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Iran Unveils Its First UAV Bomber
ms_gen writes "Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad unveiled today the first UAV bomber produced by Iran. The drone, named Karrar (farsi for Striker) can carry various types of bombs. It can reach up to 900 km/h in speed and has a range of 1000 kilometers (620 miles). The Iranian president mentions that 'Karrar is a symbol of the progress of defence technology in Iran.'"
How can one summarize this bit of news, and leave out the fact that Iran refers to this UAV as "The Ambassador Of Death?" I mean, come on. That's the best part.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
It's called Persian. You don't go around saying "in espanol it's called..." do you?
I think this falls under "Stuff that Matters".
You know, since this is yet another "antagonize the West" type of action by Iran.
Just what I'd expect from Iran, the use of UnAmerican Vile Bombers. So unlike the Righteous Holy American Bombers used by our own beloved military. It's like how Iraq stooped to deploying weapons of mass destruction; something we'd never dream of doing. At this rate we're going to have to liberate the entire world.
Ok, really Iran? If you really want to be credible, you have to stop announcing military things when you have a "civilian" project going. So first off you make a nuclear reactor come online. No problem there, then on the same day you announce that you've upgraded your weaponry... I really, really want to believe that Iran just wants to use the energy for peaceful purposes... But with timing like this... it isn't going to make the west trust you anymore Iran.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Video of a test launch and production.
http://vodpod.com/watch/4282312-iranian-karrar-drone
Looks alot like a V-1 or Loon but with hard points on the wings and turbojet instead of pulse jet. So late 50s technology designed with CAD. Probably a 30-40% failure rate on them too, that's standard for first or second generation cruise missiles/drones.
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I don't know about this particular area, but Iran's industrial sector is more advanced than you might think. There is an extensive auto industry. Though it manufactures under licenses from foreign companies (the most common vehicle is a variant of the Peugeot 206), modifications have been designed and implemented in Iran. Iran is no banana republic.
Right, just to clear this up: the fact they've developed their own UAV bomber is purely to spite the 'West' whereas any similar defense technology development by a western nation should never be construed as antagonising the Middle East, let alone Iran. Furthermore, Iran should not by any means be allowed the same fear sodden defense industry that the West so covets and they should simply accept that.
OK, thanks, I think I've got it now - you're schlepping the same drag-and-drop late-night-international-espionage-TV-drama idiocy that practically defines the geo-political arrogance of our precious West in the eyes of others.
You ought to remember that many countries see the supposed leader of the West, The U.S, as a terrible and amoral aggressor, having willfully used WMDs against civilians (carpet bombing, nuclear weapons), continues to stockpile nuclear weapons munitions while chastising the rest of the world for doing so using trade and political embargoes, trades big-brother-style protection rackets to arm-bend smaller countries into accepting U.S military bases, has camps in which they not only 'disappear' but spiritually and psychologically humiliate the prisoners using methods not seen since Vietnam (the list goes on). This is the stuff they see in talk shows on their TVs, read in their opinion columns in their newspapers, talk about in political science classes at high-school, etc...
Just to point you to the other side of the coin where the opinions of 6 or so billion other people may differ from your picture of it all.
So, when Iran defends itself from what they see as an imperialist nation, they're antagonizing the West?
OK.
But it's still not newsworthy.
Oh my, yes it is. This particular UAV doesn't have the range to threaten Israel (that would require another 500km at least), but you can bet that Iran wants the world to think that the next one will. Militarily, a UAV would be an less-than-ideal delivery mechanism for a nuclear weapon, but it might prove viable if it were able to fly low-and-slow with a negligible radar profile.
Iran's closer neighbours, meanwhile, have all been served notice, too. This is Iran's way of saying, 'Don't fuck with us.' Remember that most neighbouring countries do not love the Shi'ite version of Islam, which is a majority religion only in Iran and Iraq, I believe. Think back to the European wars that accompanied the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation. Shias and Sunnis are kind of like Catholics and Protestants. Peaceful now, but often at odds with one another.
Lastly, this is Iran thumbing its nose at US-sponsored economic sanctions. Effectively, they're saying, 'No matter what you do to thwart us, we can still acquire the technologies we want to be the threat you don't want us to be. So why not sit down and allow us to negotiate a better place for ourselves in the region?'
