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What a shot-down US pilot saw just before ejecting over Iran · INSIGHT TODAY

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  Speaker 1: CNN exclusive reporting of what a US fighter jet pilot
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  Speaker 1: saw right before ejecting over Iran. His plane was shot
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  Speaker 1: down in April, and at the time President Trump said
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  Speaker 1: it was from a shoulder fired missile. Well, according to sources,
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  Speaker 1: the pilot saw multiple Iranian drones swarming and moving in
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  Speaker 1: a formation that looked like jellyfish. One of the sources
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  Speaker 1: described it as a quote real alien. These sources, speaking
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  Speaker 1: to my colleague Zach Cohen and Katie bolilis that fighter
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  Speaker 1: pilot was later rescued by special forces.
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  Speaker 2: CNN's senior National security reporter Zachary Cone is here with
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  Speaker 2: us in the situation room with his exclusive reporting. Zach
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  Speaker 2: tell us a little bit more about what the pilot
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  Speaker 2: described seeing and how the intelligence community is reacting.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, sorts of say that this description really shocked US
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  Speaker 3: intelligence officials who were conducting this debrief of this pilot
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  Speaker 3: who was shot down and then subsequently rescued after they
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  Speaker 3: were shot down over Iran in April. And our sources
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  Speaker 3: say that the pilot was talking about witnessing multiple drones
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  Speaker 3: were interconnected, with the larger drones operating above the smaller ones,
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  Speaker 3: the smaller ones acting sort of as legs. All of
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  Speaker 3: these drones moving in unison, which suggested that there was
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  Speaker 3: interconnectivity between them, and that's something that we're told was
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  Speaker 3: not something the intelligence community of the US Intelligence Comunity
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  Speaker 3: was really tracking as far as Iran's drone capabilities are concerned,
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  Speaker 3: and other source characterizing the pilot's acount as describing a
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  Speaker 3: mine field of drones and initial reports did acknowledge the
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  Speaker 3: possibility that these drones could have in some way enabled
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  Speaker 3: the Iranians to shoot down this F fifteen fighter jet,
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  Speaker 3: which would be a pretty remarkable moment in this conflict,
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  Speaker 3: given this was the first instance in which a manned
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  Speaker 3: US aircraft was shot down by the Iranians. Now, there
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  Speaker 3: are some questions as to whether or not this pilot
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  Speaker 3: did actually see what he described as seeing in this debrief.
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  Speaker 3: For one, the pilot was concussed from being shot down,
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  Speaker 3: and two, this was actually the second time he had
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  Speaker 3: been shot out of the sky during the week's long
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  Speaker 3: conflict with Iran. He was one of the pilots that
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  Speaker 3: was hit by friendly fire over Kuwait just a few
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  Speaker 3: months or weeks before that too. But all that taken
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  Speaker 3: into account, this did spark a debate inside the US
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  Speaker 3: intelligence community about Iran's drone program and Iran's drone capabilities,
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  Speaker 3: and if they were able to achieve this new capability
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  Speaker 3: as far as the US was concerned, how did they
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  Speaker 3: manage to do that without intelligence agencies seeing that happening?
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  Speaker 3: And one idea that is the most likely scenario if
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  Speaker 3: this was in fact the reality of what the pilot saw,
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  Speaker 3: that they would like Iran likely needed help from Russia
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  Speaker 3: or China in order to do this. Now there's a
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  Speaker 3: trail of evidence that suggests Russia and China both provided
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  Speaker 3: drone technology to Iran, and that's something sources described to
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  Speaker 3: me as really the biggest indicator of how Iron could
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  Speaker 3: have achieved this capability.
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  Speaker 2: Interesting reporting. Good word, Zach Cone, thank you very much.
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  Speaker 1: O Willis, thank you. All right back with us here
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  Speaker 1: in the situation where we see in a military analyst
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  Speaker 1: and retired Air Force Colonel Cedrick Layton, I wondered just
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  Speaker 1: what your reaction is to what you heard from Zach's
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  Speaker 1: reporting here, what this pilot purportedly saw, and the reaction
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  Speaker 1: from the intelligence community. The surprise.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, surprise is always a bad thing in the intelligence business,
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  Speaker 4: right Pam. And so when you look at you know
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  Speaker 4: what the pilot allegedly saw and Zach's reporting, and you
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  Speaker 4: combine all these factors, what is distinctly possible is that
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  Speaker 4: there is a new technology, or at least new tactics
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  Speaker 4: being employed here. What this is similar to is basically
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  Speaker 4: there's a concept that even the US Air Force has
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  Speaker 4: of having a manned aircraft serve as kind of the
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  Speaker 4: quarterback of a combined manned unmanned fleet that would go
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  Speaker 4: after a set of targets. Now this is different because,
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  Speaker 4: you know, according to this report, the basic idea would
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  Speaker 4: be that the quarterback is an essence played by larger
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  Speaker 4: a larger drone, and that larger drone would then be
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  Speaker 4: controlled by a ground controller somewhere in Iran. Presumably, the
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  Speaker 4: way in which this would work would require a lot
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  Speaker 4: of sticated tactics and techniques to have been developed, and
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  Speaker 4: it's most likely, as Zach was reporting, that these tactics
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  Speaker 4: and techniques were developed either in China or Russia or
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  Speaker 4: a combination thereof, and then potentially adapted by the Iranians
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  Speaker 4: for the purpose.
