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LONDON (Reuters) - Iran said on Tuesday it would boost its military might and also showcased a new fighter jet amid increased tensions with the United States and with regional rivals over conflicts in the Middle East.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said the Islamic Republics military prowess was what deterred Washington from attacking it, adding that under President Donald Trump the United States was becoming isolated even from its own allies.

We should make ourselves ready to fight against the military powers who want to take over our territory and our resources, Rouhani said in a speech broadcast live on state television ahead of Wednesdays National Defence Industry Day.

Why does the United States not attack us? Because of our power, because it knows the consequences, Rouhani added.

Last week, Irans Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also said the United States would avoid any military confrontation with Tehran because of Iranian military might.

Khamenei has rejected Trumps offer of unconditional talks on a new nuclear deal, prompting Trump to tell Reuters in an interview on Monday: If they want to meet, thats fine, and if they dont want to meet, I couldnt care less.

Relations between Washington and Tehran worsened further after Trump in May took the United States out of an international deal that curbed Tehrans nuclear program in return for an easing of economic sanctions.

Trump branded that 2015 deal as flawed because it did not address Irans missile program or involvement in conflicts in Syria and Yemen, and he has reimposed U.S. economic sanctions.

Rouhani compared the sanctions on Iran with the U.S. trade war with China and its new tariffs on some imports from Turkey and European countries.

Its not only us who do not trust America. Today even Europe and China do not trust them; even American allies like Canada have lost their trust, he said.

Earlier on Tuesday Rouhani attended a ceremony, broadcast by state TV, that included the fly-past of a new fighter jet called Kowsar, which Iran says is 100-percent indigenously made and able to carry various weapons and to be used for short aerial support missions.

However, some military experts believe the fighter jet is a carbon copy of an F-5 first produced in the United States in the 1960s.

The airframe appears to be an externally unaltered, two-seat F-5 tiger. Whilst it may be domestically manufactured, its an entirely foreign airframe, said Justin Bronk, a research fellow specializing in combat airpower and technology in the Military Sciences team at the Royal United Services Institute.

Its a very small lightweight fighter with very small engines which limits the thrust output, a very low internal fuel capacity which limits range, and a very small nose which limits the size and power of radar that you can fit, he told Reuters.

All of those constraints are not going to be changed by updating the internal components. While you might put a modern radar, or modern avionics - by Iranian standards - in there, it is still going to be subject to all limitations of the F-5 airframe.

Irans air force has been limited to perhaps a few dozen strike aircraft using either Russian or aging U.S. models acquired before the 1979 Iranian revolution.

Iran has sent weapons and thousands of soldiers to Syria to help prop up President Bashar al-Assads forces, but had to rely on Russia for aerial support due to its own lack of a powerful air force.

The Islamic Republic launched in 2013 what it said was a new, domestically built fighter jet, called Qaher 313, but some experts expressed doubts about the viability of the aircraft at the time.

Reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin; Editing by Gareth Jones

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Eyeing U.S., Iran says to boost military might, showcases new ...

LONDON (Reuters) - Iran told OPEC on Sunday no member country should be allowed to take over another members share of oil exports, expressing Tehrans concern about Saudi Arabias offer to pump more oil in the face of U.S. sanctions on Iranian oil sales.

FILE PHOTO: A gas flare on an oil production platform in the Soroush oil fields is seen alongside an Iranian flag in the Gulf July 25, 2005. REUTERS/Raheb Homavandi/File Photo

In a meeting with OPEC Secretary-General Mohammad Barkindo, a senior Iranian diplomat urged him to keep the group out of politics.

No country is allowed to take over the share of other members for production and exports of oil under any circumstance, and the OPEC Ministerial Conference has not issued any licence for such actions, Irans oil ministry news agency SHANA quoted Kazem Gharibabadi, the permanent envoy to Vienna-based international organizations, as saying.

In May, U.S. President Donald Trump pulled out of an international nuclear deal with Iran and announced sanctions against the OPEC member. Washington is pushing allies to cut imports of Iranian oil to zero and will impose a new round of sanctions on Iranian oil sales in November.

