Missile Math with Iran: 3+1 = 4

Apparently Iran has been feeling a bit under-endowed. From the Lede: “As news spread across the world of Iran’s provocative missile tests, so d...

Apparently Iran has been feeling a bit under-endowed. From the Lede:

“As news spread across the world of Iran’s provocative missile tests, so
did an image of four missiles heading skyward in unison. Unfortunately,
it appeared to contain one too many missiles, a fact that had not
emerged before the photo appeared on the front pages of The Los Angeles
Times, The Financial Times, The Chicago Tribune and several other
newspapers as well as on BBC News, MSNBC, Yahoo! News, NYTimes.com and
many other major news Web sites.”

Oops. Fess up, Iran.

Yeah, that’s more like it.

“Agence France-Presse said that it obtained the image from the Web site
of Sepah News, the media arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, on
Wednesday. But there was no sign of it there later in the day. Today,
The Associated Press distributed what appeared to be a nearly identical
photo from the same source, but without the fourth missile.”

“As the above illustration shows, the second missile from the right
appears to be the sum of two other missiles in the image. The contours
of the billowing smoke match perfectly near the ground, as well in the
immediate wake of the missile. Only a small black dot in the reddish
area of exhaust seems to differ from the missile to its left, though
there are also some slight variations in the color of the smoke and the
sky.

Does Iran’s state media use Photoshop? The charge has been leveled before.
So far, though, it can’t be said with any certainty whether there is
any official Iranian involvement in this instance. Sepah apparently
published the three-missile version of the image today without further
explanation.”

If you play with fire, you’re gonna get burned.

UPDATE: