The Lost Drone

[RocketMan]

Hell, if I were No-Such-Agency, I'd be ordering fake drones, and dropping/crashing them all over enemy countries. I'd fill them with all sorts of gonzo head-scratcher stuff, like a tube of magnets and wires where the jet turbine should be, tanks of liquid carbon dioxide, and fill it with fiber optics, and instead of microchips, have junk circuit boards with little crystals mounted in them that I'd gathered up from the Smithsonian gift shop's "box o rocks".  Add in a mix of fake squiggly alien writing on some of the parts too with a mix of bogus U.S. NSN's.

It would be cool if we did something like that, but we're usually not that smart and devious.  The simplest answer, one of Occams's favorites, is that it's one of our drones, a real one.  It made a decent enough automated landing when control was lost that only the landing gear got mushed. And now the Iranians have it.

[AJ Dual]

Besides just jamming GPS, I'm sure that Russian/Chinese ELINT can produce false GPS signals. So I could see how they could force a drone down by making it think that it was constantly gaining altitude.

However, I think/suspect that the drones don't use GPS, or only in very limited circumstances. Modern INU's/laser gyros are very accurate, and such a drone probably also has a magnetic compass, air-pressure altimeter, maybe even a sun/star tracker system, or uses other beacon systems/frequencies it's operators provide, and all probably have to agree, or anomalous info is rejected.

If the landing gear got mushed a bit, I see that as nothing to hide. It's an amazing capture for them no matter what.

Although I've been thinking more about my fake "unobtanium tech" drones, and from the perspective of the Iranians, hell, even the Russians and Chinese, a real drone is almost as bad. 

The best secrets are the software/firmware that control it, and presumably, the proper fail-safes and encryption are in place.

And as to advanced avionics, jet engines, and materials, the trick isn't knowing it exists, but how to produce it. Reverse engineering one of our drones is about as bad as a program to make one of your own from the ground up. Unlike the earlier days where the Soviets/Russians could copy basic airframes, like the B-29, or the B1B, and it would shave years off their development time, the devil these days is in the details.

They find that the drone has "impossible" composite X in it. It's the strongest of all, but far too brittle, but the Americans figured out some way to enhance it's flexibility, while sacrificing little strength. What does having a chunk of it in your hands tell you, other than, "Yes it's possible"?

Or that their analysis turns up that alloy Y, which is supposedly impossible to weld, was indeed welded for parts of the drone.

Our methods and processes are the best secrets, and those stay at home, even when a big pile of the end results crashes in some enemy country. Some big boring three ring binder full of checklists, QA/QC procedures, and flow charts sitting on a shelf at Boeing, or General Atomics etc. is probably a way more sensitive set of secrets than an entire stealth drone is.

[wmenorr67]

We have a saying in the intel world, "It isn't the information that is classified, it is the source."

[longeyes]

Drones are micro-surgery.  They are not going to remove the cancer.

[CNYCacher]

As stated earlier, blocking/jamming the signal I would believe.  Hijacking the encrypted control connection and taking over control I will not believe.  You simply do not break modern encryption.  Iranians or any other government could never break into an encryption scheme that I could implement, or any other half-way decent programmer, so don't believe for a second that anyone could break into an encryption scheme that the government would bake into their drones.

Jam the control signal? Who cares.  Autopilot back home safely.  I doubt that they are being flown manually most of the time anyway.
Jam GPS?  So what.  My PHONE has accelerometer and gyroscope-assisted GPS that can stack vectors accurately for minutes during a GPS outage.  I don't believe for a second that a drone can't do the same thing and a hell of a lot more accurately for a lot longer time.

[birdman]

Our methods and processes are the best secrets, and those stay at home, even when a big pile of the end results crashes in some enemy country. Some big boring three ring binder full of checklists, QA/QC procedures, and flow charts sitting on a shelf at Boeing, or General Atomics etc. is probably a way more sensitive set of secrets than an entire stealth drone is.

Yup.  Speaking from experience at building various things of a similar bleeding edge nature, even if you have the plans, and specs, there is a huge learning curve to get to a functional product, even to the point of inventing tooling along the way.

However, from a perspective of exploiting vulnerabilities, loss of the devices is bad, as even if one can't reproduce it, measurement of material properties and design might allow vulnerabilities and/or countermeasures to be developed, at which point, the edge is lost, even if it's not duplicated.

[MicroBalrog]

Look at China. They've been buying fighter plane engines by the hundreds from Russia - and every year they plan to "Develop" their own. And then the year after they come to Sukhoi and ask to more engines.

[AJ Dual]

Look at China. They've been buying fighter plane engines by the hundreds from Russia - and every year they plan to "Develop" their own. And then the year after they come to Sukhoi and ask to more engines.

Yes, and the raised rivets on their "stealth" prototypes really give them a retro-futuristic flair that neither the Russians or Americans seem capable of duplicating.

[grampster]

News is reporting that someone familiar with drones is saying that it is a phony; a mock up.  Says it's the wrong color.   

