Iran buying air defense for their S-300? through Syria! from RUssia

Syria has agreed to supply Iran with at least 10 out of 50 air defense systems that Damascus is in the process of buying from Russia, Jane's Defense Weekly reported in this week's edition.

A Russian Tor-m1 missile systems launching vehicle during exercises at an undisclosed location in Russia.
Jane's quoted a source close to the deal as saying that while most of the Pantsyr-S1E systems were earmarked for Syrian Air Defense Command, the end user for 10 of the systems is Tehran. It said Iran would take delivery of them in late 2008. To reward Syria for its middleman role, Tehran would part-finance Syria's Pantsyrs as well as paying for its own.

Iran is locked in confrontation with the United States over its developing nuclear program and delivered its latest warning to Washington last week that it would retaliate severely if attacked. Iran denies US accusations that it is trying to build atomic weapons under cover of a civilian nuclear program. Washington emphasizes it wants to resolve the standoff through diplomacy but has not ruled out military action to destroy Iran's nuclear infrastructure.

Jane's said Syria struck a $730 million deal with Russia earlier this year for some 50 Pantsyr-S1E self-propelled short-range gun and missile air defense systems. Its source said Moscow had not been officially notified of the reported Syrian arrangement with Tehran, which flowed from a November 2005 strategic accord between the two countries on military and technological cooperation.

Russia, as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council with veto power, is a key player in international diplomacy over Iran's nuclear ambitions.

by the way this is a Pantsyr itself -www.army-technology.com...
pvo.guns.ru...
pvo.guns.ru...


www.iranian.ws...

www.todayszaman.com...

Pantsyr looks very similar to the French Crotale system which China acquired decades ago. I would not be surprised if it is largely copied from Crotale. What is the missile envelope ?

However imposing a missile system looks there are often flaws which can be exploited to overcome them. Recconaisance flights by drones are often used to get the SAM sites to disclose their tracking frequencies so that later these frequencies may be jammed.

Good quality photos like those posted often provide good clues about signal wavelengths too.

What appears to be emerging is an Islamic millitary block in the middle east based upon Syria and Iran, backed by sophisticated weaponry, nuclear weaponry and oil wealth. If USA pulls out of Iraq no doubt this country will become a third member of that block.

Wonder what that means for Kuwait, UAE and Saudia Arabia ?

Originally posted by sy.gunson
What appears to be emerging is an Islamic millitary block in the middle east based upon Syria and Iran, backed by sophisticated weaponry, nuclear weaponry and oil wealth. If USA pulls out of Iraq no doubt this country will become a third member of that block.

What nuclear weapons? The only middle eastern country with nuclear weapons is Israel. And USA of course.

Ask yourself this Planeman:

Iran is developing ballistic missiles with the range to throw one ton payloads as far as Europe. We're talking about Shehab-3 and Shehab-4 based on the North Korean version of Scud.

Not content on this they obtained components of Russian SS-4 missiles scrapped under SALT II and are reverse engineering these to produce the far more accurate Shehab-5 and 6.

Why if it's just about self defence, does Iran need to invest fortunes in such technology just to throw high explosive?

Iran flares enough natural gas each year to power half of Europe, so why spend billions of dollars on nuclear power ?

When other countries have offered technology that requires low or no enrichment of Uranium in return for abandonment of it's nuclear enrichment project did Iran reject this ?

Why when Iran's known Uranium reserves are only enough to fuel one nuclear power plant for 6 years does Iran insist it has to build 7 reactors ?

Why when Iran's Uranium reserves are only sufficient to fuel each of the 7 reactors for 9 months each, would you pump billions of dollars into a nuclear power station which can only run for 9 months ?

Why would you insist on enrichment to bomb grade uranium, when Soviet reactors can run on only 10% enriched uranium ?

Why when you can run a Soviet reactor on low enriched Uranium, would Iran bother spending billions on concealed underground centrifuge plants ?

What other use is there for bomb grade uranium ?

Answer: Bomb grade Uranium is used in a nuclear reactor to breed Plutonium.

What is Plutonium useful for ?

Answer: Nothing else except creating nuclear weapons.

That is why running 7 reactors for just 9 months each is worth the massive investment. They don't need those 7 reactors either, except for haste.

They already have a Soviet research reactor capable after modification of acting as a Plutonium breeder and it may already be acting that way.


[edit on 27-5-2007 by sy.gunson]

Its simple survival. Countries have seen how Crazy Kim gets the kid gloves treatment no matter how much of a lunatic he is BECAUSE of his WMD's. Why would any other nation want that deterence?

But, will 10 of these systems really buttress the Iranian air defence network in a meaningfull way?

[edit on 5/27/07 by FredT]

It's not just 10 systems. Russia is selling the S-300 through other proxy sales to Belarus for example:

vwt.d2g.com:8081...

www.missilethreat.com...

www.charter97.org...

Janes Defence weekly has reported the purchase of 24 systems for Belarus funded by Iran. One might reasonably assume that half or 12 systems will find their way to Iran. There are six missiles per battery.

Originally posted by sy.gunson
There are six missiles per battery.

You might want to research that.

I base that on the Russian division (battery) system, but if you know differently then I welcome your contribution.

Originally posted by sy.gunson
I base that on the Russian division (battery) system, but if you know differently then I welcome your contribution.

For a start each TEL has 4 missiles, so 6 missiles = 1.5 vehicles.

Beyond Iran's nuclear intentions, which I expect most people agree on, I think your opinions are a bit sensationalist and most of yuour assumptions lack substance. That sounds pretty patronising but what i'm trying to say is that I don't agree with you but that I can't be bothered to debate it much either.

That Iran obtains S-300 in the future remains a distinct possibility, but the rest is hypeboyle.

The stuff is already in Iran, long border with Russia. Maybe a Syrian broker, but to leak that would be begging for every Syrian ship to be crawling with frogmen.