An U.S. Air Force F-35A Lightning II aircraft assigned to the 421st Expeditionary Fighter Squadron lands in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility July 25, 2023. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Christopher Sommers
Iran has the capabilities to detect, track and intercept United States F-35 stealth fighter jets, Chief of the Self-Sufficiency Research Organization of the Iranian Air Defense Force told the Mehr News Agency on September 2.
General Samad Agha-Mohammadi was commenting on the U.S. recent decision to deploy F-35s in the Middle East.
The F-23 was designed to perform both air superiority and strike missions. The stealth fighter jet is also able to provide electronic warfare and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities.
On July 25, a squadron of F-35s arrived in the region to respond to Iranian movements in the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, a choke point between the Arabian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, through which roughly 20 percent of the world’s oil supply flows.
The deployment was not very successful however. Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters on August 29 that the stealth fighter jets didn’t deter Iran.
“We continue to see harassment,” Singh said. “We have not seen that threat drop, I would say, so we haven’t seen a reason to move our forces out.”
Tensions have been mounting in the Middle East since Iran seized two oil tankers on April 27 and May 3 in the Persian Gulf, reportedly in response to the capture of a China-bound Iranian oil shipment by the U.S. near southern Africa on April 22.
Gen. Agha-Mohammadi remarks are not surprising considering that Iran possesses one of the largest air defense networks in the Middle East. The network includes passive, bistatic and multistatic radars that are in theory capable of detecting stealth fighter jets like the F-35.
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