Some Russian cruise missiles crashed in Iran, unnamed US military officials claim

Unnamed US military officials have claimed that some cruise missiles fired from Russian ships at targets in Syria landed in Iran on Wednesday.

According to the Russian Defense Ministry, 26 long-range cruise missiles, launched from the Russian Navy's Caspian Flotilla, traveled more than 900 miles (1448 kilometers) over Iran and Iraq before striking Daesh (ISIL) positions in several provinces of Syria.

However, a senior US military official, speaking on condition anonymity, said on Thursday, some of the missiles could not make it to their targets in Syria, The Washington Post reported.

And, two unnamed Pentagon officials told CNN that four Russian cruise missiles went off course and crashed in Iran, adding that they don’t know if the errant missiles caused any damage.

US State Department spokesman John Kirby said he could not confirm these reports.

“I can’t confirm it but I think it points all the more towards the need to have proper deconfliction procedures in place,” Kirby said, using a military term, deconfliction, which means rival armies will talk to one another in order to avoid accidental encounters between their forces.

Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry denied claims that a few of the missiles fired from Russian ships in the Caspian Sea landed in Iran.

The Russian Defense Ministry statement said that the new Kalibr-NK cruise missiles all struck within nine feet of their intended targets in Syria.

The missiles landed in Raqqa, Idlib and Aleppo provinces and they destroyed ISIL positions, including training camps and ammunition depots, Russian officials said. 

"No matter how unpleasant and unexpected it is for our colleagues in the Pentagon and Langley, our strike yesterday with precision-guided weapons at ISIS (Daesh/ISIL) infrastructure in Syria hit its targets," Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Major General Igor Konashenkov said on Thursday.

In an interview with Press TV on Thursday, American political analyst Eric Draitser said that Russia’s airstrikes in Syria are meant to demonstrate its military power and that it will not accept the diktats of the United States.

“What is this actually demonstrating? I think this is very important that Russia has the military and naval capability that up to this point only the United States had, specifically the launching of missiles from naval vessels over 1,500 kilometers and striking with a precision and accuracy unrivalled by anybody other than the United States,” Draitser said.

“This is, I think, very significant because it is a clear and unmistakable signal to Washington that the United States will not be able to impose its will militarily especially now that Russia has thrown its weight into the conflict in Syria,” he noted.

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