher
Iranian television has broadcast a video of a United States drone that Tehran
claims to have brought down on its territory, and it's probably safe to say
that the images are the stuff of US intelligence officials' nightmares.
In the video, two men dressed in Iranian military uniforms poke and prod at the
small, bat-winged aircraft. One gestures to a wing and appears to be explaining
something to a decorated superior.
But what? Possibly what until now were highly guarded US advances in covert
intelligence gathering.
A banner at the foot of the aircraft in the video reads, "The US cannot do a
damn thing," which is a direct quotation from Iran's
late supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Iran's alleged capture of the drone represents more than just a huge propaganda
prize for the regime, which has long been hostile to the United States. It also
could be a bonanza of secret US military technology so sensitive that US
officials briefly considered going into Iran to try and retrieve the downed
aircraft, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal. The operation was
rejected as too risky.
US officials have acknowledged the loss of the plane, but a Pentagon spokesman
told reporters on December 8 that officials were "not going to talk about these
kinds of missions and these kinds of capabilities."
But US and foreign officials briefed on the matter told the The New York Times
that the RQ-170 Sentinel drone was at the center of a secret program to gather
information on possible Iranian nuclear sites.
Top-secret treasure trove
The United States has used satellites for years to gather intelligence on Iran,
which it believes is hiding a nuclear weapons program. But Jason Campbell, a
military analyst with the RAND Corporation, says the RQ-170 possesses new and
unique capabilities that take covert intelligence gathering to a new level.
"What makes this particular drone quite useful, from an intelligence
perspective, is that it can fly at extremely high altitudes - reportedly up to
50,000 feet. It is capable of staying in the air for hours at a time, which is
a luxury you don't have with satellite imagery. [It has] multiple sensors on
it; it can intercept electronic communications, it can take air samples to
detect whether or not there is any chemicals or other unusual things in the air
that might lead one to believe that there is, in the case of Iran, a nuclear
program that is active in the area," Campbell says.
"And it also takes what's called 'full-motion video' on the ground, where
you're not just taking pictures of hardened targets, you're able to see the
comings and goings of individuals and other movement on the ground, which is,
again a capability that isn't offered by satellite."
The fear is that Iran, and its close allies China and Russia, will be able to
learn and copy those capabilities.
Analysts say the most valuable technology on the drone is probably its ability
to detect and gather a vast array of information as it hovers or flies
undetected over targets. Its radar capability may also be much more advanced
than either Beijing or Moscow has developed, they say.
Not everything about the RQ-170 Sentinel UAV, which stands for unmanned aerial
vehicle, is secret. The first photos of it became public two years ago, and
showed it sitting on a US air base in Afghanistan. Its shape is based on the
B-2 stealth bomber, which has been in use by the US military since 1997,
including during the war between Kosovo and Serbia in 1999 and in US military
operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Did Iran shoot it down?
Unsurprisingly, there are competing versions of how the drone ended up on the
ground. The chief of the air force of Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards,
General Ami Ali Hajizadeh, said on December 8 that his forces had brought the
aircraft down with an electronic ambush. US officials dismiss that scenario and
blame an aircraft malfunction.
When something goes wrong during a drone flight, RAND's Campbell says it is
programmed to automatically return to base. But in this instance, he says,
something didn't go according to plan.
"We don't know at this point if there has been some sort of a self-destruct
mechanism that kicked in, as it should have, but given that many of these
drones, particularly this one, is programmed to automatically return to base
should there be a satellite disruption - which is usually the cause of some of
these missteps - the fact that that wasn't engaged, it may suggest that the
self-destruct mechanism wasn't activated," Campbell says.
At least one military expert thinks the Iranians may be bluffing. John Pike, an
analyst for the website GlobalSecurity.org, says the drone that was shown on
Iranian TV looked like "a parade-float model" rather than the high-tech robotic
surveillance aircraft itself, and speculated that it was "a mock-up."
Since the plane's downing this weekend, analysts and some US officials have
said that they don't think it's possible to reverse-engineer the plane's
systems and learn how to replicate it. They have also said that the data the
drone collected before it crashed is probably irretrievable.
That's no doubt what US officials hope.
"Unfortunately," the RAND Corporation's Campbell says, "We'll probably never
know the full story."
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