Iran said it is monitoring the movements of US B-52 bombers moment by moment, stressing that its airspace is a “red line” and threatening a “crushing and fiery response” to any violation.
The statements came in response to Washington’s decision to fly a pair of B-52 strategic bombers from a base in Louisiana to the Middle East on Thursday as a show of force and a warning to Iran or its proxies against launching an operation targeting the US or its allies in the region.
"The main air defense base monitors the movements of US bombers at a distance of more than 150 kilometers from the country's airspace in the southern Gulf, moment by moment," Brigadier General Qader Rahimzadeh, the Second-in-Command of Iran’s Khatam al-Anbia Air Defense Base, said Saturday.
Iran’s Tasnim news agency, citing the Iranian Army’s public relations, reported that Rahimzadeh stated during his inspection of the Air Defense Operations Command Center that “the country’s airspace is among our red lines and, as enemies have experienced in the past too, the smallest violation will be met with the [Iranian] air defense forces’ crushing and fiery response.”
He added that Iran’s surveillance operations cover the entire range of movements that are carried out by the regional and extra-regional forces, including the B-52s.
Meanwhile, Iranian Defense Minister Amir Hatami said on Sunday that the parliamentary National Security Committee approved proposals on strengthening the defense infrastructure.
