Axios: How the second American pilot was rescued from the heart of Iranian territory
In a one of the most daring and complex rescue operations in the history of US special operations, which resulted in the recovery of a US weapons systems officer from the heart of Iranian territory, two days after his F15E fighter jet was shot down.
The pilot was the second crew member of the plane that Iran said its air defenses had shot down, with Washington announcing the rescue of the first last Friday, the same day it shoots it down.
Axios quoted US officials as saying that special forces commandos succeeded in rescuing the second officer in the crew of the fighter jet that Tehran shot down over the southwest of the country.
According to the sources, the officer, who is a colonel, was injured after jumping with a parachute, but managed to hide in a rugged mountainous area for more than 24 hours, and he was able to escape the chase of units of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) that were racing against time to reach him.
The officer relied on secure and highly encrypted communication devices to coordinate with commando teams from his position in the Iranian mountains, where the sources confirmed that the crew made immediate communication through advanced distress systems after the parachute jump, which enabled the CIA and the Pentagon to pinpoint their location despite the continuous camouflage and chase operations by the Revolutionary Guards.
The operation, which was carried out on Saturday night, used hundreds of special operations forces, dozens of warplanes and helicopters, as well as advanced intelligence, cyber and space capabilities to pinpoint the officer’s location.
In the details of the confrontation on the ground, sources said that US Air Force planes launched intensive raids on Iranian convoys and forces that tried to approach the officer’s hiding area.
An HL-60 helicopters carried out low-altitude flights in the mountainous terrain amid Iranian ground fire, confirming that a Black Hawk helicopter was hit by the fire of Iranian defenses, but it was able to complete its mission and return safely.
The US forces used drones to attack Iranians who approached the pilot before rescuing him.
The operation raises questions about the Pentagon’s previous statements about absolute control over Iranian airspace, the first time a US manned aircraft has been shot down by hostile fire since the start of the last military campaign on February 28.
The operation didn’t go without material losses, as US forces were forced to blow up two transport planes that broke down during the operation at a temporary base inside Iran, to ensure that their technologies didn’t fall into the hands of Iranian forces, before all special forces left Iranian airspace.
The IRGC said it shot down a US drone south of Isfahan last night, saying it was helping to search for the US pilot.
On Friday that two Black Hawk helicopters involved in the search were hit by Iranian fire, but managed to exit Iranian airspace.
In a separate incident, officials reported that an A-10 Warthog fighter jet was injured, causing it to crash over Kuwait and the pilot jumped from it, and the nature of the injuries among the crew members is not yet clear.
Iran’s armed forces said on Sunday that US forces used an abandoned airport in the south of the central province of Isfahan to rescue a pilot of a warplane that crashed Friday in the Islamic Republic.
“The so-called US military rescue operation, which was planned as a deception and escape operation at an abandoned airport in southern Isfahan under the pretext of recovering the pilot of a downed plane, was a disastrous failure,” said Colonel Ebrahim Zolfiqari, the spokesman for the Khatam al Anbiya headquarters, the central operations room of the Iranian armed forces.
“Two C-130 military transport planes and two Black Hawk helicopters were destroyed,” he added.
