Uh oh looks like there is going to be an "Operation Iranian Liberation" soon.

I can't see anyone being that stupid, even Obama who has been actually more pro-war then Bush so far.

I mean if you think Afghanistan is bad, the East side of Iran would be even worse for guerilla warfare.  You'd honestly have to take over half the country up to probably Tehran then just set up a border and try and keep guerilla's out that way.

Wondering the same thing, maybe under the assumption that they are indeed stealth there would be no reason to beleive they are going to get captured. Or they are just cheap? Don't know.

What a supid move, thats for sure, they can only blame themselves.

Iran said no

self-destruct would be to dangerous if you ask me, strapping explosive on an device like that would be asking for an accident to happen while it being transport , repaired or whatever

Ha no I was joking.  You're right even Obama isn't that dumb.

He said that while on the campaign trail. As a President he might have thought differently. He's not privy to all the intelligence Obama has nor does he have to worry about the consequences of actually carrying out an action.

And I hope you've had so much fun since then, sealed and delivered right into your doors, that now you understand how you should had complied with orders given to you back then. Iran will learn this, too.

I'm sure in your way of thinking everyone that doesn't bow down to the mighty empire will learn their lesson. The world is a big place and no empires are eternal. Wishing for war is a dangerous way to think and the path to war can always lead to unforseen consequences.

@OP

Military aircraft which have not been authorised to enter a sovereign country's airspace should be shot down. While I am no fan of Iran I am glad to see that they are showing a lot of restraint. There appears to be significant covert pressure on them including assasinations of high ranking officers and nuclear scientists but so far the situation is still relatively quiet.

I hope calmer heads continue to prevail but sadly I think certain interest groups are determined to force the US and Iran into a disastrous war.

For those of you who are interested in how the iranians did it, here's an article from an israeli newspaper:

Iran official: We tricked the U.S. surveillance drone to land intact

Speaking with the Christian Science Monitor, Iranian electronic warfare specialist says Iranian forces tampered with the RQ-170's GPS to make it think it was landing in its Afghanistan base.

Iranian electronic warfare specialists were able to "trick" the recently downed U.S. surveillance drone to land on Iran soil intact, Iranian engineers said in an exclusive interview with the Christian Science Monitor on Thursday.

On Monday, U.S. President Barack Obama indicated that the United States had officially requested that Iran return the secret RQ-170 Sentinel drone, after Iranian TV displayed the craft in what they considered to be a great victory.

Speaking with the Christian Science Monitor on Thursday, Iranian military officials said that they were able to cut off communication between the U.S. drone and its operators, and reconfigured the drone's GPS to make it land where it thought was its home base in Afghanistan.

"The GPS navigation is the weakest point," the Iranian military official told the Monitor, calling the downing an "electronic ambush" of secret drone.

"By putting noise [jamming] on the communications, you force the bird into autopilot. This is where the bird loses its brain," he added.

The engineer added that the Iranians were able to make the drone land "on its own where we wanted it to, without having to crack the remote-control signals and communications” from the US control center."

Last week, Iranian state television displayed what it said was a downed U.S. surveillance drone, days after U.S. officials expressed concern that Tehran would be able to glean information about a classified military program.

According to the semi-official Fars news agency, in the televised segment, commander of the Revolutionary Guard's Aerospace Forces Amir Ali Hajizadeh said that Iranian forces uncovered the aircraft as it was about "to infiltrate our country's airspace for spying missions."

"[A]fter it entered the Eastern parts of the country, this aircraft fell into the trap of our armed forces and was downed in Iran with minimum damage," Hajizadeh told Fars.

According to the Iranian military official, the drone was "equipped with highly advanced surveillance, data gathering, electronic communication and radar systems," saying that "this kind of plane has been designed to evade radar systems and from the view point of technology it is amongst the most recent types of advanced aircraft used by the U.S."

"The technology used in this aircraft had already been used in B2 and F35 planes," Hajizadeh added, saying the "aircraft is controlled and guided through satellite link and land stations in Afghanistan and the United States."

"Military experts are well aware how precious the technological information of this drone is," Fars quoted Hajizadeh as saying.

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/iran-official-we-tricked-the-u-s-surveillance-drone-to-land-intact-1.401641

Sounds very plausible in my opinion and it's very similar to what many experts have already speculated. I guess it also explains why the self-destruct mechanism didn't work - the drone's autopilot believed it was properly landing in it's american base, so it believed there was no reason to self-destruct.

The newspaper the above article is from has proven to be one of the best resources about this incident btw. They were almost the first to report on it, and even in the very first article they already pointed out that Iran claimed to have "downed" it using electronic warfare. A fact that most other media initially didn't even mention, most newspaper actually even lied by saying that Iran claimed to have shot down the drone.