Was Tacit Blue Flown Over Iran in the 1980's

With the recent rise in tensions with Iran, I thought I would resurect this image and see what people thought. I saw it in a popular science many years ago. What it shows is a picture taken over Iran with a plane that to my eye looks like the Tacit Blue. SO what may be flying over Iran today?

The U.S. Air Force unveiled the Tacit Blue Technology Demonstration Program on April 30, 1996, at the Pentagon. Tacit Blue was created to demonstrate that a low observable surveillance aircraft with a low probability of intercept radar and other sensors could operate close to the forward line of battle with a high degree of survivability. Such an aircraft could continuously monitor the ground situation behind the battlefield and provide targeting information in real-time to a ground command center. Tacit Blue validated a number of innovative stealth technology advances.

Tacit Blue featured a straight tapered wing with a Vee tail mounted on an oversized fuselage with a curved shape. The aircraft has a wingspan of 48.2 feet and a length of 55.8 feet and weighed 30,000 pounds. A single flush inlet on the top of the fuselage provided air to two high-bypass turbofan engines. Tacit Blue employed a quadruply redundant, digital fly by wire flight control system to help stabilize the aircraft about the longitudinal and directional axes.
www.globalsecurity.org...

[edit on 8/13/05 by FredT]

Iran recently admitted that it has had a nuclear program for 18 years now. I don't think we had anything flying over Iran, otherwise we would have known about Iran's nuclear program a long time ago.

Why fly that, we were still using SR-71's in the 80's. They could get in and out without being observed. Keep in mind, we helped build Iran's air defense systems, and knew where the holes in it were.

From 1980 to 1984 there were some proposals to build operational reconnaissance version from Tacit Blue, but they never realized.

Just one question: Were USA able to risk they latest stealth and top secret technology only for some photos from Iran? My answer is NO, because they had many other usefull devices for reconnaissance.

But they should use some secret unmanned vehicle. Just remember Lockheed Senior Prom. Many people still believe, that it was advanced cruise missile, but revealed information is telling, that it was secret reconnaissance plane, launched from C-130 [to replace the Firebee].

Not likely. TB was a testbed for the B-2. It was never a operational plane. Actually TB used to work from Area 51

no, I think thats just a UFO.

BTW, everytime I see that Tacit Blue I just have to wonder what were the builders smokin, I mean come on, its the exact opposite of aerodynamic.

Hard to say! In some ways, the two craft look very simular in many ways. On the other hand, we only have evidence for a single test plane being built. If Tacit Blue ever went operational, why didn't they build more of them? I've never heard of the military buying only one operational example of an aircraft. The smallest operational fleet of military aircraft that I've ever heard of is the 2 VC-25A's that make up the Presidential airlift fleet (Tail Numbers: 28,000 and 29,000). The only reason the fleet is so small, is because we only have One President at a time, so they have Air Craft #28,000 as the primary, with 29,000 as the back-up. Why would you build a single spy plane? As many nations as we have to keep an eye on, surly they would want a fleet of several.

Tim

Originally posted by iris_failsafe
Not likely. TB was a testbed for the B-2. It was never a operational plane. Actually TB used to work from Area 51

More exactly - it was a testbed for curved shaped stealth plane. It is the reason, why the aerodynamic was at the last place and low RCS on the first place. I know that only one example was build and the second was completed as a backup for some 40%. But what I wrote was, that there were short time some attempts to build operational reconnaissance version from Tacit Blue, equipped with SLAR radar. It stayed only on drawing board.

Originally posted by NWguy83
Iran recently admitted that it has had a nuclear program for 18 years now. I don't think we had anything flying over Iran, otherwise we would have known about Iran's nuclear program a long time ago.

- Er don't you know the Iranian "nuclear program" all got started thanks to the USA?

So of course the USA knows all about the early Iranian "nuclear program" and when it all got started.

The foundations for Iran's nuclear program were laid in the 1960 under auspices of the U.S. within the framework of bilateral agreements between the two countries.

In 1967 the Tehran Nuclear Research Center (TNRC) was built and run by the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI). The TNRC was equipped with a US supplied 5-megawatt nuclear research reactor. Iran signed and ratified the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1968.

With the establishment of Iran's atomic agency and the NPT in place plans were drawn by Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi (Iran's monarch) to construct up to 23 nuclear power stations across the country together with USA by the year 2000.

By 1975, The U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, had signed National Security Decision Memorandum 292, titled "U.S.-Iran Nuclear Cooperation," which laid out the details of the sale of nuclear energy equipment to Iran projected to bring U.S. corporations more than $6 billion in revenue.
At the time, Iran was pumping as much as 6 million barrels (950,000 m³) of oil a day, compared with about 4 million barrels (640,000 m³) daily today.

President Gerald R. Ford even signed a directive in 1976 offering Tehran the chance to buy and operate a U.S.-built reprocessing facility for extracting plutonium from nuclear reactor fuel. The deal was for a complete "nuclear fuel cycle". The Ford strategy paper said the "introduction of nuclear power will both provide for the growing needs of Iran's economy and free remaining oil reserves for export or conversion to petrochemicals."[1]

en.wikipedia.org...