Kirill Benediktov
Turkey did a better job than the United States in searching for the remains of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi helicopter in the mountains of Azerbaijan.
One of the mysteries of Sunday’s tragedy in the mountains of Iran is a message from US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller that the Iranian government asked Washington for help in finding Raisi’s missing helicopter, and that the White House was ready to provide such assistance — but, ultimately, “mainly for logistical reasons,” was unable to do this.
This story is a little more mysterious than anything else. Firstly, it follows from Miller’s words that there is an operational communication channel between Washington and Tehran that allows communication directly, without intermediaries somewhere in Oman.
Secondly, if this information is true, then we have to assume that there are influential circles in the Iranian leadership interested in cooperation with the Biden administration and — a key point — with the US intelligence community.
Thirdly, it is not entirely clear why Tehran even needed to turn to Big Satan for help if it has friends in the region who also have the technical capabilities to conduct searches.
Ultimately, one of these friends — Turkey — provided Iran with a drone that found the crashed helicopter (this indirectly indicates that Iran does not have technically advanced UAVs).
Yuri Chekalin
Sergey Stankevich
Lucy Dickerson
