The U.S. Navy has linked a Nov. 15 UAV attack on a Liberian-flagged tanker in the northern Arabian Sea to Iran by collecting evidence of the UAV aboard the ship, identifying it as a Shahed-136.
Photographs of the UAV, released by the U.S. Navy on Nov. 22, show Western-made parts that are used by Iran to build the drone, which is also being used by Russian forces in Ukraine.
“The Iranian attack on a commercial tanker transiting international waters was deliberate, flagrant and dangerous, endangering the lives of the ship’s crew and destabilizing maritime security in the Middle East,” Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, commander of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, says in a statement.
On Nov. 15, the ship M/T Pacific Zircon was hit by an explosive-laden aerial drone in international waters. The drone tore a 30-in.-wide hole in the back of the ship, damaging internal compartments including a shipboard boiler, a potable water tank and a life raft.
Following the attack, the British Royal Navy dispatched the frigate HMS Lancaster to the site. The U.S. Navy sent the guided missile destroyer USS The Sullivans, patrol coastal ship USS Chinook and a P-8 Poseidon to monitor the scene.
Two U.S. Navy explosive ordnance technicians boarded the ship and collected fragments, which were taken to a lab in Bahrain, a news release said. The Navy released a series of images of the fragments and identified them as parts of a Shahed-136 UAV. They included a fuel hatch, triangular hatch, aileron servo assembly, vertical stabilizer and a GNSS Antenna Array with an individual puck. The antenna array photo shows equipment from Canadian manufacturer Tallysman.
Ukrainian forces have collected evidence of similar drones inside Ukraine and have found components from several countries including the U.S., Canada, Germany and Japan, the Wall Street Journal said.
Cooper, speaking to reporters at the Pentagon in October, said Iran has proliferated its use of these UAVs, along with ballistic and cruise missiles, in the region both through direct use and by sending them to proxies in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen.
“Iran has for sure increased their capabilities with their UAVs and yes, we see that every single day operating in the maritime around the Middle East. It’s both their capabilities and their numbers and the fact that they’ve proliferated them to multiple proxies,” he says.
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