Iran gets “Gary Powers” affair?

Bill Weinberg

Here’s an ominous one. We bet this won’t be the last we hear of this news item. Where the hell is “Southwestern Asia” and why the secrecy about the location of the crash? Doesn’t the secrecy combined with the unsubtle geographic hint pretty much make clear that it is Iran–where the US has admitted to using spy planes?

U-2 Spy Plane Crashes in Southwestern Asia, Killing Pilot
June 22 (Bloomberg) — A U.S. U-2 spy plane crashed in southwestern Asia, killing the pilot, the U.S. military said.

The pilot had completed a mission in support of the U.S.-led operation in Afghanistan, Enduring Freedom, and was returning to base when the crash occurred at 8:30 Greenwich Mean Time yesterday, the U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Florida, said in an e-mailed statement today.

The military didn’t specify the location of the crash or the plane’s base. The area has been secured to preserve the crash site for a military investigation into the cause, according to the statement. The pilot’s name is being withheld pending notification of next of kin.

“The airmen of the 380th Air Expeditionary Wing mourn the loss of a true American hero in the service of his country,” Colonel Darryl Burke, 380th Air Expeditionary Wing commander, said in the statement.

The first U-2 went into service in 1955 and didn’t come to public attention until one of the planes, piloted by Gary Powers, was shot down over Soviet territory in 1960. Powers survived and served almost two years in a Soviet prison.

A U-2 was used in 1962 for surveillance that indicated the Soviets were basing weapons in Cuba, prompting the Cuban missile crisis.

The aircraft have been used in mapping studies, atmospheric sampling and for collection of crop and land management data for the Department of Energy, according to the Web site of National Museum of the United States Air Force.

But not to worry. George Bush says the notion that the US is planning air strikes on Iran is “rediculous.”

See also our last post on Iran.

  1. AMERICAN MULLAH STEALS PRESIDENCY: WHO CARES ABOUT THE u2
    WHILE WE ARE TAKING ABOUT THE U2 SPY PLANE, THE MILLIONAIRE MULLAH AND THE BEST IDELOGICAL ALLY OF THE US IN THE REGION STOLE THE IRANIAN ELECTION!!

    The MULLAH WHO STOLE THE ELECTION:

    FARHAT QUAEM MAQUAMI

    Nearly 51 years ago American CIA agents shamelessly arranged a coup to overthrow the democratically elected, secular government, of Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran and subverted a blossoming civic society and changed it into a dictatorial regime. It seems that every generation thereafter that carried Iranian aspirations for justice, freedom and real social change would also be hijacked by the CIA and its paid agents.. This time is no exception. The Iranian regime’s corruption, political inaptitude, economic grievances, along with a combined variety of social problems has provided a window of opportunity and a perfect political storm for another American instigated sabotage for regime change. The final ingredient that CIA agents in Iran need is a presidential candidate who challenges a corrupt electoral system to make a “Hijab Revolution

    1. Now they’re saying United Arab Emirates
      I’m not sure I exactly follow you, but I certainly share your hopes for an authentic, indigenous revolution in Iran. However, I don’t believe Rafsanjani is a mullah. Anyway, now the Pentagon is saying the plane went down in the United Arab Emirates. Why the initial secrecy then? Is this just a story? From Fox News, June 23:

      The military is offering a few more details about the U2 spy plane crash that killed a US pilot last night.

      A Pentagon spokesman in Washington says a US security team is at the crash site in an undisclosed location in southwest Asia. Officials are investigating the cause of the crash.

      Military officials say they won’t name the country in which the jet went down, “due to host nation sensitivities.” Officials say the pilot was on the way back to base after completing a mission in Afghanistan.

      The military also won’t say where the base is. American U2s operate out of a base in the United Arab Emirates, although the military won’t discuss that fact at their host’s request.