Iranian "Ambassador of Death"

there’s very little the west can do against Iran’s Ambassador of Death because it has diplomatic immunity! :diablo:

RyanCrierie has put some interesting comments and links in his post August 23rd on this.

http://www.tboverse.us/HPCAFORUM/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=6351

Its hardly anything “revolutionary” or new. Or even all that practical. At best a last-ditch kamikaze drone.

I did love Yahoo News having this thing on the front page yesterday with the headline “Iran unveils world’s first unmanned bomber”.

It was a “black sell” during the last years of Kuchma period. Apparently China acquired 10 Kh-55 and Iran 2 or 3. It was a brief scandal between U.S, Ukraine and Russia.

I missed that part about sales to Iran! Forgot that the us and relatively speaking were bosom buddies.

Irans plan makes perfect sense. They are trying to buy s300 anti air system. They know that in conventional air or naval battle they would not last. So they are developing systems that they can produce a lot of to cause most nuisance as possible. They are being very clever with what they have.

I don’t understand the Iranian weapons development plan. It seems they are dispersing resources on many projects with relatively low punch. It is not wiser try to clone the Kh-55 acquired from Ukraine and after that develop a land based launcher? That will have far more range and punch than this toy.

It definitely looks to be a derivitive of the South African Skua target drone. It has been strongly suggested that the Skua was designed as a cruise missile in South Africa originally during sanctions. The performances of the two, looking at the figures quoted above, are reasonably similar.

The Iranian Lark UAV is also of South African origin BTW.

on serious side it does not look that big how will it carry cruise missiles? or do they mean laser guide bombs?

It looks like a converted target drone.. not a bad idea for a long range v1 type weapon.. always wondered why more countries have this arrangement..

if nothing else it would occupy radar systems..

Would you think that they took some of the BQM 74C fired in Iraq and reverse engineered them?

I don’t think they would need to take any from those fired into Iraq to reverse engineer them:

MQM-74C Chukar II

The Navy liked the Chukar I but wanted a somewhat faster version, and in the early 1970s Northrop developed the improved experimental MQM-74B, which was followed by the production MQM-74C Chukar II. The Chukar II is difficult to distinguish from the Chukar I, but the Chukar II is slightly scaled up and uses an uprated Williams WR24-7 turbojet with 180 pound (800 N) thrust, giving it a top speed of 590 mph (950 km/h).

Like the Chukar I, the Chukar II is ground or ship launched only. At least 1,400 Chukar IIs were built, mostly for the US Navy, but other customers included NATO, Great Britain, West Germany, Greece, Iran, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, and Spain.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BQM-74_Chukar

The 4-meter-long drone aircraft can carry up to four cruise missiles and will have a range of 620 miles (1,000 kilometers),

State TV later showed video footage of the plane taking off from a launching pad and reported that the craft traveled at speeds of 560 miles per hour (900 kilometers per hour) and could alternatively be armed with two 250-pound (113.4-kilogram) bombs or a 450-pound (204.12-kilogram) guided bomb.

See: http://www.kansascity.com/2010/08/22/2166234_iran-inaugurates-nations-first.html?storylink=omni_popular#ixzz0xPZwQk2s or http://www.kansascity.com/2010/08/22/2166820/iran-inaugurates-nations-first.html

As mentioned, it appears to have considerable similarity to the rusisan DAN aerial target drone. Then again, Iran also has quite a range of UAVs and drones, of which this may well be a development.

See: http://www.irandefence.net/showthread.php?t=52325

See: http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?68737-Iran%92s-Air-Forces-Struggling-to-Maintain-Readiness

Baby-Snark on its back.

No bomber, a cruise missile.

Any size/weight estimates? I’d say it’s about the size of a Firebee, 1500kg max.

Isn’t think the Iranian copy of the South African Skua? Its been around for many years, and its hardly impressive in performance.

I bet all it is, is a bomb strapped to the target drone to turn it into a kamikaze drone.

Anyway…I wonder how stealthy it is :p

It is very similar to Russian DAN-M:

http://okb-sokol.ru/cgi-bin/go.pl?i=38

One of the UAV’s limitations is the short tether datalink control, since Iran has no military communications satellites for BLOS control. This means an airplane containing comms relay or control equipment must stay within LOS of the UAV. The realistic operational radius of the UAV can be a fraction of Iranian claims, depending upon the operating altitude of the UAV, altitude of the airplane containing the comms relay and atmospheric conditions.

on serious side it does not look that big how will it carry cruise missiles? or do they mean laser guide bombs?

It looks like a converted target drone.. not a bad idea for a long range v1 type weapon.. always wondered why more countries have this arrangement..

if nothing else it would occupy radar systems..

Would you think that they took some of the BQM 74C fired in Iraq and reverse engineered them?

Karrar does not seem particularly advance it looks like someone transported it from the 1940’s.

BTW: Where do they come up with these silly names?:D

I don’t know, I’d still say the US beats them hands down on that front, especially with their snappy abbreviation obsession. Joint this, Joint that. The one that tickles me is AMRAAM though. Advanced Medium Range Air-Air Missile. What about when it comes time to develop it’s successor, would that be MAMRAAM-More Advanced Medium Range Air-Air Missile? 😮

BTW: Where do they come up with these silly names?:D

The original name given on the link you posted and other news stories i have seen is “Karrar”.

This was the title given to Ali ibne abi talib (Prophet’s cousin) for his fighting style of unrelenting or repeated attacks on the battle field. Ali is the central figure in Shia Islam.

Another way to describe the title is “one who comes back and attacks repeatedly”. Sort of appropraite for a UCAV/ Strike UAV?

It’s the sort of thing Dr Evil would come up with.

What next? Camels with frickin lazer beams attached to their frickin heads!?