Saturday, August 17, 2019

Iraq: Closes down airspace to all flights after Iranian bomb store exploded.

(Baghdad) The one thing that you can take for granted in the Middle East is rumours run riot. In fact people have been murdered on the wisp of a rumour, be it your daughter was seen talking to a man, that UN teams are administering a Polio vaccine makes you ill or even that the Israelis are bombing from afar.

Well the last rumour has spread like wild fire after an Iranian arms depot went bang the other day. The official Iraq comment on the explosion was that it was due to a fire which started due to the poor husbandry of the arms depot which wasn't helped by the heat of the day.
However this is the Middle East, which is why former Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Baha al-Araji is pushing the line of :
“We believe the weapons depot was targeted by an oppressive colonial state on the basis of a treasonous Iraqi act,”
As rumour and rife rule the roost here, the Iraqi PM Abdul-Mahdi  has now called for an end to all “unauthorized flights,” whether US drones, spy planes, jets, or helicopters, and insisted that planes that do operate in Iraqi airspace must comply with Iraqi law and under Iraqi government direction.
The thing is the F35 stealth fighter simply does not have the legs to fly to Iraq and back in full stealth. Something it would have to do in which to ensure mission success. But hey rumour and rife.