By Ahmad Habibullah

It’s now common knowledge that all the political fantasies of the US-Zionist alliance that led to the latest unprovoked and inhumane war on Iran have become a nightmare for President Donald Trump, his core team, and the war criminal in Tel Aviv, Benjamin Netanyahu.

To their utter surprise and shock, Iran has courageously fought back with unparalleled and indomitable spirit for over five weeks, following the aggression that led to the martyrdom of over 2,000 people, many of them children and women, with civilians and civilian infrastructure being the main targets.

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei and some top-ranking military commanders were also assassinated in the very first wave of aggression on February 28.

The brave Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) and the strong Iranian Army, with the full popular support of the Iranian nation, who have been on the streets from day one, will continue to resist this blatant aggression until their legitimate demands, as outlined by the new Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Sayyed Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei, are met completely and unconditionally.

On the other hand, the United States, with its inflated propaganda and the repeated, often contradictory claims by Trump that it has won the war and achieved all its objectives, is now in a quagmire of heavy and insulting defeat. The loud claims of defeating Iran do not match the harsh ground realities of the war, which Iran is winning and gaining more victories daily.

Below is a brief analysis of the factors leading to this dramatic and unpredictable scenario that has attracted the attention of the whole world these days and has smeared the face of the United States as a failing state and Iran as a heroic nation.

1. The pre-planning of the war was not initiated by the US political establishment or its military. Rather, it was the war-mongering idea of Netanyahu from about 40 years ago, painted with far-fetched, unachievable aims, and was practically lobbied by AIPAC through Zionists and Neocons within the US political system. He then found the right opportunity to pressure President Trump to strike Iran after the media exposed the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.
2. None of the objectives that were loudly claimed to be the reasons for unleashing the aggressive war on Iran have been achieved so far. “Regime change” has basically failed; there is no certainty that the nuclear program has been completely eradicated, and the Strait of Hormuz is still under the control of the IRGC. The so-called “most powerful army” in the world has suffered a humiliating defeat it never imagined at the hands of a comparatively much weaker country militarily: Iran.
3. While Trump repeatedly claimed that the Iranian navy, ground forces, and air force were destroyed, the technological superiority of the US Army has been completely defeated, and it has failed on the ground. Every day, several hi-tech US drones and several of its top-class fighter jets, including the untouchable and so-called formidable jets, are being shot down. Interestingly, all this billions-of-dollars-worth of military equipment is being shot down by relatively very cheap Iranian military drones and interceptors designed and developed indigenously.
4. If the US were indeed winning the war, the top American army generals and officials would be awarded medals and honors. However, adding to the current quagmire, several of its top military officials, including the chief of staff of the US Army, have been fired by the Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth. This is strong evidence not only of the failure of the top military leadership in their practical war strategy but also indicates their disagreement with Trump and Hegseth.
5. There is rising global condemnation of the illegal and unnecessary war against Iran, which has now isolated the US and its ally, the rogue Zionist regime. Especially the bombing of Minab School, which caused the brutal massacre of nearly 170 school children, has led to worldwide protests and sympathy for the Iranian nation, despite the US propaganda of face-saving excuses. Aside from nearly all Asian, Latin American, and African countries that have opposed this aggression against Iran, the European allies of the US and members of NATO have decided that they will not take part in this war and will not allow their airspace for US military purposes.
6. The rallies all over the U and many European countries against Trump, his international and domestic policies, and his close relationship with the child and female sex mafia chief Jeffrey Epstein have led to a new movement that is growing day by day and seeks to ultimately remove him from power. There is a strong possibility that he will be impeached next year.
7. The decline of US power started several years ago and has been progressing steadily because of several factors. The internal factors include rising political corruption, instability of government and private institutions, a wide gap between rich and poor, over three trillion dollars of national debt, suppression of freedom of speech, undue intervention in academic affairs by polarized government policies, violent suppression of protests in top universities, nationwide police brutality (especially recently by ICE), racial injustice, blockade of immigrants who were the backbone of the low-paid workforce for years, and highly intelligent students and intellectuals who were the basis of the intellectual and technological superiority of American universities and institutions. There is also rising public awareness that members of the United States political establishment are serving the interests of the Zionist regime rather than the interests of their own country. Finally, there is a media campaign that calls for a renewal of the whole so-called democratic but tyrannically capitalist system of the United States.
8. The external factors that have turned the US into a paper tiger superpower include the long-standing failed foreign policy of the country, which is mostly based on hegemony, regime change operations, targeted assassinations, a war-based economy, all-out support of the Zionist regime, support of weaker countries that serve as vassal states and lack the support of their own people but provide oil and other benefits such as minerals, exploitations and interventions in several Asian, African, and Latin American countries, and overall behaving as hegemon in every country, bypassing the United Nations. In addition, the launch of the recent MAGA project introduced by Trump, with aggressive policies of high-handed tariffs and derogatory political and economic tactics even against friendly nations, has significantly contributed to its overall decline.

