Obama appeals to Iran to return downed US spy drone
75 replies, posted
[QUOTE]The US has asked Iran to return a surveillance drone downed earlier this month, Barack Obama disclosed on Monday.Obama was asked about the missing drone during a joint press conference with the Iraqi president Nouri al-Maliki to mark the withdrawal of troops from Iraq by the end of the month.
"We have asked for it back. We'll see how the Iranians respond," Obama said but ended with a smirk, an acknowledgement that Iranian co-operation was highly unlikely.
It is the first time that the US has formally acknowledged that Iran has the drone.
Obama declined to answer a question about whether US national security had been undermined by the loss of the drone to Iran. "With respect to the drone inside of Iran, I'm not going to comment on intelligence matters that are classified," he said.
Tehran said on Sunday it had reverse engineered the drone in order to extract important technical information about how it is put together.
The US insists the drone malfunctioned and was not shot down.
General Hossein Salami, deputy head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, said on Sunday that Iran would not be handing it back because it amounted to a violation of its air space and was a hostile act.
Although Obama asked for its return, this appeared to be a formality and there is little sign that it is going to develop into a major international crisis comparable to the 1960 stand-off when Russia downed the U2 spyplane.
But tensions have been growing between Iran and the US. Israel has threatened to attack Iranian nuclear installations to prevent it achieving a nuclear weapon capability. The Obama administration has said it is reluctant to be dragged into another war.
The visit by Maliki to the White House is intended to highlight again the exit of US troops. The president announced, amid great fanfare, the withdrawal of all combat troops from Iraq last year, then again in October and again yesterday. There will be another burst of publicity when the last trooper crosses the border from Iraq into Kuwait.
One of Obama's big campaign promises was to end the war in Iraq, even though the timetable for withdrawal had already been put into place in 2008 by George W Bush. But Obama can claim in the 2012 re-election campaign that he fulfilled his pledge.
White House press spokesman Jay Carney offered a taste of this when he said: "This is a momentous visit because, as you know, the Iraq war – a war that we've been engaged in for eight and a half years – is over. And after eight and a half years of sacrifice, America's war in Iraq is coming to an end. Since President Obama took office, nearly 150,000 US troops have been removed from Iraq and hundreds of bases have been shut down. In the next two weeks the final US forces will cross the border. For the first time in over eight years no US troops will be preparing to deploy to Iraq. We will have no bases in Iraq. The war is over and the troops are coming home."
Obama was asked if he still thought, as he had said on the campaign trail, that it was a "dumb" war. Given the American war dead, he diplomatically shuffled by this, saying: "I think history will judge the original decision to go into Iraq."
On Syria, Maliki, who is politically closer to the Iranian government than to Washingotn, refused to back US calls for the removal of Syrian president Bashir al-Assad, who has signed a defence pact with Tehran. Obama agreed that there were what he called "tactical differences" between the US and Iraq in their approaches to Syria.
Maliki insisted it was not the role of the Iraqi government to call on another leader to stand down and he hoped there would be a peaceful resolution in Syria.[/QUOTE]
Even though it's low tech and apparently worthless.
Source: [URL]http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/dec/12/obama-iran-downed-us-spy-drone[/URL]
it would be nice if they could open communication with each other. Better than more saber rattling
"We spy on you, we let our shit fly over you country. But pleeeaaaase could we have it back?"
I doubt they will give it back. They will make too much money showing it to other countries, even though it is a glorified rc plane with just a basic stealth body.
I really really doubt they shot it down, I'm willing to bet that it malfunctioned. If they detected this one, they would have detected others, and complained then.
Iran has no reason to give it back and shouldn't. Regardless of whether it's really just a worthless drone or not.
I personally think it's hilarious that Iran is totting it around while everyone in America yells on repeat "Yeah well it's just a piece of junk anyways!"
i wonder if this is part of the ruse
He's asking for them to return it so they'll prove they actually HAVE it. The one in the video still looked like nothing more than a cheap fake to me and I'm betting Obama thinks the same.
[QUOTE=Rofl my Waff;33690227]Iran has no reason to give it back and shouldn't. Regardless of whether it's really just a worthless drone or not.
I personally think it's hilarious that Iran is totting it around while everyone in America yells on repeat "Yeah well it's just a piece of junk anyways!"[/QUOTE]
I don't think anyone seriously believes it is a 'piece of junk', more like, beyond the designed hull and control systems, it isn't very advanced compared to something like a predator. This craft is most likely meant to be expendable. It could be useful to Iran.
[QUOTE=SilentOpp;33690292]I don't think anyone seriously believes it is a 'piece of junk', more like, beyond the designed hull and control systems, it isn't very advanced compared to something like a predator. This craft is most likely meant to be expendable. It could be useful to Iran.[/QUOTE]
if you check any other threads regarding this topic, you'll see about half the posters going "i refuse to believe they could have shot it down/hacked it so they only reason have it because we let them take it because it's the worst technology we have and it was on a mission to throw the iranians off the trail of the ACTUAL technology they want by using this FAKE AND BAD technology in this drone"
Aliens.
Seems to me like Obama is trying to make the Iranians the bad guys in this situation if they don't give it back
[QUOTE=Uber|nooB;33690350]if you check any other threads regarding this topic, you'll see about half the posters going "i refuse to believe they could have shot it down/hacked it so they only reason have it because we let them take it because it's the worst technology we have and it was on a mission to throw the iranians off the trail of the ACTUAL technology they want by using this FAKE AND BAD technology in this drone"[/QUOTE]
If it was so advanced, we would have destroyed it.
