Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ismail Baghaei, commenting on the American statements regarding the pilot’s rescue operation, said that the point that was allegedly linked to the disappearance of an American pilot in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer Ahmad province does not match the location where the American planes landed south of Isfahan. Baghaei added that the distance between the two sites is “very far,” which raises the possibility that the operation was a “deception operation” aimed at stealing Iranian uranium. He stressed that the essence of the operation was “a clear failure and a catastrophic scandal” for the United States, describing what happened as “the middle of the second,” in reference to the failure of the famous American operation in 1980, when the United States tried to rescue the American hostages.