By Jacob K Philip
How many military aircraft/remotely controlled aircraft/drones have both sides lost in the West Asia war so far?
While it is true that the first casualty in a war is truth and facts, there are still some figures that can be confirmed as of April 2, a month and three days after the war began.
If we sift through all the information spread by both sides’ news channels, newspapers, and especially social media, it can be seen that the reliable numbers are, five aircraft and 60 remotely controlled aircraft/drones.
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Aircraft:
1. A US Air Force Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft.
-Crash on March 12 while flying over western Iraq
2. A US Air Force Boeing E-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft (registration 81-0005).
-Destroyed by an Iranian missile on March 27 while parked at Prince Sultan Air Base in Al Kharj, Saudi Arabia.
3. Three US Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jets were accidentally shot down by the Kuwaiti Air Force near Al Jahra, Kuwait, on March 1.
Total 5.
Drones, Remotely Controlled Aircraft:
1. US MQ-9 Reapers – 12
Shot down and damaged during the attack.
2. US MQ-9 UAVs – 5
3. US MQ-4C Triton – 1
This Northrop Grumman MQ-4C remotely piloted-reconnaissance aircraft, registration 169660, has not flown since it made a distress call and landed at Al Dhafra Air Base in Abu Dhabi on February 22.
4. Iranian attack drones (such as the Shaheed) – 40
This is not a complete count. This is because many drones are launched together and many drone interceptions go unrecorded.
5. Israeli Hermes and Heron UAVs – 2
This is also not a complete count. This is because very little information is publicly available about most of Israel’s drones.
A total of 60.
Although the total loss of aircraft and drones has so far been confirmed to be 65, it is widely reported that seven US fighter jets, four AWACS aircraft, three tankers, four transport aircraft and 20 UAVs (such as the MQ-4C Triton) have been destroyed.
These are reasons why these claims cannot be confirmed –
1. No debris from the crashed aircraft have been found anywhere
2. There are no satellite images of the aircraft that are said to have destroyed while parked at airbases.
3. There were no known search and rescue operations after the aircraft went down.
3. There are also no reports of capture of the crew of the aircraft that are claimed to have been shot down, alive or dead.
The mere fact that the aircraft has not been seen on tracking sites does not prove that the aircraft has crashed. During war, such aircraft may fly completely invisible—with their transponders turned off.
There are two reasons why Iran’s losses are not complete.
The first is that Iran has only fielded a few aircraft, just because they have very few fighter planes. And in the present theatre of war, Iranian aircraft do not penetrate and attack enemy areas. Their primary weapons are all missiles and drones. As mentioned earlier, since many drones are launched at once, the number of losses can often be inaccurate.
The reason why Israel’s aircraft losses are not counted is because of the very strict censorship that exists there. Moreover, the fact that the frontline fighters in this war are the United States, is also minimizing and hiding Israel’s air losses.
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Jacob K Philip is the Editor of Aviation India/Indian Aviation News Net. He can be reached at jacob@indianaviationnews.net
