After a giddy 12 months that heralded a rise in domestic speedboat production, the enhanced ability to attack mock wooden aircraft carriers and a failed missile test that resulted in the “surprise martyrdom” of 12 of its own sailors, Iran President Hassan Rouhani claimed Thursday the country has raced up global defense power rankings from number 23 to 14.
Speaking in an online ceremony unveiling Iran’s most recent defense achievements, President Rouhani said Iran is trying to achieve step-by-step progress in the defense industry that should leave all its enemies quivering in fear.
President Rouhani added best practise production methods delivered enhanced Iranian radars that now give the Islamic Republic “unmatched eavesdropping abilities and vision powers” across the Middle East while “domestic drones’ vision has been improved.”
Defense Minister Brigadier General Amir Hatami went further just two days before. He warned of “Iran’s crushing response to any act of aggression” as the Trump administration seeks to extend a U.N.-imposed arms embargo against the country.
“We are monitoring the enemy carefully, and can take measures to disable the enemy’s anti-missile gear, and we say vehemently that our missiles can penetrate into their air defense (systems),” Hatami added, according to the domestic Tasnim News Agency.
Although no physical evidence was offered to back the claims of incredible advances in military engineering other than vision of two new missile varieties, previous attempts to boost the profile of domestic military achievements have led to ridicule:
President Hassan Rouhani waves goodbye to the pilots of a new domestic fighter jet before an inauguration ceremony of the aircraft, Iran, Tuesday, Aug. 21, 2018. Iran displayed the twin-seat fighter it says is all Iranian-made and which allegedly has advanced avionics and fire control systems. However experts soon noted similarities between the plane and the F-5 fighter jet, designed by Northrop-Grumman in the 1950s and utilized by the U.S. military in the 1960s. Five years before the Islamic revolution, Iran purchased F-5s from America in 1974. (Iranian Presidency Office via AP)
As Breitbart News reported, Iran announced in May it had exceeded all expections in building 112 special new attack speedboats.
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Commander Major General Hossein Salami used the moment of their unveiling to warn all foes in the Persian Gulf, including the U.S. Navy, the craft symbolise “what will become a hell for the enemies of Iran and Islam.”
The new vessels are reported to be Zolfaqar-class speedboats and Heidar-class and Meead-class vessels, according to Iran’s Tasnim News Agency.
The outlet described the vessels as missile boats and fast attack craft. The outlet reiterated the IRGC’s missile boat doctrine of “mobility over defense and firepower.”
Earlier this month, the U.S. Navy taunted Iran’s unmatched ability at building a target ship by taking to Instagram and showing a bogus American aircraft carrier with a bullseye on it.
The Navy proclaimed in a meme, ‘IRAN BUILDS TARGET SHIP’, showing an aerial view of the fake vessel sitting alongside, unprotected and vulnerable with a bullseye, and adds across the bottom of the image, ‘THEY’RE EXPERTS AT THAT’.
The post comes after Iran built the wooden replica of a U.S. Navy Nimitz-class carrier and had its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard fire missiles at it in the strategic Strait of Hormuz, as Breitbart News reported.
The replica carried 16 mock-ups of fighter jets on its deck, according to the satellite photos taken by Maxar Technologies. The vessel appeared to be some 650 feet long and 160 feet wide.
The mock vessel later sank as it was being towed back to port, blocking Iran’s main naval base at Bandar Abbas.
That was not the only disaster to befall Iran’s navy this year.
As Breitbart News reported, on May 19 sailors died and 15 others were left wounded after an Iranian naval support vessel was hit and sunk by a new surface-to-surface missile in a “friendly fire” incident later described as “a bit of an accident” by Iranian authorites.
The sinking happened during an exercise in the Sea of Oman, near the Iranian port city of Jask, according to one Iran state media outlet that also confirmed the “surprise martyrdom” of the deceased crewmen.