
Iran showing off new video to say it flew a drone over a U.S. aircraft carrier - salmonet
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2016/01/29/iran-is-showing-off-this-new-video-to-say-it-flew-a-drone-over-a-u-s-aircraft-carrier/?tid=sm_tw
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discardorama
Just like any other country, there are factions in the Iranian government that
are unhappy about the rapprochement between US and Iran. They probably
profited handsomely from the sanctions (just like Saddam and his sons did in
Iraq, years ago). They're unhappy. And they're making these ridiculous
provocative gestures to provoke the US.

The last thing that US needs to do is get provoked. Ignoring the idiots is the
right course of action. But will the US do that? I doubt it. Because we have
our own set of idiots too, who love to play cowboys.

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dogma1138
Not exactly, Iran has a 2 tier system. The upper tier which consists of the
Council of Experts (also known as the Guardian Council) and the Supreme Leader
who also control the IRGC (which controls most of Iranian industry at this
point) is not another faction this is the main ruling body of Iran an the body
which de-facto controls everything within it.

While the people can say elect a president the Religious leadership has veto
rights into who is going to actually run basically how Iranian elections start
is that you have a bunch (were talking 50 or more candidates) of candidate
starting the race about half of them get rejected immediately by the religious
authorities the rest "decline" to run and you end up with 1 or 2 candidates in
the final race in which always one of them wins in a land slide mostly because
the entire election process is fixed by the Supreme Leader.

The so call "belligerent" faction in Iran is under the direct control of the
Supreme Leader and this isn't exactly a country where one does what ever they
think. This is a country with well over a 1000 executions each year you won't
have politicians sending out embarrassing letters or generals speaking out of
term unless they want to either face a firing squad or have their necks
stretched out.

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kaonashi
> This is a country with well over a 1000 executions each year

You don't say... [http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/16/the-
counted-k...](http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/16/the-counted-
killed-by-police-1000)

~~~
dogma1138
Ironically this probably illustrates the difference the best making the same
comment in Iran (and many other countries in region) would've gotten you into
a heap of trouble including putting your life directly at risk.

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Synaesthesia
This is surely not amazing news for the military right? I bet they've flown
tons of drones over Iran, they've certainly been deployed in a number of
theatres extensively.

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joezydeco
If the US is capable of tapping into Israeli drones, Iranian drones are
probably possible too.

If Iranian drones are really a threat, they can quickly be turned into a non-
threat one way or another.

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dogma1138
They can (and did), they could also blown the drone out of the sky.

Iran is making a power play in the region one of the outcomes of the deal is
that the US have lost the "respect" of most of it's allies in the region (and
I'm not talking about Israel but about SA and the gulf states).

This incident just like the incident a week ago with the captured US sailors
is pretty much an embarrassment to the US in a region where your image and
reputation mean allot.

This isn't something aimed against the US to show that Iran can deal with
them, this is aimed at all the countries in the region showing that Iran can
pull down their (US) pants so everyone could have a laugh without a reprisal.

The US has lost it's only card it had against Iran which was the sanctions, it
can no longer enforce any sanctions regardless of what they are for Iran has
stated that sanctions against them even if they are due to their support of
terrorism or due to their long range ballistic missile program will constitute
a violation of the nuclear deal.

Europe has already swarmed the Iranian market it was a market they desperately
needed especially with sanctions over Russia and with China importing less and
less goods from the EU. Iranian economy is ripe for rapid growth they had a
huge automotive industry in the past, they have a big (even if severely
outdated) energy section and unlike most countries in the region Iran actually
has a good primary and higher education systems which means that you actually
have a fairly large pool of educated professionals to draw from even if
Iranian schools are quite behind the west they are still better than any other
country in the region except for Israel.

Iran is Turkey but with considerable energy reserves and an educated
population if it wasn't being ruled by an authoritarian religious regime it
could've been one of the biggest economies in the world easily. Even with
their current handicap they have the potential to rival the likes of Canada
and the big European economies especially if they finally will be ready for
another revolution that will dismantle the mullahs and the IRGC.