Trump has called on OPEC to pump more oil to bring down prices. Energy ministers of Saudi Arabia, a U.S. ally, and Russia said in May they were prepared to ease output cuts to calm consumer worries about supply.

Iran believes that OPEC should strongly support its members at this stage and stop the plots of countries trying to politicize this organization, Gharibabadi said.

Regional rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran are involved in proxy wars, including in Yemen and Syria.

Iran and other signatories of the nuclear deal, including Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China, have been working to find a way to salvage the agreement despite U.S. pressures.

Iran has set a series of conditions for European powers if they want Tehran to stay in the nuclear deal, including steps by European banks to safeguard trade with Tehran and guaranteeing Iranian oil sales.

Irans vice president said on Sunday the government was seeking solutions to sell oil and transfer its revenues despite fresh U.S. sanctions.

In August, Washington imposed sanctions on acquisition of U.S. dollar by Iran, and its trade in gold and precious metals. Washington will reimpose on Nov. 4 sanctions on Irans oil exports, and banking sector.

We are hopeful that the European countries can meet their commitments but even if they cannot, we are seeking solutions to sell our oil and transfer its revenues, Eshaq Jahangiri was quoted as saying by the state news agency IRNA.

In similar remarks, Iranian foreign minister praised the European signatories for their efforts to salvage the deal, especially for EUs so-called blocking statute that aims to mitigate the impact of U.S. sanctions for European businesses.

However, Mohammad Javad Zarif said such measures have not been enough.

The European have so far expressed their stance, but have failed to present an action plan ... We believe the Europe is not ready yet to pay a price, Zarif was quoted as saying by the Young Journalists Club (YJC) website.

Zarif also tweeted on Sunday that the formation of a new Iran Action Group in the U.S. State Department to coordinate Trumps pressure campaign against Iran aimed to overthrow the Islamic Republic, but it would fail.

Reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin; Editing by Jane Merriman and David Evans

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What if Turkey collapses?

It's not outside the realm of possibility. Turkey's currency is in free fall. Inflation is at 15% and climbing. The Turkish economy could enter a recession. The US has imposed economic sanctions on the country because President Recep Tayyip Erdogan refuses to hand over an American preacher who has been jailed there.

Lots of things are going wrong in Turkey, all at once.

As this map shows, Turkey may not be important economically in terms of contagion to the rest of the global economy but it sure is important strategically and militarily.

Turkey is the bridge between the democratic, peaceful West and the war-ridden dictatorships of the East.

How strong do we want this bridge to be?

Countries ranked by the percentage of their exports that go to Turkey. Credit Suisse

If you are not confident about where Turkey is on the map, you are not alone. It's only when you see Turkey's borders that you realize why everyone is freaking out about the lira crisis.

On its Western flank, Turkey borders Greece and Bulgaria, Western-facing members of the European Union. A few years ago, Turkey a member of NATO was preparing the join Europe as a full member.

Turkey's other borders face six nations: Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Armenia, and Nakhchivan, a territory affiliated with Azerbaijan. Five of those are involved in ongoing armed conflicts or outright war.

Turkey is the thing that has physically prevented the Islamic State terrorist group from rolling into Greece. It keeps the Syrian war inside Syria. It prevents the Russians from rolling back into Bulgaria. And it deters the Iraqis, Iranians, and Kurds from escalating their various conflicts northward into Europe.

That's the reason Turkey has the largest standing army in Europe. We need Turkey to be strong and stable, in other words.

That's why two recent moves by Erdogan are so chilling:

The lira has lost 45% of its value against the US dollar this year.Yahoo Finance

In the immediate term, Erdogan's economic illiteracy is particularly worrying: Turkey's biggest, easiest weapon to contain its crisis is higher interest rates.

In principle, when a central bank raises interest rates, it sells bonds, taking in currency from those sales, and thus makes its own money more scarce and more valuable.

High rates would also encourage savers to put money into Turkish banks. That is exactly what Turkey needs to prevent a run on its central bank and a wider economic collapse. And it is the one tactic Erodgan bafflingly doesn't believe should be used.

