Iran Has Successfully Launched A Monkey Into Space

The real question at this point, then, is why. Iran has twice launched living things toward the heaven before. In 2010, it sent a rat, turtle, and worms into space, and in 2011 it admitted that its first attempt to launch a monkey skyward failed–without elaborating (there is not telling what happened to that monkey). Also in 2010 President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that Iran plans to put a man in space by 2020. Also notable bout Iran: it maintains a belligerent attitude toward the West (and East, and pretty much everybody, actually) and a uranium enrichment program that many Western analysts think is a front for a nuclear weapons program (Iran says it’s for peaceful energy and medical purposes). So there are plenty of people around the world that see Iran’s space ambitions as a thinly veiled excuse to test long-range ballistic missiles. No word on whether the monkey was weaponized, but doubtlessly someone is looking into it. BBC