Inside daring rescue to avoid wasting US airman from Iran – CIA deception and firefight
The US President fired off a rant threatening to blitz Iran’s power plants and bridges unless it reopened the Strait of Hormuz, after the missing American airman was rescued
(Image: AP)
Donald Trump warned ‘crazy b*******’ Iran to open their ‘f******’ shipping lanes or face ‘hell’ – after his troops pulled off one of the greatest ever behind-enemy-lines rescues.
The US President fired off a foul-mouthed rant threatening to blitz Iran’s power plants and bridges unless its leaders agreed to re-open the Strait of Hormuz – the key sea supply route they have shut in revenge for American-Israeli attacks.
It came after an emboldened Trump crowed ‘we got him’ when his special forces soldiers pulled off a daring rescue of an American airman trapped behind enemy lines following an F-15E fighter crash.
The two-man crew of the jet were missing in action after being shot down over Iran on Friday. The pilot ejected safely and was rescued by two military helicopters the same day.
But the second crew member – who the President described as a ‘highly respected Colonel’- had to dodge chasing Iranians for 36 hours with a £45,000 bounty on his head while Reaper drones overhead protected him from danger. Nursing an injured leg after ejecting and armed with just a handgun he scaled a 7,000ft mountain peak to escape his pursuers before making a daring dash to the rescue site.
The operation to bring him home involved dozens of special forces troops and several dozen warplanes and helicopters. A firefight broke out on the ground as Iranian forces closed in on the stricken colonel. He was snatched to safety by US special forces minutes before his almost certain capture.
During the mission two of five rescue planes that got stuck in a remote airfield inside Iran and were blown up by the Americans to avoid being captured by the enemy. Sources claimed up to 100 Iranians were killed in the operation while the US suffered no casualties.
Trump hailed Saturday night’s swoop ‘one of the most daring search and rescue operations in US history’. He wrote on his Trump Social network: “We got him…safe and sound.”
The President said ‘this brave warrior was behind enemy lines’ in the ‘treacherous mountains of Iran being hunted down by our enemies who were getting closer and closer by the hour’. But he was ‘never truly alone’ because US military leaders were ‘monitoring his location 24 hours a day’.
“At my direction the US military sent dozens of aircraft armed with the most lethal weapons in the world to retrieve him,” Trump said. “He sustained injuries but he will be just fine.”
Trump said a news blackout had been ordered over the pilot’s rescue because ‘we did not want to jeopardise’ the second operation. He said: “This is the first time in military memory that two US pilots have been rescued separately deep in enemy territory. We will never leave an American warfighter behind.”
CIA intelligence experts tricked Iranian forces into believing the missing colonel had already been found when he was actually hiding out deep inside Iranian territory. Regime chiefs placed a bounty on his ‘head’ and urged locals near the crash site to hunt down and seize him .
Bombs and weapons were fired from US warplanes to keep Iranian troops away. Iran state media claimed its military destroyed US C-130 military aircraft which had flown into their airspace to rescue the colonel.
But US officials said they blew up the aircraft themselves to keep them out of enemy hands after they got struck in sand. An MH-6 Little Bird helicopter was also destroyed after it was damaged before the evacuation. The rescued airman was flown out to Kuwait.
Basking in the operation’s success Trump later messaged: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day and Bridge Day all wrapped up in one in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!!
“Open the f****** Strait, you crazy b*******, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah. President Donald J Trump.”
For the latest breaking news and stories from across the globe from the Daily Star, sign up for our newsletters .
