Iran's Revolutionary Guards have developed aerospace capabilities powerful enough to counter a global superpower and bring it to a standstill, IRGC spokesman Hossein Mohebbi said Wednesday. Speaking to the Guards-affiliated Tasnim news agency, Mohebbi said the IRGC Aerospace Force had become a symbol of the Islamic Republic's military power, enabling Tehran to establish a balance of power against a global superpower. He credited the force's development to the directives and guidance of the late supreme leader Ali Khamenei, as well as the expertise and efforts of military commanders who helped establish and expand its capabilities. Mohebbi singled out Hassan Tehrani Moghaddam, widely regarded as the architect of Iran's ballistic missile program, for his central role in developing the Guards' aerospace capabilities. Tehrani Moghaddam was killed in November 2011 in an explosion at a Revolutionary Guards missile base near Tehran that also killed 16 other Guards members.