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
His behavior only appears to be irrational if you believe that either Israel would win a quick victory in a war with Iran by itself or that the US would quickly enter the fight to defend Israel in a war that it started against the express advice of the US. I don't think either is very likely to be the case. Iran clearly has a much higher tolerance for civilian casualties. They can accept casualties in the hundreds of thousands while the Israeli government could hardly survive if Israeli casualties reached the low thousands in an unprovoked war that it began without any immediate threat.
China is heavily dependent on Iranian oil. Both China and Russia would come out with uncompromising condemnations of Israeli aggression. The choice facing Obama would be to force an Israeli ceasefire or start World War 3.
it is a fairly obvious trap and it is highly unlikely that Israel is going to fall for it. The consequences would be catastrophic if it did.
Instead, Israel appears to be trying to invite a preemptive strike by Iran on Israel which would be disastrous for Iran for much the same reasons.
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Well, to be honest, it does seem like more of a "we can do that too!" type of gesture. The US employs UAVs because, right or wrong, our military presence is effectively everywhere.
The UAV does seem to be the poster-child of US military power in the region. Whether or not the Iranian weapon system is effective on the battlefield probably isn't as important as the propaganda it will generate.
This thing is a gimmick. It is a small cruise missile with remote capabilities. The bomb on it is a tiny little dumb thing that isn't going to hurt anyone unless it hits them directly, and I am going to go out on a limb and say that the avionics on that drone don't amount to much more than a camera bolted on. In defense against the presumed target, the US, this thing is a novelty. The US gets giddy over electronic warfare and this thing is asking have its connection severed. The fuel and explosives are better spent on a missile that doesn't bother to return home and doesn't need an operator to guide it in. This does nothing to help the defense of Iran against the style of combat the US uses.
If you are going to fight the US, and you are not China or Russia, you need to fight dispersed, hidden, and from cover. The only time it is worthwhile to fully stand and fight is if the victory you achieve is worth the destruction of the force you are having stand and fight. It is worthwhile to launch a massive simultaneous missile on a US carrier battle group with everything you have knowing that force will be destroyed. If you kill a carrier, the fact that you just destroyed your missile force is worth it. Outside of that though, you need to fight with the understanding that the US has the capability to glass the shit out of any arbitrary size of land using just conventional weapons. Your goal as the defender is to make it so that your forces are concealed and doing hit and runs, and so never standing around waiting to be glassed, or to fight from a position the US is unwilling to destroy. Namely, if you fight from a city the US won't level the city World War II style. They might knock down the buildings one by one trying to take out suspected military units, but the won't just level the place in one swipe like they could with a few MOABs. This glorified cruise missile doesn't help this style of fighting. It can't be launched by field units, and even if it could, it is going to lead the US back to your position assuming it even makes it back. You are better off to launch a missile that isn't expected to return or, even better, save the money to arm your city bound army with more and better RPGs.
Personally, if I had to organize the defense of Iran from the US, the only conventional forces I would bother with would be sea mines and easily concealed cruise missiles. The only point of those forces would be to try and sacrifice themselves in doing damage to the ocean going invasion force. The rest of my defense would involve the army stripping down into civilian clothing the second the invasion hits and dispersing into the population with a plan, and giving everyone a (civilians included) gun. Train the army in guerrilla tactics, cache weapons and explosives all over the place, and never even make the pretense of fighting with uniforms on. Encourage the civilians to fight in their own amateurish way not to inflict any real harm, but to blur the line between military and civilian in the eyes of the enemy as much as possible. The only military tech worthwhile would be the kind useful to guerrilla forces. Bike bombs, all manner of concealed explosives, easily concealed weapons, concealed body armor, methods of communicating across cells and receiving orders, methods of smuggling, modified civilian vehicles (that still look civilian) with military applications, and that sort of thing are the techs worth developing in earnest. You still need the capacity to fight a conventional war against your neighbors, but the real threat, the US, is a fight you don't want to do standing up. The US loves nothing more than to see massive troop formations all lined up nice and orderly in a big open desert. See Iraq War part 1 for what happens to armies that stand.
eventually the US is going to have to realize that the west/Russia simply can't have a nuclear monopoly
... "China" or something like that. I suppose you'd rather forget about the UK, and France, and Pakistan, and South Africa, and India ... why, I'm not sure. But you have an odd working definition of "monopoly" (which is funny, because even in the way you used it, you implied that the US and Russia are somehow a single entity. Which is ridiculous.
