Iran’s Defense Ministry revealed on Tuesday that the country produces 70 percent of the products needed for aircraft and helicopters locally. This has enabled it to keep building drones and missiles, and replacing aircraft even under tough sanctions.
This means that the US maximum pressure campaign can only go so far in breaking Iran when it comes to its export of precision missiles to Hezbollah or drones to Yemen. The recent report was from Fars News in Iran.
Iran’s new report specifically mentions missiles, vessels and aerospace, which relate to the arms industry. This includes clandestine programs, and also the ones Iran boasts about, such as the growing drone army it has built to carry out swarm and cruise missile attacks.
We know from some intercepted Iranian cargo that the US waylaid off the coast of the Gulf, where Tehran has used some foreign components such as gyroscopes. It may need those for its drones.
The 30% it doesn’t make at home may include key elements. That is why Iran has sent many of its agents abroad to scour areas in Europe or even the US for know-how. Some have been detained and then traded back to the Islamic Republic.
Iran’s Defense Minister Amir Hatami said that Iran doesn’t domestically produce aircraft or helicopters, but he says the regime has localized parts and is one of the few countries to do so. Iran is urging Russia and China to help end an arms embargo this year.
Part of the reason is that it wants to ramp up its existing arms trade using foreign components. The ministry in Iran is very pleased with progress it has made so far. The report notes that the defense minister has shown new progress and a “lot of success.”