Yesterday, February 3, was marked by an incident that once again heightened the already tense relations between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran. International media outlets, such as the news agency Reuters, reported that a fifth-generation stealth F-35C fighter jet, assigned to the air wing of the USS Abraham Lincoln, shot down an Iranian drone after it “aggressively approached” the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier currently deployed by the U.S. Navy, operating under the area of responsibility of U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM).
In recent weeks, alongside major protests against the Iranian regime—resulting in figures indicating thousands of deaths and detained demonstrators—the U.S. government ordered a reinforcement of the American military presence in the Middle East region.
Through this directive issued by President Donald Trump, throughout last January and early February, the U.S. Armed Forces, along with those of allies—such as the United Kingdom—have deployed a series of high-profile assets, among which the most prominent by far is the strike group of the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln.
With the presence of Nimitz-class supercarriers in the region confirmed days ago, its strike group—composed of guided-missile destroyers and support vessels—along with the aircraft that make up its embarked air wing, including F/A-18 Super Hornet fighters, stealth F-35C aircraft, EA-18G Growler electronic warfare aircraft, as well as E-2D Hawkeye airborne early warning planes, began operations in the region.
Regarding yesterday’s episode, first reported by Reuters, it was stated that a drone belonging to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was shot down by an F-35C stealth fighter. While initial reports indicated it was a Shahed-139 unmanned aerial vehicle, Iranian sources such as the Tasnim agency claimed instead that it was a Shahed-129, an aircraft similar in design and operational role to the U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone.
Once the incident was confirmed and more information emerged over the following hours, sources provided additional details. Specifically, U.S. Navy Captain Tim Hawkins, a CENTCOM spokesperson, told the specialized outlet The War Zone: “An F-35C fighter from the USS Abraham Lincoln shot down an Iranian drone in self-defense and to protect the aircraft carrier and the personnel aboard. No U.S. service members were injured during the incident, and no U.S. equipment was damaged”… “The unmanned aircraft aggressively approached a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier with unclear intent.”
“The USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) was transiting the Arabian Sea approximately 500 miles off the southern coast of Iran when an Iranian Shahed-139 drone maneuvered unnecessarily toward the ship.”
“The Iranian drone continued flying toward the vessel despite de-escalation measures taken by U.S. forces operating in international waters,” Hawkins concluded to the U.S. specialized media outlet.
However, as of today, no further details have been provided regarding the shootdown of the Shahed drone by the F-35C, and it has not yet been clarified whether it was carried out using air-to-air missiles—such as the short-range AIM-9X Sidewinder or the longer-range AIM-120 AMRAAM—or even with 25 mm cannon fire.
Although the incident occurred in a delicate regional context—both due to Iran’s ongoing internal crisis, one of the most significant in decades because of its scale and the extent of state repression and censorship against the protests, as well as the presence of high-profile U.S. military assets in the region—this was not an isolated event.
Over recent months, U.S. combat aircraft have carried out several shootdowns of Iranian drones, as well as those of various proxy forces, as part of their coverage and interception missions under CENTCOM’s area of responsibility. This situation has even allowed the U.S. Air Force, Marine Corps, and Navy to refine tactics for intercepting and destroying drones using guided rockets instead of missiles, a more cost-effective solution for dealing with low-performance unmanned vehicles or cruise missiles.
Photographs used for illustrative purposes.
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