What are you talking about? You do understand that there are many other countries with nuclear weapons, right? First, there's that funny litte country out east
War breeds more war, diplomacy can keep peace. Look at WWI which bred WWII
What are you talking about? It was diplomacy that bought Germany enough time to gear up for WWII. Google for "peace in our time" just for a refresher.
WWII which bred the Cold War
Have you actually ever studied any of this? The Cold War was between, essentially, the Soviet Block and everyone else (primarily the US and NATO allies). This wasn't about anything that happened in WWII, it was about the communist totalitarians running the USSR looking to forcibly model the rest of the world in the same fashion. It was the deterrent threat of an unwinnable nuclear war that ended that horrible regime.
And I'm sure if you looked further you could see that there were conflicts which caused WWI
You're completely missing the point. It wasn't previous conflicts (as is, past battles/wars) that "caused" WWI. It was fundamental differences between regional cultures, economies, resources, etc. Physical conflict errupted as a means by which to resolve those differences - because talking about them did not, of course, actually change anything. The entire history of Europe involves thousands of years of territorial, religious, and familial squabbling over turf, power, and resources. War (against the Germans, twice) was what ended that. War with the Soviets never happened, and their system collapsed under its own ponderous, confiscatory, non-productive, Nanny State weight.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
The US doesn't threaten them because they are allies, the moment Pakistan stops cooperating with the "war on terror" the media and government will be just as hostile to them as we are to Iran.
Appeasement didn't work because Germany was trying to expand its borders, not simply maintain a military. Iran is not trying to expand its rule, Iran just wants to have a larger military force. In fact, treaties from WWI that prevented Germany from having a strong military force was the very reason Hitler could rise to power it was also the thing that pissed off Japan.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Look at the Treaty of Versailles
The Rhineland will become a demilitarized zone administered by Great Britain and France jointly. German armed forces will number no more than 100,000 troops, and conscription will be abolished. Enlisted men will be retained for at least 12 years; officers to be retained for at least 25 years. German naval forces will be limited to 15,000 men, 6 battleships (no more than 10,000 tons displacement each), 6 cruisers (no more than 6,000 tons displacement each), 6 destroyers (no more than 800 tons displacement each) and 12 torpedo boats (no more than 200 tons displacement each). No submarines are to be included. The manufacture, import, and export of weapons and poison gas is prohibited. Armed aircraft, tanks and armoured cars are prohibited. Blockades on ships are prohibited. Restrictions on the manufacture of machine guns (e.g. the Maxim machine gun) and rifles (e.g. Gewehr 98 rifles).
Because of these restrictions, the Germans were pissed because they could not defend their country which was surrounded by hostile powers. Because of this, they turned to extreme nationalism and the Nazi party which lead to WWII.
Have you actually ever studied any of this? The Cold War was between, essentially, the Soviet Block and everyone else (primarily the US and NATO allies). This wasn't about anything that happened in WWII, it was about the communist totalitarians running the USSR looking to forcibly model the rest of the world in the same fashion. It was the deterrent threat of an unwinnable nuclear war that ended that horrible regime.
The Cold War was basically caused because the USSR managed to reverse engineer the atomic bomb which in turn scared the US based on an absurd notion of a huge Soviet Empire, of course ignoring the fact that Communism can never scale properly. So they fought a bunch of proxy wars to mask the problems of the Soviet economic system being nearly impossible to maintain in peace time because it all revolved around the government which needed war as a way to increase production without having to innovate which was nearly impossible in a communist state. Had the USSR never gotten the atomic bomb, why would the US really care that various third-world insignificant countries like Vietnam and Korea?
Why would Japan have attacked the west if it was allowed to defend itself with the proper amount of battleships? Why would Germany gone to extreme nationalism if it could maintain a proper armed forces? It wouldn't have, the results of WWI shaped WWII more than any socio-political differences ever could.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
And yet, in the fifty-five years since the two times they were used, we've managed to avoid sliding down that slope. So far, we've done something right; I just hope we can keep it up.
