One of America's most advanced spy drones is now in the possession of Iran after the aircraft crashed on its territory, 225 kilometres from the Afghanistan border. Iran has been quick to make propaganda capital out of the incident, displaying the aircraft on state television under the Iranian flag and claiming that an attack by its "electronic warfare unit" had forced the unmanned drone down by overriding flight systems.
Nato officials, by contrast, have acknowledged the loss of the unarmed aircraft, but stated that it had been flying a mission over western Afghanistan when its operators lost control of it. Whatever the true course of events, the RQ-170 Sentinel drone appeared to be undamaged in the video footage shown on Iranian television Thursday, although the underside of the aircraft was not in view.
"We don't know for sure when the drone took off and for how long it can fly out of control. It's improbable that it was shot down, however, as it wouldn't look in such good condition," said a foreign military attache in Tehran. Iran initially claimed to have shot down the Sentinel drone but later changed its story.
"Once the drone entered Iranian airspace, it fell into the trap laid by our electronic warfare unit, who then managed to land it with minimum damage," Brigadier General Amir-Ali Hajizadeh, commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards' aerospace division, told Iranian media.
If the American account is to believed, the drone crashed close to the Afghan border. But Iranian authorities claim that its forces steered the aircraft to the ground near the eastern Iranian city of Kashmar, situated more than 200 kilometres from the border. If the Iranian story is of any substance, it could mean that the Revolutionary Guards are in possession of technology capable of neutralising enemy drones - which could have consequences for any future US spying missions.
The Sentinel could theoretically have been deployed in Iran to spy on the country's nuclear installations, but these facilities are situated in central rather than eastern Iran, meaning the drone would have had to fly more than 1,000 kilometres to reach its target.
Plus, the US already has "ample documents and satellite photographs" to convince the International Atomic Energy Agency and global community that Iran is looking to construct a nuclear bomb. The whole incident is obviously a huge propaganda coup for Iran, as state television proudly claimed that the country had defeated the US in a technological battle and was now in possession of valuable top secret information.
"Our experts are very well aware of what precious technological information is contained in this drone," said Brigadier General Hajizadeh. It remains unclear whether the Iranians can gain access to any valuable information, but the whole event has already caused acute embarrassment to the US.
It is unlikely that any intelligence collected by the drone would be of use to the government in Tehran, as the Iranians are not overly interested in the location of possible Taliban bases in Afghanistan. The question remains, however, of what will become of the drone? "As they probably can't do much with it, the cleverest idea would be to strike a deal and return the aircraft to the Afghanistan government as a gesture of goodwill," said a political scientist from Tehran, who preferred not to be named.
The drone could also be used as a great bargaining chip in any future negotiations over Iran's nuclear facilities. "A concession by the US in the nuclear negotiations would be, in the long term, much more useful to Iran than the drone and its data," the political scientist concluded.
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