Israel Matzav

Hmmm.... US has F-22's parked a 6-minute flight from Iran

I'm sure you all remember the F-22, the plane Hussein Obama didn't want. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel did some mouthing off in Washington on Thursday, and it turns out that the United States now has some F-22's parked in an airbase in the United Arab Emirates just a six-minute flight from Iran (Hat Tip: Sunlight). In fact, they've actually been there since at least April 2012. This is from the third link.

At a dinner in downtown Washington Thursday, US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel touted the Pentagon’s deployment of advanced weaponry, including the Air Force F-22 Raptor, to the Middle East.

The stealthy fighters, as well other “high-end air, missile defense, and naval assets,” have been positioned in the region “to deter Iranian aggression and respond to other contingencies,” Hagel said during his remarks to The Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

It just so happens that satellite imagery of those F-22s in the Middle East has popped up on Google Earth.

Five F-22s have turned up on satellite imagery at Al Dhafra Air Base in the United Arab Emirates  about 100 miles from Iranian territory. While it’s no secret the US has deployed the radar-evading Raptors to the Al Dhafra, this is the first time they have popped up on publicly available satellite imagery.

The satellite picture was taken about a year ago, however it appears to have been put on Google Earth in recent months.

...

The US military goes to great lengths not to disclose the location of Air Force assets in the region, mostly due to host nation sensitivity. That said, the Air Force has periodically released pictures of F-22s on the ground and training. Photo captions simply refer to the jets being in “Southwest Asia.”

Hmmm. 

Labels: F-22, Iranian nuclear threat, stealth aircraft, United Arab Emirates

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:43 AM