All these factors have led to subtle opposition over recent years, leading to new alliances confronting the United States and its hegemonic policies. The US has, in fact, created its own enemies. The BRICS, SCO, and Sahel Alliance are examples of a rising multipolar world that will ultimately take over the future of the world economy and overwhelm the military superiority of the United States.

The start of the war has led to a change in the geopolitics of South Asia and especially the West Asian region. There is increased insecurity among Persian Gulf states, which have heavily and solely relied on the US for their security. They will not be security partners of the US in the future, irrespective of the outcome of the current war.

On the other hand, the overall failure of the US military-industrial complex, the destruction of its regional military bases, radars, military planes, fighter jets, drones, and other such facilities, and everything that supported its military or war-based economy in the Persian Gulf states, and its crushing defeat by the IRGC and the Iranian Army, have earned respect for Iranians as a heroic nation in the world.

Especially for most Muslim and developing countries that were previously afraid of even murmuring against the oppression of the US, Iran has solidly proven that a courageous nation can be successful and defeat the strongest army and has shown them the path to follow. This will have a long-lasting impact, especially in West Asia, with the ultimate eviction of the American forces from the region and its replacement by a friendly alliance of Muslim nations with the support of China and Russia.

The rapid and powerful rise of resistance movements against the US-Zionist aggression in recent years has added a new game-changer not only in West Asia but also worldwide. The Ansarullah resistance movement of Yemen has yet to play its important and strategic role in the ongoing war in support of Iran.

The blockade of the Bab al-Mandab Strait will definitely have a crippling effect on the already deteriorating economic situation of Europe, the United States, and other Western countries.

In addition, African and Latin American countries are coming together and gaining the courage to confront the US and European colonialist policies. This will definitely lead to the emergence of new anti-colonialist and resistant alliances in these continents against the United States.

End of war: Shallow conjecture-based proposal

A shallow conjecture-based proposal would be to advise Iran to accept the repeated requests by the US government to end the war and agree to negotiate on the 15 unrealistic, cruel, and one-sided points of the aggressive enemy, and not consider the 5 realistic and legitimate points proposed by Iran, as reported by Press TV for the first time.

It is now well-known and based on reports published in international journals and books written by famous political scientists, psychologists, and psychiatrists that Trump is a narcissistic psychopath with a dangerous delusional personality.

He is highly unreliable, lacks emotional stability, and has mental problems. He is heavily under the influence of neocon Zionists who are blackmailing him for his close association with Jeffrey Epstein.

His statements uttered without cortical involvement, such as that Iran will be sent “back to the Stone Ages, where they belong,” indicate the bluffs of a politician not fit for any office.

In addition, considering past experiences, there is no guarantee that Iran will not be attacked, will not be subjected to more unjust and crippling sanctions, will not be a victim of external and internal conspiracies, assassinations, and other internationally defined violations of human rights.

There is absolutely no possibility of any mutual nonaggression pact with the US whereby it will not strike Iran in the future. Any suggestion of future economic interactions with the US while it has heavily sanctioned Iran for years is a political fantasy and a dumb idea that has nothing to do with reality.

While Trump has announced that the war against Iran has ended, the US Army is continuously bombing Iran every day without any distinction between civilian and military targets. In addition, the US and the illegitimate Zionist Regime have previously been deceptive and have deceived the Iranians.

They started the war while indirect nuclear negotiations were going on. The 12-day war ended with a ceasefire; however, in December 2025, they again conspired and orchestrated nationwide violent riots, damaging public properties, killing public and government police and security personnel, and attempting to provoke public sentiments against the government with all-out media propaganda.

There is a complete lack of trust on the Iranian side in any proposal from the US side. Thus, the proposal to end the war at this stage, when the US is clearly losing it on all fronts, is akin to falling into the deceptive trap, showing a lack of political foresight, not considering the precious gains Iran has achieved so far – both militarily and politically – and finally losing its global position as the leading resistant nation.

[…]

Via https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/06/766388/ending-us-israeli-war-iran-ground-realities-evidence-based-path-forward

By Ivan Kesic

April 5, 2026

In a stunning display of coordinated defensive warfare, Iranian forces – combining the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), police commando units, Basij resistance fighters, and regular army elements – destroyed two American C-130 transport planes and two Black Hawk helicopters in southern Isfahan province early on Sunday.

The complex operation transformed a US rescue mission into the most embarrassing American military debacle since the 1980 Tabas desert catastrophe.