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This is really part of the Pentagon's smaller budget. We're now getting the Iranians to build and launch new target drones for the US Navy.
Never shake hands with a man you meet in a fertility clinic.
I've driven all those cars, and every year that rankings come out, the ones with best quality are the ones with least of local modifications (206 included). Every few years they announce a brand new "National Car" initiative which turns out to be a hybrid of several foreign designs put together usually poorly and then after it fails in the market, it becomes the mandatory car for government organizations. Considering 80% of economy is owned and run by the government, the manufacturing will survive with just one customer. In a few years, rinse, repeat, blah blah. Proof of the massive failure of auto industry in Iran is their constant lack of ability to penetrate even third world markets and even though they sell them to foreign markets at a fraction of the domestic price.
Generally speaking, while the state of industry in some areas is better than Iraq, Afghanistan and few neighbouring countries, it's nothing remotely comparable to west or even Turkey. Along with improving relations with China, the few barely competitive sectors are being bought one by one by the Chinese, then begin importing and labeling Chinese products to sell domestically as Iranian-made. The incompetence of government, powerful grip of Revolutionary Guards over virtually all industries and their profit at any cost MO as well as population's general ignorance are all contributors.
Iran's auto industry was founded almost the same time as South Korea. Saddens me to look at their global empire and our local disaster.
Whether you call it Farsi or Persian, Karrar is neither. It's Arabic and while many Arabic words and phrases are used in everyday Farsi, "Karrar" is definitely not one. As a native Farsi speaker with some knowledge of Arabic, I had to look the meaning up. Generally, the government has some fetish of putting Arabic names on everything, especially anything military related to make them sound more "holy" since Arabic is language of Islam.
Can we just bomb their nuclear reactor and take all their oil already and quit with the fake reasons to do so?
I come here for the love
They've succeeded in getting a nuclear reactor opened and unveiled a UAV bomber without making any explicit threats at all.
You mean other than promising to wipe Israel off the map as soon as they are able?
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Why are you worried about Turkey?
#1) Iran has demonstrated (via press release) the equivalent of a model airplane with a camera. They don't have the military data network capability to reliably deliver these anywhere outside their borders. Furthermore, Turkey has one of the largest and most powerful air forces outside of the major superpowers with approximately a thousand aircraft, and over 200 F-16's (mostly modern CCIP variety, and the ability to produce them locally). I wouldn't take Iranian air aggression too seriously.
more importantly it's who your friends are:
#2) Turkey is a NATO member country. That means that if Iran (an external force by NATO definition) attacks Turkey, the most powerful military powers on the planet are obligated to rip Iran a new one...
Given that Iran's proxies Hezbollah have taken over Lebanon, it seems clear that the Iranians have invaded and occupied that country. Also consider than some of the great persian epic poems and ballads are about fighting in Afghanistan - Khorasan, as they call it. Certainly the Iranians have invaded that country, which is why there are so many Persian speakers there.
It's ironic that when Iran was politically benign during the 1950s, it was subjected to foreign meddling. But now that Iran is in the grip of an irredentist ideology and trying to build nuclear weapons, the Left are suddenly arguing they pose little threat.
It just goes to show how morally bankrupt the Left has become, when they scoff and sneer at some poor illiterate woman who's facing death by stoning, claiming that her case is over-hyped and overblown. That's not the kind of liberalism I was raised to respect - kids these days (sigh).
We shouldn't underestimate Iran, nor should we compare ourselves to the wonderfully brave but horribly under-equipped British.
In actual war with Iran, for example, those pre-positioned bases we built to defend the region against it might be used for their intended purpose.
They were built years before they were used in the Gulf War, with prepositioned equipment enough for a serious effort. They still exist, they are unsinkable, and (literally) generations of airmen and sailors have deployed to and fought from them.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
An Israeli attack isn't going to be a "war". It's going to be a hit and run attack like the attack on Saddam's Nuclear reactor. They will probably fly a few dozen planes into Iran and bomb the snot out of every facility they have intelligence on. Given Iran's preparations it will probably only destroy about 50% of the institutions in a best case scenario and likely have little to no effect other than a slight delay in production.
