In the wake of the Israeli airstrikes on Iran on Saturday morning, there has been increased focus on Iran’s air defense systems.
Even though Iran has a large number of defense systems, Iran’s air defense has not been a strong point of the country. Iran hasn’t faced a major conventional military threat for years, and having been placed under sanctions, Tehran neglected to upgrade the systems.
The last time Iran fought a conventional war and had to seriously defend its airspace was during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. Therefore, Iran has to make do with what it has and invest where it can in defenses.
Iran’s quantity of defenses over quality
Despite the sanctions and a lack of pressing need to upgrade security, Tehran boasts an impressive quantity of varied systems – whether they are effective is less clear.
Iran’s air defenses are also hampered by the fact it doesn’t have a large air force that can aid its air defenders by intercepting threats.
The force is ageing and is not well placed to confront a modern sophisticated fifth-generation air force, such as Israel’s. That being said, Iran hasn’t needed its air force in the decades; instead relying on proxies abroad.
Adding to Iran’s defense capabilities, Tehran carved out a buffer zone by colonizing part of Iraq using pro-Iranian militias.
Israel’s retaliatory strikes included precision strikes on numerous targets. What is known about these strikes is only coming out into the media slowly. For instance, Israel’s Kan reported on Monday that Iranian radar systems were “breached” during the airstrikes and their “screens froze.”
Iran’s ability to intercept targets was limited and allowed the Israeli air force to penetrate Iranian airspace, Iranian sources were cited by KAN as saying. Other reports at The Wall Street Journal have suggested that all of Iran’s air defenses were impacted by the strikes.
In order to understand what may have been impacted, it’s worth understanding what Iran has in terms of air defenses. Reports say four Iranian S-300 batteries were affected.
Iran acquired the S-300 system from Russia over the last two decades. The deal dates from 2007 when Iran signed an $800 million deal for the Russian system. Iran sought to acquire four of the systems.
The Russian military technology was supposed to give Iran a major military advantage over its Arab neighbors in the Gulf, who use advanced American warplanes and air defenses – defenses Iran has tested over the years. In 2019 Iran attacked Saudi Arabia’s Abqaiq facility with drones and cruise missiles. The Houthis also attacked Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Al-Jazeera noted in 2015, the “range and advance tracking of S-300 system allows Iran to threaten aircraft long way from its borders.” In April 2016, a report claimed, “Iran Foreign Ministry confirms receipt of S-300 long-range, surface-to-air missile as part of first batch of the defenses.” Al-Jazeera also noted that back in April Israel “hit the Artesh air force base in Isfahan, destroying part of an S-300 long-range air defence system.”
The S-300 system consists of a number of components. It has launchers as well as two radar systems. This means that each S-300 battery is actually a number of vehicles, radars, launchers and components. Iran received four of these from Russia after 2015. These included the S-300PMU2 version of the batteries and the S-300PMU1 version.
A 2016 report at The Washington Institute noted “Even if upgraded, the system has lower capabilities than the PMU-2 version Tehran was originally believed to purchase, but it still represents a potentially formidable boost to the country’s air-defense network.” Reports say each had four launchers and two radars and other support vehicles. The same report said that photos showed the “what appear to be partially camouflaged components of the ST68U/UM Tin Shield and 64N6E Big Bird search-and-acquisition radars associated with the older PMU-1 version.”
A report at the Institute for Science and International Security said the S-300s were key to defending nuclear sites at Isfahan and Natanz as well as Fordow. Reports in the wake of the strikes point to several S-300 sites being affected near Tehran, as well as radar sites in places like Ilam in Iran.
The report added Iran has its own locally-made air defenses that are as good as the S-300. Iran has a number of other locally-made systems. It has showcased the Bavar 373 air defense system. The system uses the Sayyad 4 missile and can supposedly shoot down aircraft and other threats.
An article at The National Interest noted that “the Bavar’s two radars are carried on eight-wheeled Zafar trucks: an S-Band acquisition radar for spotting aircraft at a distance, and a shorter-range but more precise X-Band fire control radar that guides missiles to their targets. Both are supposedly Active Electronically Scanned Array radars, which are harder to detect and have higher resolution.” The same article said the system could engage targets up to 155 miles away.
The 2016 article at The Washington Institute which examined the Russian supply of S-300s to Iran said that “to effectively cover such a large country, however, Iran will still need to integrate the S-300s with its modified S-200 and Raad surface-to-air missiles, and perhaps with the Bavar-373, a system that is claimed to be under development in Iran loosely based on the S-300 design.” The overall goal of the different radars and systems is that they can detect hundreds of targets at a range of 200-300 miles and then intercept the targets at a range of up to 100 miles.
Iran also developed other systems or improved upon existing systems. Iran developed a system with missiles based on the US-made MIM-23 Hawk air defense system. It called the system Mersad and continued to improve upon it over the last decades, using locally made missiles dubbed Shalamcheh and Shahin, and also a version of the Sayyad-2 missile. A later version of this system is called the Mersad-16, and also called Kamin and is a road-mobile short-range air defense system.
Iran has a plethora of other systems and surface-to-air missiles. The Sayyad 1 missile that Iran uses was developed from a Chinese system called HQ-2J. Iran also has Russian S-200s. The Iranian regime also employs the 15 Khordad system, as well as shorter-range Chinese origin HQ-7(CH-SA-4). Iran also uses the Russian Tor M1 system. Iran mistakenly shot down a Ukrainian commercial airliner using the Tor M1 system in 2020.
Iran also developed a system called Talaash which uses its Sayyad-2 and Sayyad-3 missiles. That system first appeared in 2013. Around the same time, Iran introduced the Raad air defense system, from which it then developed its 3rd Khordad air defense system. It used a 3rd Khordad to shoot down a large American Global Hawk drone off the coast of Iran in 2019. It also tried to export the 3rd Khordad to Syria in April 2018. The system arrived at Syria’s T-4 base but was destroyed upon arrival.
Iran has sought to increase its air defense capabilities in the last several years.
In February Iran claimed to roll out a new missile system called Arman and a new air defense system called Azarakhsh.
“Arman is also known as Tactical Sayyad, as the missiles used in it belong to the Sayyad 3 class. The system is capable of detecting targets from a distance of 180 kilometers (112 miles) and engaging at least 12 targets within the range of 120 km (74.5 mi) simultaneously,” state media reported.
In June, Iran’s Brigadier General Alireza Sabahifard did an inspection tour of “tactical radar sites, observation posts, and artillery positions along the northwestern border,” Iranian media said.
“Air Defense, based on its indigenous capabilities and domestic capacities, is at a very high level of readiness and combat capability,” General Sabahifard declared during his visit. In August Iranian state media boasted that the military had received new equipment, including locally-made radars and missiles.
