Russia Deployed Bombers to Iranian Base That US Could Use 'Prior to 1979'

"Washington described the deployment as 'unfortunate.' Perhaps because the United States had the right to use the base prior to the Islamic Revolution of 1979," Stuttgarter Zeitung suggested.

On August 15, an undisclosed number of the Tupolev Tu-22M3 supersonic long-range strategic bombers and Sukhoi Su-34 strike fighters left the airfield in the Russian town of Mozdok located in the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania and landed at the Hamadan airfield in Iran.

Russian bombers deployed to Iran have carried out several massive airstrikes against Daesh and al-Nusra Front targets in Syria this week. On Thursday, Tu-22M3s and Su-34 destroyed five large depots with weapons, ammunitions and fuel, six command and control centers and armored military hardware in the Deir ez-Zor province, the Russian Ministry of Defense reported. "A large number of militants" were killed in the operation.

Two days earlier, Russian airstrikes destroyed five large ammunition depots with weapons, munitions and fuel, as well as militant training camps near the cities of Serakab, Al-Ghab, Aleppo and Deir ez-Zor cities. In addition, Russian bombers razed to the ground three command and control centers near the cities of Jafra and Deir ez-Zor. A "significant number of militants" were killed in what the Russian Defense Ministry described as a "concentrated airstrike."

These facilities, the ministry added, were used to support and assist radical groups fighting near the city of Aleppo.

The German-language daily also added that Russia views its counterterrorism operation in Syria as an intermediate step on the way to a larger goal of establishing a naval presence in the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf.

"Russia's contribution to the operation in Syria is just a stage. In the medium term, Moscow wants to create a counterweight to the US Sixth Fleet that dominates the eastern Mediterranean. In the long term, Russia also plans to cover the Persian Gulf where the US Fifth Fleet is based," the newspaper observed.