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  Speaker 2: You're a retired US Air Force colonel, how do you
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  Speaker 2: defend against this so called jellyfish formation of drones.
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  Speaker 4: So that's going to be a real challenge for the
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  Speaker 4: air Force and really all flying entities out there because
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  Speaker 4: a formation like this. First of all, it was a
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  Speaker 4: surprise to the pilot when he saw something like this,
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  Speaker 4: and then the other part of it is is that
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  Speaker 4: the whole effort behind this is to create something that
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  Speaker 4: overwhelms the natural defenses that the pilot has as well
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  Speaker 4: as the electronic defenses that the aircraft would have. For example,
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  Speaker 4: an aircraft has something known as a radar warning receiver
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  Speaker 4: and it's designed to really take a look at all
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  Speaker 4: the radar inputs that are coming there possible threats to
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  Speaker 4: the aircraft. When you have multiple inputs or no input
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  Speaker 4: at all, threat like that, it's really hard to defend
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  Speaker 4: against that. So there is going to have to be
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  Speaker 4: probably an integration of artificial intelligence into defensive capabilities. It's
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  Speaker 4: also going to really rely on the ability of the
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  Speaker 4: intelligence agencies to assess exactly what technologies were employed and
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  Speaker 4: what techniques were employed, because the tactics and techniques are
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  Speaker 4: going to be critical to countering them, and understanding of
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  Speaker 4: that is going to be key.
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  Speaker 2: It's impressive, the US pilot ejected in Iran, but was
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  Speaker 2: still rescued by US military personnel.
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  Speaker 4: Absolutely, and that speaks to a whole realm of combat
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  Speaker 4: search and rescue capabilities that are basically generations light years
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  Speaker 4: ahead of what happened back in nineteen eighty when we
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  Speaker 4: attempted the hostage rescue mission. The interoperability at that time,
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  Speaker 4: back in nineteen eighty was far less than what it
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  Speaker 4: is today. This was a textbook rescue operation and was
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  Speaker 4: executed based on all accounts that we have right now,
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  Speaker 4: almost flaw. There were some issues with aircraft having to
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  Speaker 4: be left behind, you know, and basically blown up on
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  Speaker 4: the makeshift field, but that's, you know, something that's relatively
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  Speaker 4: minor compared to saving not only the pilot's life but
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  Speaker 4: all the rescuers' lives as well.
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  Speaker 1: And it's incredible when you learn about this technology that
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  Speaker 1: there weren't more casualties or deaths or anything from just
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  Speaker 1: from the pilot, the wizzow and all the rescuers involved, right.
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  Speaker 4: Absolutely, yeah, because you know, normally the widow's job, or
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  Speaker 4: a weapons systems officer's job is to really be able
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  Speaker 4: to help defend the aircraft against threats of any type,
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  Speaker 4: but specifically electronic threats and this kind of an operation
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  Speaker 4: may either take place in a frequency the command and
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  Speaker 4: control of frequency. That would be something that is not
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  Speaker 4: being picked up by our aircraft. That's a possibility, or
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  Speaker 4: it may be done in a way where there is
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  Speaker 4: no radio transmission, where the systems operate autonomously and they've
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  Speaker 4: been pre programmed to go after certain target sets, and
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  Speaker 4: the F fifteen may have been a target of opportunity,
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  Speaker 4: or it may have been something that they had pre
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  Speaker 4: planned and we're basically willing to test this tactic against
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  Speaker 4: a flying manned aircraft at the US Air Force was flying.
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  Speaker 5: The other thing, Sabrina, if true, is it shows the
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  Speaker 5: Iranians still have advanced drone technology and capability that it
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  Speaker 5: has not been destroyed in this war, just like now
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  Speaker 5: we've learned that their missile capabilities have not been destroyed.
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  Speaker 5: They still have enriched uranium which was not completely destroyed.
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  Speaker 5: So what does that tell us about what was accomplished
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  Speaker 5: up until that point.
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  Speaker 1: In the war.
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  Speaker 6: Well, what it tells us is that the US military,
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  Speaker 6: while it was effective in degrading the Iranian Navy and
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  Speaker 6: Air Force, Iran still maintains and retains quite incredible capabilities.
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  Speaker 6: I mean this new reporting and Escentric laid out. If
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  Speaker 6: this is true, is very complex and something that if
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  Speaker 6: Iran is able to execute on the battlefield, is really
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  Speaker 6: going to change how modern w are already being fought.
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  Speaker 6: I mean, we're seeing that how drones are impacting the battlefield,
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  Speaker 6: both in Iran and of course in Ukraine. And so
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  Speaker 6: the fact that Russia, I mean the fact that Iran
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  Speaker 6: is able to not only retain these drone capabilities, the
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  Speaker 6: United States has expended an incredible amount of military might
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  Speaker 6: and just tomorrow Pete Hegseth is going to go on
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  Speaker 6: the hill and ask for eighty billion dollars more to
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  Speaker 6: fund this war and to backfill our stock. So I
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  Speaker 6: think if this story in the reporting holds true, Iran
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  Speaker 6: is really going to change the modern battlefield and also
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  Speaker 6: how the US purchases its own arms and things about
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  Speaker 6: future wars.