[AJ Dual]

News is reporting that someone familiar with drones is saying that it is a phony; a mock up.  Says it's the wrong color.   

[TommyGunn]

  Photoshop .... ..... ..... right? 

[wmenorr67]

News is reporting that someone familiar with drones is saying that it is a phony; a mock up.  Says it's the wrong color.   

If so then why did an "official" say it was ours?

[Tallpine]

If so then why did an "official" say it was ours?

Even if it's a mock-up (the original was badly damaged...?). the Iranians (and now the rest of the world) know what it looks like.

( I did have to wonder about the green flying saucer  )

[Harold Tuttle]

  Photoshop .... ..... ..... right? 

The Iranians did a missile test a few years back, and shopped the image and added a few more launches by simple copy paste. There was much jockularity.

[Jamie B]

If the drone is real, why was there no self-destruct feature that was activated when it crash-landed?

[Frank Castle]

I can't really talk about this !  I'm in a EWO slot for the Army.

I will say this thou ........

Iran has acquired allot of electronic warfare technology, from china and Russia!

[kgbsquirrel]

Soooo.... If that's supposed to be a US RQ-170* stealth drone.... why is it covered in 90 degree angles?

ETA:*

[HForrest]

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/1215/Exclusive-Iran-hijacked-US-drone-says-Iranian-engineer

Not an expert, so I have no idea what to think about their claims.

[Zardozimo Oprah Bannedalas]

Soooo.... If that's supposed to be a US RQ-170* stealth drone.... why is it covered in 90 degree angles?

ETA:*

I thought drones were stealth due more to size than angles and paint?

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2011/1215/Exclusive-Iran-hijacked-US-drone-says-Iranian-engineer

Not an expert, so I have no idea what to think about their claims.

Seems reasonable to me.

[Jamie B]

I thought drones were stealth due more to size than angles and paint?
Seems reasonable to me.

You are correct.
The original F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter (Have Blue) had a radar cross-section about the same size as a 1" ball bearing.
Rolling that ball bearing across tables at the Pentagon was exactly how Ben Rich and Kelly Johnson sold the original program.
Angles, broken surfaces, diffused engine exhaust, etc. were the cause of such a small cross section.

[Zardozimo Oprah Bannedalas]

You are correct.
The original F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter (Have Blue) had a radar cross-section about the same size as a 1" ball bearing.
Rolling that ball bearing across tables at the Pentagon was exactly how Ben Rich and Kelly Johnson sold the original program.
Angles, broken surfaces, diffused engine exhaust, etc. were the cause of such a small cross section.

Fascinating stuff, thanks for posting.

This suggests that the drone is legitimate:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204770404577082822643123332.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
I remember a lot of leaks re: Bin Laden, too. Has Obama made any efforts to muzzle these highly-placed blabbermouths?

Then again, it could've been Biden.

[Jamie B]

You are welcome, Zardoz.

More information here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Have_Blue

Here is Ben Rich's book: http://www.amazon.com/Skunk-Works-Personal-Memoir-Lockheed/dp/0316743003/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1324042424&sr=1-1

I bought the book when it came out, and it is fantastic! Highly recommended!
Ben Rich was Kelly Johnson's right-hand man @ Skunkworks, and spent his entire career there.
The book also covers the SR-71, and a lot of other Skunkworks projects.

[longeyes]

An over-reliance on drones is symptomatic of what's wrong with our foreign policy.  War from the armchair.  Clean, remote, impersonal.  To Obama it's a way of fighting without really fighting, or pretending that he's tough when he's not, dealing with the underlying political and military problems when he's really not.

Believing our enemies (and their allies) are stupid and primitive is foolish.  Hey, many of them were educated in our best institutions.

[MillCreek]

An over-reliance on drones is symptomatic of what's wrong with our foreign policy.  War from the armchair.  Clean, remote, impersonal. 

I would argue that this attitude predates President Obama, and probably accurately reflects the wishes of the American people.  Especially since WWI, we have preferred to spend money on technology to save American lives.  In recent years, the distaste for using American troops in unwinnable situations seemed to really crystallize after the situation in Somalia and Blackhawk Down.  Heck yes we prefer using drones rather than having Americans killed.  I would rather see my taxes buy drones and Hellfires than to ship American troops back home in caskets.

Obviously, remote warfare is not the preferred approach in all situations, but where it is a realistic alternative, sign me up as supporting that over throwing Americans into a meat grinder.

[Monkeyleg]

I would argue that this attitude predates President Obama, and probably accurately reflects the wishes of the American people.  Especially since WWI, we have preferred to spend money on technology to save American lives.  In recent years, the distaste for using American troops in unwinnable situations seemed to really crystallize after the situation in Somalia and Blackhawk Down.  Heck yes we prefer using drones rather than having Americans killed.  I would rather see my taxes buy drones and Hellfires than to ship American troops back home in caskets.

Yes. Clinton didn't have drones, so he had bombers in Serbia dropping their loads at 16,000 feet to avoid US casualties. The problem was the number of civilians killed because of the lack of precision from that altitude.