The thirty-seventh day of the US-Israeli aggression against the Islamic Republic of Iran did not begin with American triumph as some US officials claimed, but with Iranian fire.

Just after dawn on Sunday, Washington launched what it would later desperately frame as a successful rescue operation for a downed F-15E pilot from the 3 April engagements.

Instead, the mission became a complete operational collapse.

Within hours, the spokesperson for the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters announced that Iranian joint forces had destroyed two C-130 military transport aircraft and two Black Hawk helicopters in southern Isfahan province.

Images of burning wreckage – geolocated and verified by Press TV – circulated across global platforms, drawing immediate and unavoidable comparisons to Operation Eagle Claw, the failed 1980 American rescue mission that ended with eight US soldiers dead and aircraft abandoned in the Tabas desert in South Khorasan province.

For the Islamic Republic, it was not merely a defensive feat. It was historical revenge, divine justice, and a military-technological declaration that US power holds no sway over Iranian skies, contrary to the claims of US President Donald Trump and his war minister.

Desperate rescue born from earlier defeat

The events of Saturday cannot be understood in isolation. They were the direct consequence of the black day that had struck American air power on April 3, when Iranian integrated air defense networks downed an F-15E Strike Eagle over central Iran, along with an A-10 Thunderbolt II over the Persian Gulf, multiple MQ-9 Reaper drones, Hermes reconnaissance platforms, and cruise missiles.

The F-15E, a twin-seat multirole strike fighter valued at over $90 million, disintegrated upon impact in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province in central Iran.

The crew member or members remained missing, despite an initial American extraction bid that cost the aggressors two Black Hawk helicopters damaged by Iranian ground fire on April 3. There is no evidence that the US forces were able to locate the pilot. 

By Saturday, US commanders faced an impossible choice: abandon a missing airman to Iranian custody, or launch a deeper, riskier incursion into sovereign Iranian territory.

They chose the latter. That decision would prove catastrophic.

The Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters later confirmed that the Americans had planned what they called a “deceive and immediate escape mission,” using an abandoned airport in southern Isfahan Province as a covert staging point.

Iranian intelligence, however, had already mapped the operation.

Morning of 5 April: Joint forces spring the trap

According to reports, at approximately 09:20 local time on April 5, American aircraft began entering Iranian airspace to search for the missing pilot.

The formation included two C-130 Hercules transport planes—four-engine turboprop workhorses designed for tactical airlift, paratroop drops, and medical evacuation—alongside two UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters providing close support and personnel extraction.

According to operational summaries released by the IRGC and confirmed by the Law Enforcement Command, the US aircraft attempted to descend toward the pre-identified abandoned airport.

What the Americans did not anticipate was the full integration of Iranian defensive assets: IRGC Aerospace Force radar and missile batteries, police special operations commando units positioned on the ground, Basij resistance fighters familiar with the mountainous terrain, and regular army air defence elements all operating under a single command structure.

The spokesperson for the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters described the response as “divinely guided and precisely timed.”

As the C-130s approached their landing zone, Iranian police commando units opened heavy fire from multiple directions, immobilizing the first transport aircraft before it could unload its personnel.

Minutes later, IRGC air defence systems locked onto the second C-130 and the two Black Hawks. One by one, the American aircraft were struck.

Two C-130s and two Black Hawks as the toll of defeat

By 10:20 local time, Iranian media began broadcasting the first official confirmations.

The Khatam al-Anbiya spokesperson announced that two Black Hawk helicopters and one C-130 military transport plane had been destroyed, left burning in southern Isfahan.

Subsequent detailed reporting, including images released by local media and verified by geolocation analysis, revealed the full scope: two C-130 aircraft had been hit, not one.

The discrepancy was explained by the dynamics of the engagement; the first C-130 was immobilized by police commando fire and then completely destroyed minutes later, while the second was struck during an attempted escape manoeuvre.

Both Black Hawk helicopters were downed in the vicinity of the abandoned airport, their wreckage scattered across the arid landscape.

At least five American personnel were killed in the operation, according to Iranian military sources. Some unofficial reports have put the death toll even higher.

The IRGC’s Public Relations Department issued a terse but devastating statement.

“The invading enemy aircraft in southern Isfahan, including two Black Hawk helicopters and two C-130 military transport aircraft, were hit and are now burning in the flames of the wrath of the heroic fighters of Islam,” it stated.

For the first time since the aggression began on 28 February, Washington had lost not just strike aircraft but the very platforms designed to retrieve downed pilots, a catastrophic failure of combat search-and-rescue doctrine.

Tabas parallel: History repeats as humiliation deepens

Even before the smoke had cleared over Isfahan, the city known for its picturesque gardens and magnificent monuments, Iranian officials and social media users alike drew an unmistakable historical parallel: the failed American Operation Eagle Claw of April 1980.