The solution to the Iranian problem is to bring their people to power and an attack on the Iranian nation would delay that solution.
Right, just to clear this up: the fact they've developed their own UAV bomber is purely to spite the 'West' whereas any similar defense technology development by a western nation should never be construed as antagonising the Middle East, let alone Iran. Furthermore, Iran should not by any means be allowed the same fear sodden defense industry that the West so covets and they should simply accept that.
No, it's because we didn't announce that we had the things until a decade after we started using them to maintain their legitimate strategic advantage in battle (just like nearly every other military tech in the last 30 years). They're using this as saber rattling, not as a genuine strategic advantage.
You ought to remember that many countries see the supposed leader of the West, The U.S, as a terrible and amoral aggressor, having willfully used WMDs against civilians (carpet bombing, nuclear weapons), continues to stockpile nuclear weapons munitions while chastising the rest of the world for doing so using trade and political embargoes
As if the number isn't being gradually decreased, used as a bargaining chip to get other nations, one of which has many more nukes than we do, to do the same.
trades big-brother-style protection rackets to arm-bend smaller countries into accepting U.S military bases
Citation please?
has camps in which they not only 'disappear' but spiritually and psychologically humiliate the prisoners using methods not seen since Vietnam (the list goes on)
I don't agree with Guantanamo, but you tank as if no other country has those. I guess they don't, since the public doesn't know about it like we know about Guantanamo.
This is the stuff they see in talk shows on their TVs, read in their opinion columns in their newspapers, talk about in political science classes at high-school, etc...
Funny, we talk about that stuff too, in those same classes.
"Iran's industrial sector is more advanced than you might think"
To be clear, you're talking about a country that sits on a giant reserve of oil, but has to import gasoline because they have no refining capacity. Iran's industrial sector is a fucking embarrassment.
You're talking about Tehran, a city whose building codes will be cited as the cause of the worst single humanitarian disaster in history when the big one finally hits NW Iran. 10 million dead is going to be an interesting psychic moment for the Islamic Republic.
Iran's great defense is their mountains. No one wants to fight from valley-to-valley killing thousands of poorly armed soldiers trying to fight a country that's one bad natural disaster away from being the next North Korea or Pakistan.
Even Saddam Hussein was only dumb enough to try it once.
I scream. You scream. I assume that means we're both acquainted with the problem. We proceed.
Iran's core military strategy is to send one guy with a rifle and ten unarmed guys behind him. The Iranians' grand military plan is to refight the Battle of Stalingrad. Even deploying this strategy, they basically fought Iraq to the ugliest stalemate since the trenches in France in 1915. A full-on war between the US and Iran would result in the equivalent of a one-sided Verdun every single week.
A couple missiles aren't going to mitigate the fact that Iran has no strategic petroleum reserve and zero refining capacity. Its transport would fail in the first week of any war and agriculture couldn't last a year. Probably less if the attacker(s) launched a prolonged ground war in late winter (as is US tradition in the region) before crops go in the ground.
A couple missiles are also not going to mitigate the fact that Iran would mostly depend on imported Hezbollah fighters to train its army how to fight a ground war the right way. And, frankly, you can't take a military modeled on the Red Army and convert it into a competent guerilla force like Hezbollah without years of advance planning. That planning hasn't happened. Iran doesn't have any commando force of any international reputation.
In short, Iran is not prepared to fight the war it would need to fight to take advantage of its rough terrain.
I scream. You scream. I assume that means we're both acquainted with the problem. We proceed.
And a range of 620 miles? Isn't that about the distance between Iran and Israel? How sweet of them.
(This "coincidence" is the surest sign to me that it doesn't have nearly the claimed range.)
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
Air war is as much about intelligence these days as anything else. Long gone are the days of the dog fights. Now, at least if you are talking the US, you engage targets beyond visual range with extremely smart guided missiles.
So if you want to have an airforce that can deal with the US you need four things:
1) Something to counter their AWACS. It might be stealthy jets, it might be good jamming hardware, whatever the case you have to have something to stop that. Otherwise, they'll know ever every single thing in the air is, with pinpoint accuracy. This can be crossdecked directly to new fighters, or simply told to older ones, so their jets can come in without ever turning on a radar. They don't even need them on to fire with AWACS coverage.
