And remember, this isn’t just a matter of designing a camera or radio that will short circuit and fuse into slag if improperly opened by unauthorized techs. You’re talking about a vehicle where everything is top secret, even the radar-absorbing paint and the shape of the airfoils.

Blowing the whole thing up would be a great idea, if wasn’t such a stupid idea.

The same thought occurred to me, but I discarded it after about a nanosecond of deep concentration and reflection.

What if the drone, due to a malfunction, falls on your territory, and is recovered by your allies, by civilians, by neutral parties, or even by your own troops who don’t know its been secretly booby-trapped? What if it crashes and burns on landing or takeoff in one of your own bases? What if the bomb malfunctions, and either goes off prematurely or fails to go off when required? What if the hangar or ship where it is stored is hit by enemy fire and the drone is set ablaze?

You can’t solve every problem in the world by blowing it up. “BAM!”, my ass.

Something that doesn’t go off until triggered from within. Unfriendlies capture one and take it to some secret research facility for study, then when a room full of well trained technicians and engineers begin to look at its insides, BAM! You can wipe out a large group of their best and brightest at the same time you destroy your secret equipment.

Regarding your last comments, it isn’t necessary to be able to duplicate or even fully understand an advanced technology to be able to deduce how it works, and thereby, devise countermeasures to it.

Stealth designs are not foolproof. This isn’t the first time we’ve lost one, the Serbs shot one down, we left a chopper behind when we nailed Bin Ladin. There have probably been others. And yes, even if the patriots are always quick to point out these were mere happenstance, that is the nature of war, isn’t it?

As LCDR Spock, UFPSF, once remarked about another stealth technology, “Military Secrets are the most fleeting of all.”

On matters such as this, the other country seems to be more honest than the US. I’m remembering the U2s shot down over Russia and Cuba. The Soviets and Cubans were a bit more forthcoming than the US for a while. And accurate.

It seems to me that while Iran is a big country those snoops are headed to relatively few places. And they are not invisible to radar, especially a strong signal looking for them.

‘The RQ-170 design lacks several elements common to stealth engineering, namely notched landing-gear doors and sharp leading edges. It has a curved wing, and the exhaust is not shielded by the wing. It has been postulated that these missing elements suggest the designers have avoided highly sensitive technologies due to the near certainty of eventual operational loss inherent with a single-engine design and a desire to avoid the risk of compromising leading-edge technology.”

http://www.canada.com/story_print.html?id=5828509&sponsor=

But also: “A U.S. official said Wednesday that Iran would probably not be able to make use of the highly sophisticated technology found in the drone.

“U.S. capabilities are remarkably advanced, and it’s unclear that the Iranians have the expertise” to exploit the advanced know-how in the aircraft, the official said.”

There is one clue in this mystery. Iran is a huge country, much of it covered with inaccessible mountainous or desert terrain. It is highly unlikely the drone just fell out of the sky and they stumbled on to it.

A long time ago, I used to work for an outfit that specialized in electronic warfare, communications and surveillance. I didn’t work in that department, I was in image technology and analysis, but you could pick up a little by osmosis.

There is one clue in this mystery. Iran is a huge country, much of it covered with inaccessible mountainous or desert terrain. It is highly unlikely the drone just fell out of the sky and they stumbled on to it.

I spent a few days in Tucson a few years ago, stayed with my cousin. Their neighbor was a guy who was training to fly one of those things. So far he had had significant training and was in simulators only, but flying realistic missions.

He had lost 3 simulated aircraft, and was a long ways from being qualified. Apparently it’s very hard to meet the proficiency standards necessary for flying secret equipment over unfriendly territory.