Drones
Revolutionary Guards claim they shot down a US MQ-9 over the Strait of Hormuz – threats against the seven undersea internet cables
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards claim to have shot down a US MQ-9 drone over the Strait of Hormuz, an unconfirmed claim, and an IRGC spokesman said new targets would be revealed, pointing to the seven internet cables under the strait.
In the early hours of Tuesday, October 20, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced through Iranian state media that it had shot down an American MQ-9 unmanned aircraft over the Strait of Hormuz. It attributes the shoot-down to an “advanced air defence system” of the IRGC Aerospace Force. The claim has not been independently confirmed, and US Central Command (CENTCOM) had not responded by the morning.
The Guards say it is the 54th American military drone downed by Iran’s integrated air defence network. In September they announced the shoot-down of another MQ-9 over Qeshm island, which they presented as the 52nd of the type, with no comment from the US military at the time. US MQ-9 losses have worried Washington, since the Pentagon has lost a quarter of its Reapers in the operations against Iran; the Congressional Research Service counted 81 US aircraft destroyed or damaged in the war.
The threat against the undersea cables
A few hours earlier, on Monday, IRGC spokesman Hossein Mohebbi turned attention to the digital map of the Gulf. “Seven big internet cables pass under the Strait of Hormuz,” he said, claiming that all of the region’s internet and commercial data traffic passes through them. “We simply want them to know that new targets will be revealed. New weapons will be revealed,” he added at a ceremony at Tehran’s Holy Defence Museum, vowing to expel “the remnants of American power” from the region.
The threat is not new. Earlier in October, Supreme National Security Council secretary Mohsen Rezaei said Tehran could target undersea cables, data centres and US-linked artificial intelligence facilities in a new war, noting that “we have not yet included these assets among our targets”.
The blockade continues
At sea, CENTCOM continues its naval blockade of Iranian ports. On October 17 it announced that the destroyer USS Rafael Peralta was transiting the area as part of the blockade and that 138 merchant vessels had been diverted so far. A few days earlier, replying to a statement by the commander of the IRGC Navy, CENTCOM had written that “the IRGC Navy commander has no navy” and that US forces and regional partners clearly control the Strait. In the same period the Guards claimed that a supertanker hit a mine on an “unapproved” route.