He is condemning his nation to an inflation spiral that will, unchecked, look like the hyperinflation of the Weimar Republic.

From a strategic or military point of view, Erdogan "looking for new friends" is even more worrying. Turkey suddenly has a lot in common with Iran, Syria, and, across the Black Sea, Russia: They are all the targets of US sanctions.

Do we really want Turkey to turn toward Iran, Syria, or Russia? Because that's one potential outcome if the West cannot find a way to keep Erdogan inside the fold.

What is the endgame here, if Erdogan doesn't reverse course on interest, or if the US maintains or increases its sanctions?

The worst-case scenario is a Turkish government that cannot pay the army that controls its borders, in search of "new friends" to bail it out.

Thus the lira continues its plunge.

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Mention the word Iran to most people and this image is probably close to what first comes to mind:

Older people will remember a vastly different impression of Iran though, the Iran from before the Islamic Revolution. There are a large number of pictures and videos out there that show a radically different country from the one today (some might be from the 1960s BTW) so I've gathered a few of them together.

(Edit: Actually the pictures are almost all people so perhaps Iranians in the 1970s would be a more appropriate title)First some photos from two videos here and here:

A few screen shots from this video:

As well as some other images from here and there:

Finally, here are some links to other photos from Flickr that can't be posted here but are still worth looking at.

See also this video I uploaded last month that shows what spoken Persian sounds like:

And if you've been interested in learning Persian but have been intimidated by the script, don't worry: Persian is a much easier language to learn than you might think (I'm learning it myself and can attest to that). It does take a while to get used to reading the script but after that it's really easy to pick up. Easy verb conjugation, no grammatical gender, plural is easy to form, etc. To watch BBC Persian's newscast online see here and here.

Edit: in response to the first comment - I haven't assembled the images in an attempt to make pre-revolutionary Iran look like a golden age, but rather to show that Iranians/Persians are much less conservative at heart than one might be led to believe (yes, it does vary by region and ethnic group but still). I chose to focus on Iranians alone and not the government at the time for that reason.

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Page F30: Iran in the 1970s before the Islamic Revolution

Iran began a large-scale exercise in the Strait of Hormuz involving more than 50 small boats that is expected to last several hours. (AP)

Iran began a large-scale exercise in the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday involving more than 50 small boats, practicing swarming operations that could potentially shut down the vital water way if ever deployed for real, U.S. officials said.

The drill, which officials anticipate will end in a matter of hours since the gun boats are small, comes after President Trump pulled the U.S. out of a landmark nuclear accord with Iran and leaders of both countries exchanged fiery rhetoric.

"We are aware of the increase in Iranian naval operations within the Arabian Gulf, Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman," Navy Capt. Bill Urban, a U.S. Central Command spokesperson, said in a statement. "We are monitoring it closely, and will continue to work with our partners to ensure freedom of navigation and free flow of commerce in international waterways.

Roughly 10 percent of the worlds oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz.

U.S. officials say there has been no indication of any threats to American forces.

Currently, the guided-missile destroyer USS The Sullivans is in the Persian Gulf. Some British and French warships are nearby in the region. There are also 10 American patrol craft based in Bahrain at the headquarters for the U.S. Navys 5th fleet.

The U.S. destroyer is part of the Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier strike group, but the aircraft carrier is not in the Persian Gulf or surrounding area right now, having returned to Norfolk, Va. late last month following a three-month deployment.

The Trump administration plans to impose more sanctions on Iran next week, drawing the ire of senior Iranian leaders.

Trump said Monday, however, he would be willing to meet with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani with no preconditions.

Iranian officials the next day rejected Trump's overture.

Since the U.S. pulled out of the nuclear deal, Irans currency has plummeted, drawing thousands of protesters across major cities in Iran in recent weeks.

Lucas Tomlinson is the Pentagon and State Department producer for Fox News Channel. You can follow him on Twitter: @LucasFoxNews

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Iran deploys 50 small boats to Strait of Hormuz for large ...