RT - All is fair in love and war, or when you want to do a little scaremongering. Reuters sounded the alarm on Iran�s efforts to boost the range of its missiles, while completely missing what missiles they were.

The story ran by the news agency on Wednesday cited Iran�s Brigadier General Aziz Nasirzadeh as saying: �One of our most important programs is increasing the range of missiles and ammunition,� and �We don't see any limitations for ourselves in this field.�

Sounds scary? Sure, because, Reuters added, the Iranian military say the range of their missiles is 2,000km and it is enough to target �US bases in Afghanistan, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar, plus US aircraft carriers in the Gulf.� It�s so scary that the US deemed it a good reason to pull out of the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran.

The only problem with this leap of logic is that General Nasirzadeh leads Iran�s Air Force (which Reuters did mention) and that he was speaking about Iranian air-to-air missiles (which Reuters omitted). Air-to-air missiles are fired by aircraft and hit aircraft, not��bases in Afghanistan and aircraft carriers in the Gulf.�

And it just so happens that Iran�s Air Force is not the scariest part of its military. It mostly consists of US-made aircraft, which the country received back when it was led by Washington�s buddy, the Shah. This year�s big achievement for the military arm is that now Iran is mass producing the Fakour-90 long-range air-to-air missile.


Iranian�#Fakour�90 missile for�#F14#Tomcatpic.twitter.com/BUxVAsPSiV



� ParsKuru (@ParsKuru)�May 6, 2018

It�s a clone of the American AIM-54 Phoenix, can be fired from Iran�s American F-14 Tomcats and has a whopping reported operational range of 150km, compared to 190km of the original, which was retired along with its platform more than a decade ago.

Iran�s Fars news agency, the source of the quotes from General Nasirzadeh,�cites�him this way.

�Today, we are after increasing the range of our air-to-air missiles. Therefore, one of our most important plans is increasing the range of missiles and ammunition. We are after Beyond-Visual-Range (BVR) missiles and ammunition and consider no limitations in this regard for ourselves because the Air Force should heighten the country's deterrence power along with other (Armed) Forces.�


When you are so quick to write a sensational Iran story you can�t be bothered to differentiate between the Air Force �air-to-air� missiles with those other missiles in the news.�pic.twitter.com/2F9fPP7Nz3



� Arash Karami (@thekarami)�December 4, 2018

Sure, Iran does develop ballistic missiles too and seeks to improve their range. But General Nasirzadeh�s statements are irrelevant to this and his rhetoric seems to be a long cry from what Reuters made it out to be. Almost a day after its publication, the misleading story remains uncorrected.