That aborted mission, launched during the first year of the Islamic Revolution, had sought to rescue US captives from Tehran but ended in disaster at a remote desert in Tabas.

A sandstorm, equipment failures, and a catastrophic collision between a C-130 transport plane and an RH-53 helicopter had killed eight American servicemen and left the wreckage of multiple aircraft abandoned on Iranian soil.

The United States had suffered not just military defeat but global humiliation at the time.

On 5 April 2026, 46 years later, history repeated itself with even greater Iranian proficiency.

Where the 1980 Tabas operation had failed primarily due to weather and mechanical issues, the 2026 Isfahan defeat was the product of deliberate, coordinated Iranian defensive action.

Iranian forces did not wait for nature to defeat the Americans; they destroyed them directly, using domestically developed weapons, real-time intelligence integration, and the courage of IRGC, police commandos and Basij volunteers.

Images circulating on social media juxtaposed the burning C-130 wreckage of 2026 with black-and-white photographs of the Tabas desert debris field from 1980.

The message was unmistakable: forty-six years after its first humiliation in the Islamic Republic, the United States had learned nothing and lost even more.

Joint nature of victory: Police, IRGC, Basij, and Army

What distinguishes the 5 April operation from previous Iranian defensive successes, including Tabas, is the breadth of its joint character.

The Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters spokesperson explicitly named the participating forces: the IRGC Aerospace Force and Ground Forces, the regular Army, volunteer Basij resistance units, and law enforcement police commandos.

This was not a narrow military engagement but a national defensive mobilization.

The police special units, in particular, played a decisive role in immobilising the first C-130, demonstrating that Iranian law enforcement personnel are fully integrated into the country’s layered air defence architecture.

Local sources also reported that a refuelling aircraft belonging to the intruding US forces was shot down in southern Isfahan Province, targeted by elite police commando units.

The Law Enforcement Command confirmed that precise monitoring of enemy aerial movements, combined with rapid and coordinated responses, had made the operation possible.

For Iranian military planners, the Isfahan victory validated years of investment in joint command, control, communications, and intelligence integration—capabilities that American military assessments had consistently underestimated or dismissed.

American narrative: Desperate spin and visible silence

In the hours following the Isfahan debacle, US President Donald Trump took to social media to claim that a “daring” and “miraculous” rescue operation had successfully extracted the missing F-15E pilot with no American losses.

Iranian officials responded with immediate statements, mocking the US president’s claim.

Speaker of the Iranian Parliament Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf posted an image of the destroyed C-130 wreckage on his X account, writing with sharp sarcasm: “If the United States gets three more victories like this, it will be utterly ruined.”

The IRGC Intelligence Organization highlighted the absence of any photographs or video evidence of the supposedly rescued pilot—a stark contrast to the abundant Iranian imagery of burning American aircraft.

Iranian analysts noted that even if the American narrative were accepted at face value, the cost of the operation had been catastrophic: two C-130 transport planes, two Black Hawk helicopters, and an unknown number of casualties, all for the extraction of a single airman who had been shot down days earlier because American air superiority had already failed.

The Khatam al-Anbiya spokesperson dismissed Trump’s claims as an attempt to “justify the bitter defeat and failure of his weak army by creating ambiguity in public opinion,” adding that the United States had not even reported its full losses in the region for several days.

The contrast between Iranian transparency—releasing geolocated images, detailed operational summaries, and official confirmations—and American evasion could not have been starker.

Technical and strategic implications: The death of CSAR doctrine

The destruction of two C-130 transport aircraft and two Black Hawk helicopters on 5 April carries profound technical and strategic implications that extend far beyond the immediate tactical defeat.

Combat search and rescue, or CSAR, has been a cornerstone of American air power doctrine since the Vietnam War.

The Isfahan operation has demonstrated that Iranian defensive networks can not only shoot down American strike aircraft but also systematically dismantle the very rescue architecture designed to recover them.

The C-130, a four-engine turboprop transport with a maximum takeoff weight exceeding 70,000 kilograms, is not a nimble penetration aircraft; it relies on prior suppression of enemy air defences to operate safely.

Its destruction over southern Isfahan, experts say, proves that the US-Israeli aggression has failed to achieve any meaningful suppression of Iran’s integrated air defence network.

The Black Hawk, a twin-engine utility helicopter equipped with advanced avionics, night-vision capabilities, and defensive countermeasures, was similarly neutralized.

For American military planners, the lesson is devastating: no US aircraft, whether strike fighter or support transport, can consider Iranian airspace survivable.

[…]

Via https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/04/05/766350/from-tabas-isfahan-iran-destroys-two-us-c130s-echoing-eagle-claw-debacle