[QUOTE=Uber|nooB;33690350]if you check any other threads regarding this topic, you'll see about half the posters going "i refuse to believe they could have shot it down/hacked it so they only reason have it because we let them take it because it's the worst technology we have and it was on a mission to throw the iranians off the trail of the ACTUAL technology they want by using this FAKE AND BAD technology in this drone"[/QUOTE]
The confidence in America's technological advances in warfare people have is astonishing sometimes. You pretty much grow up learning that in most major conflicts it's not the guys with the advanced technology that win the war. The revolutionary war, WW2, The Vietnam war, pretty much most conflicts we've had since the founding of this country.
Donald Rumsfeld and friends held a 250 million dollar virtual war game to see how an invasion of Iraq would go, the general playing the enemy was a general Van Riper. You can read about it [url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/aug/21/usa.julianborger]here[/url] but the long and short of it is through very basic tactics and very limited resources Van Riper completely destroyed the entire US invasion. Did they use this as a learning experience? No they reprogrammed the test so that Rumsfeld couldn't lose.
All the advancements in your armament are going to mean jack shit if you don't have a cohesive battle plan and completely underestimate your enemy.
[QUOTE=SwissArmyKnife;33690546]The confidence in America's technological advances in warfare people have is astonishing sometimes. You pretty much grow up learning that in most major conflicts it's not the guys with the advanced technology that win the war. The revolutionary war, WW2, The Vietnam war, pretty much most conflicts we've had since the founding of this country.
Donald Rumsfeld and friends held a 250 million dollar virtual war game to see how an invasion of Iraq would go, the general playing the enemy was a general Van Riper. You can read about it [url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/aug/21/usa.julianborger]here[/url] but the long and short of it is through very basic tactics and very limited resources Van Riper completely destroyed the entire US invasion. Did they use this as a learning experience? No they reprogrammed the test so that Rumsfeld couldn't lose.
All the advancements in your armament are going to mean jack shit if you don't have a cohesive battle plan and completely underestimate your enemy.[/QUOTE]
That was the major thing weighing down Iraq in that conflict, they had shitty generals/tacticians.
"Hey Iran that thing we gave you was just a decoy, to distract your men and make you waste time. It's worthless. But we realize our mistakes now, and we're sorry. We won't decoy you again. Can we have it back please? It's not like it's worth anything."
It's like planting a camera in someones room and then expecting them to give you it back when they find out about it.
Obama did a bad move there. It's just inevitably raising heat for no reason.
It's their drone now, finders keepers.
That's hilarious they claimed their cyber attack team got it, really it was just glitched
[QUOTE=SwissArmyKnife;33690546]The confidence in America's technological advances in warfare people have is astonishing sometimes. You pretty much grow up learning that in most major conflicts it's not the guys with the advanced technology that win the war. The revolutionary war, WW2, The Vietnam war, pretty much most conflicts we've had since the founding of this country.
Donald Rumsfeld and friends held a 250 million dollar virtual war game to see how an invasion of Iraq would go, the general playing the enemy was a general Van Riper. You can read about it [url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/aug/21/usa.julianborger]here[/url] but the long and short of it is through very basic tactics and very limited resources Van Riper completely destroyed the entire US invasion. Did they use this as a learning experience? No they reprogrammed the test so that Rumsfeld couldn't lose.
All the advancements in your armament are going to mean jack shit if you don't have a cohesive battle plan and completely underestimate your enemy.[/QUOTE]
What you are saying applies to limited conflicts.
When civilians cease to be a limitation and instead become the target, as is the case with an actual war, the game changes significantly. The United States brings a tiny fraction of its military might down on any single opponent, but if the flood gates were to ever open, bad BAD things would happen very quickly.
The damage a single B-52 can deal, even without a nuclear payload, is mind boggling. Strategic bombers exist to destroy population centers, a task at which they excel above all others.
Technology aside, the US dominates simply because it fields classes of equipment that other nations simply can't afford. The US is also virtually alone in possessing a navy that can cross an ocean and wage war.
Do not mistake me for saying that we should take off the gloves, as that would obviously be gruesome beyond description, but don't forget that we fight with a set of very padded gloves either, as that houses its own dangers.
[QUOTE=BloodYScar;33690139]"We spy on you, we let our shit fly over you country. But pleeeaaaase could we have it back?"[/QUOTE]
It can barely even spy on anything, seriously. It's an overpriced R.C plane.
Where is the information and source of this drone just being cheap junk no better then a R.C plane with a camera?
[QUOTE=GunFox;33691500]
Technology aside, the US dominates simply because it fields classes of equipment that other nations simply can't afford. The US is also virtually alone in possessing a navy that can cross an ocean and wage war.
[/QUOTE]
That's what happens when you spend 59% of your Federal budget on Defense.
Doesn't Obama know a thing about spying? You're supposed to pretend that it never happened, and say nothing about it.
[QUOTE=Flicker;33691979]That's what happens when you spend 59% of your Federal budget on Defense.[/QUOTE]
Uh, that's 3 times what we spend:
[thumb]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7a/U.S._Federal_Spending_-_FY_2007.png/800px-U.S._Federal_Spending_-_FY_2007.png[/thumb]
The U.S still spends so much money on war and weapons it's sick.
yeah, but why should we care? quality of life in USA is rather poor compared to other developed nations.
And so many of you said it was fabricated by Iran..
[QUOTE=jorminger;33692307]yeah, but why should we care? quality of life in USA is rather poor compared to other developed nations.[/QUOTE]
You mean comapred to Australia, Norway, and the Netherlands?
[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Development_Index[/url]
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