2) Something to pick up their planes. The US has a bunch of stealthy craft these days. Even the F/A-18Fs aren't easy to pick up and the F-22As are close to invisible unless the fire, never mind the B2-Bs. You need to have some technology to be able to find those, otherwise they'll pick off your planes, destroy your bases, etc and you won't be able to do anything about it. I don't know if there is such a technology, but you'd need to have some reasonable way to find their craft to kill them
3) Good night fighting ability. The US loves night attacks, because they are really good at it and most people are really bad at it. So you need the equipment and the training to have your jets as effective at night as during the day. Otherwise they'll simply wait until your air cover becomes weak at night and destroy the air bases.
4) Long range, highly effective missiles. Even if you can find their craft and so on you still have to engage them at a long range. The US has long range missiles that are hard to jam, you have to have the same if you are to have a realistic chance in air combat.
Without those four things, the US WILL have air superiority. They'll simply shoot down any fighters, bomb air bases (which can be done with extreme accuracy) and then blast SAM sites.
It just goes to show how morally bankrupt the Left has become, when they scoff and sneer at some poor illiterate woman who's facing death by stoning, claiming that her case is over-hyped and overblown. That's not the kind of liberalism I was raised to respect - kids these days (sigh).
How about this for a liberal value: LEAVE SOVEREIGN NATIONS ALONE. If we have to invade Iran for stoning women, we've got about twenty other countries with worse human rights records - including some of our biggest allies like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan - that we'd have to invade. And those other allies I mentioned are far less democratic than Iran.
Hezbollah did not appear out of Iran's magic crystal ball. It appeared directly as a result of Israeli and American forces invading Lebanon in 1982. If you'll remember at the time, Iran was fighting an all out war against the US backed henchman Saddam Hussein, because we didn't like their chosen government back then either. I don't think they had time to form a commando unit and invade Lebanon while they were losing that war. (Gee, and that was around the time that Reagan and some current Fox News personalities were committing treason by selling weapons to sworn enemies, taking the money to Colombia, and playing the other side of the drug war to fund the unconstitutional CIA. Fascinating!)
We like destroying secular Arab nationalism and getting absolutely shocked when it turns into extreme islamic fundamentalism. We destroyed the Iranian government in 1953 and ended up with the Islamic Revolution in 1979. We destroyed the marxist government of Afghanistan and eventually got the Taliban. We destroyed the PLO and got Hamas. We destroyed Lebanese movements and we got Hezbollah. We destroyed Iraq and I'll guaran-fucking-tee you we're going to get some crazy Shia elements there as well. Amazing! It's like if you subject people with war and misery for decades, they come out the other side with some kind of chip on their shoulder.
Can we see a pattern here? Just like if you invaded South Carolina and took out their army, you'd have a bunch of fanatical Christians blowing themselves up trying to take just a piece out of whoever invaded. It's a rational response when you have no options left.
So, seriously, shut the fuck up about Iran. You can get all offended and moral about their religious laws when you stop Catholic priests from using their separate religious rules to rape children and get away with it. Oh, but I guess child-rape is morally sound in your sad, fucked up world, huh? Either that, or you think it's easier to go halfway around the world and start another war in the same spot for the third time this decade to stop some injustice.
If you really think that's the case, I have only one thing to say: go. fuck. yourself.
Sincerely,
A "Liberal" Who Has Values,
Including Calling A Spade A Spade
Was it just me who looked at the picture attached to the article and thought "Thunderbirds"? ...then I looked at the bunch of characters next to it and I swear I saw some puppet strings.
I do not recall the President of the US proposing to "wipe off the face of the earth" any country.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
They have been doing most of their moves quietly. There is a 'public' flight from Venezuela airline that move between Venezuela, Syria, and Iran. The only problem is that when the publica tries to book a flight, you can not get on it.
Yeah, this hit the 'news' recently, and its a load of twaddle. The actual route is a circular route between Tehran-Beirut-Damascus-Caracus (Iran Air flight 744) and the 'issue' of not being able to book a seat on it was raised by an Israeli intelligence operative.
The problem is, you can certainly book a flight on it, there are even aviation enthusiasts that have published trip reports (http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/trip_reports/read.main/107603).