Iran Says It's Building Stealth Missile

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran is producing its first stealth missile, a rocket that can evade electronic detection, the Iranian Defense Ministry said Tuesday while withholding its range.



The missile, named Kowsar after a river in Muslim descriptions of paradise, will be capable of hitting ships and aircraft, Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammad Reza Imani told The Associated Press.


He refused to give the missile's range or provide other details. Features of the Kowsar, such as its guidance and positioning systems, are currently on show at an exhibition in Tehran that is open only to select government officials.


Iranian state television announced the Kowsar Tuesday while screening pictures of a missile flying through the air.


Iran manufactures various missiles, chief among them the Shahab-3 whose range of 810-miles makes it capable of reaching Israel.

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http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=736&e=4&u=/ap/20040601/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iran_missile

I'm afraid they will be the ones to pay for our transgressions as well as theirs.

Israel has unstealth nukes.

I guess in weapons top trumps terms they win.

Time to even up this playing field.

Americans killing Iraqi women and children, Americans
and Israelis torturing... Iraqi women and children, Americans
getting killed and sent home in boxes.
Do you think Sharon, Bush and Cheney
have conference calls and all laugh together.

between bitter old men, by their children. If Israel and Iran want to escalate to nuclear confrontation, then let them. Unfortunately we've already pretty much blown our wad looking for WMD in the wrong place when we have known for sure that Israel and North Korea both already have nukes. Why didn't we invade Pakistan? They have some atrocious human rights abuses AND nukes.

Do they have the technology to do this?

Is this some kind of a bluff?

Stealth aircraft don't go super-fast. The faster you go, the more noise and disruption you make.

I don't know what to make of this politically. But I don't think that Iran will be very successfull with this.

More likely it is an under-the-radar cruise or some such thing.
But you can't tell much from the story.

The neocons believed their "might makes right" stance would intimidate the world and they completely ignored the common sense human reaction to defend against such threats. Moreover, the neocons have openly defied any disarmament treaties, setting the tone and the trend to race towards re-arming.

I seriously loathe those assholes.

'Stealth' is making a aircraft (or missile) using composite materials (vice metal) and in shapes that reduce the radar return... it does not eliminate it, and is greatly overratted.

And as another poster said, a stealth missile with a conventional warhead is no match for a non stealth missile with a nuclear warhead.

In first impression, they're probably not talking about ballistic missiles. Stealth technology would apply mostly to cruise/aeronautical missiles. It's not an "all-or-nothing" proposition, though. The ability to defend against missiles is clearly dependent on detection. The major advantage of aeronautical missiles is their low altitude and the resulting difficulty of radar detection. If that detection is further impeded, the challenges are made greater. If stealth technology is successfully applied to ballistic missiles, kiss Star Wars good-bye.

the kind of thing that SDI "Star Wars" is incapable of defending against, and works great for delivering a "nuke-u-lar" payload...especially when launched from a submarine...or even a specially fitted private 'yacht'...
I'm just glad i live well inland, deep in the middle of fly-over country.

I'd be getting very worried indeed...

when even Yahoo can get the technical specs of it before it is built..

if a missile needs to be fast enough to catch up to aircraft, would it have a big enough payload to damage a ship enough to sink it? I know that speed = energy, but still...

Surface to Air and Air to Air missiles usually have just enough explosive and more than enough metal to cause a lot of flak to fly around. Flak is heavy enough to take out airplanes and also covers a large area. Flak cannot go through inches of steel though. If you wanted to take out a heavy ship, you would need something that focuses it's energy into a lot smaller of an area.

American built 'Standard' SM1 anti-aircraft missiles have a secondary anti-ship capability, as do the improved SM2 and SM3 versions. You aren't likely to sink anything big enough to call a ship, but since warships aren't armored much anymore, it will blow a hole into it and severly reduce the vessel's combat capability.

(Note: The missile is actually named 'Standard'. I don't know who named it. SM1 stands for 'Standard Missile type One'.)

to protect them from missiles. I imagine that ships have the same
capabilities too.

whether they got it from Chalabi or Ollie North.

,...trickle-down arms!

Yup. We are the most profitable dealer in arms.

We sell arms to India who sells to Pakistan who sells to Sudan and Afganistan.

We sell arms to China who sells to North Korea who sells to Libya et al.

We ARE our own enemies and create adversity for profit.

Who gains financial liberty?

DUH!!!!

The war-mongers.

They thrive upon death and destruction.

They should die by that which they thrive!!!