Discussion
US F-15E jet confirmed shot down over Iran as Tehran releases wreckage images
rhcom2: One crew member rescued, other is still MIA and being actively searched for https://www.axios.com/2026/04/03/iran-us-fighter-shot-down
ceejayoz: And CENTCOM's lying about it.https://x.com/CENTCOM/status/2039805134704660622
roadbuster: During the entire gulf war (Iraq, 1990-91), only two F-15s were shot down via surface-to-air engagement. At the time, Baghdad was known to have the highest density of SAM protection out of any city in the world.An F-15 being shot down in Iran after weeks of strategic bombing of their anti-air defense systems is not a good sign.
user_7832: Hate to say it and sound so "conspiracy-like", but I no longer can trust what the current US administration is saying. Ever since the path of a hurricane was redrawn with a sharpie, it's been... unusual.
readthenotes1: That has been (rightly) said every year there has been a current US administration.It is not a conspiracy theory if it's true.And no, it's not "cynicism Olympics", it's observation.
2OEH8eoCRo0: Right on cue!
golfer: Non-walled article reporting the rescue:https://www.cbsnews.com/news/american-fighter-jet-f15e-downe...
dragonwriter: The US military is in the middle of a top-level political purge; both honesty and competence as an institution will be below normal levels for the forseeable future, and honesty about sensitive operations during wartime is never much even as a baseline.
peyton: The US military is civilian-controlled, and we had an election. A “political purge” is generally accepted to be something that happens within a political party to consolidate a dictator’s power. Not a popular election where people vote to put new people in charge, which necessarily means removing the old people in charge.
2OEH8eoCRo0: Your comment is a perfect setup for the cynicism olympics where people rush to say you could never trust the govt.
ifyoubuildit: Do you have some reasons for hope for the cynics in the crowd?
2OEH8eoCRo0: Not really. Just that trust ain't binary and the govt is made of people. I don't like this admin but this too shall pass. Cultivate your garden. Electing bad people has consequences.
tristanj: No, that tweet is from 20 hours ago, and is about a separate incident which happened two days ago over Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz.The current F-15 crash incident happened today near the city of Lali, in Iran’s Khuzestan Province.
AnimalMuppet: All true. So we should expect it, but we still shouldn't normalize it.
vorpalhex: That tweet is from yesterday.Iran tweets about taking down an American jet basically daily. By their count we are down 40 f-35s, 4 aircraft carriers and thousands of MQ-9s.
buildsjets: And they have not edited it or taken it down... why?
e-khadem: Because almost all of the people inside Iran have been disconnected for the past 35 days [1]. And believe it or not, they are texting these news live to all mobile phones on a daily basis as well. Some regime supporters believe it, because the want to believe it, they need to believe it. Just in the past 24 hours I have received 5 different messages from different organizations claiming victory and damage to US / Israel assets.Just for a quick laugh, look at the official (Iranian) president's letter to the American people published yesterday [2]. The font changes between the paragraphs![1] https://mastodon.social/@netblocks/116339631989805542[2] https://x.com/drpezeshkian/status/2039418009052119190?s=20
serf: I wouldn't be so pleased with myself over such "You will get wet in a rainstorm." style predictions.truths from different angles that are at odds with one another produce mistrust and thoughts of conspiracy. We have more of that now than we have ever had, ever. It doesn't take Nostradamus to point to the trend.tl;dr : Gee, where did this mistrust in the current government come from? I'd point but I don't have that many hands.
sco1: > Not a popular election where people vote to put new people in charge, which necessarily means removing the old people in charge.More than a year after they took office and in the middle of a war?
flowerthoughts: Surely SAMs have improved since 1991? Have the F-15s improved significantly? (I know nothing about military stuff.)
roadbuster: They certainly have, but the general idea is to first use stealth jets to bomb defensive systems (including radar observability) to conquer the skies, and then you can fly around somewhat freely. While SAM technology has improved, so have America's observability and stealth bombing capabilities. It will be interesting to learn the context and sequence of events which led to an F-15 being shot down by enemy fire.(In 1991, the United States relied on the F-117 Nighthawk to penetrate Baghdad and launch salvos against radar and SAM sites. Simultaneously, Tomahawk cruise missiles were fired against similar communication and defense sites. In this war with Iran, the F-35 and B-2 have been used for stealth missions).
