After pulling out of Iran's 2015 nuclear deal
with world powers, relations between U.S & Iran
has gone downhill.
US President Donald Trump punishing sanctions
on Iran has drawn the two countries on the
brink of a conflict.
President Hassan Rouhani said that Iran will
not surrender to U.S pressure and will never
abandon its goals even if it is attacked.
Iran's armed forces chief of staff, Major-General
Mohammad Baqeri, pointed to Iranian battle
victory in the war with Iraq and has stated
that Iran will have a "hard, crushing and
obliterating response" for any enemy.
Mr. Baqeri stated, "The confrontation and
face-off of the Islamic Republic of Iran and
the malicious government of America is the
arena for a clash of wills,"
The war of words between the two rivals has
ceased to stop and with each passing day,
the tensions are increasing.
In this video Defense Updates analyses why
Russian S 300 available to Iran is the weapon,
U.S must worry about?
Let's get into the details.
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Iran has a variety of short, medium & long-range
air defense systems.
Some of these are bought imported whereas
some have been indigenously developed.
But the most capable system available to Iran
is the S 300 which is actually considered
to one of the most lethal operational air
defense systems in the world.
The S-300 is a Russian long-range air defense
system produced by NPO Almaz.
The S-300 system was first deployed by the
Soviet Union in 1979 since then many variants
of the system have been produced.
The system is designed to protect important
areas like military bases, administrative
buildings against aerial threats like fighter
jets, bomber aircraft, cruise missiles, and
drones.
Iran is thought to possess 4 batteries each
of S 300 P and S 300 PMU2.
The P in S 300, refers to Mobile variant.
PMU2 means Mobile Modified and 2nd Upgrade.
Viewers may note that S 300 PMU3 is renamed
as S 400.
A full battery of S 300 includes 6 launcher
vehicles.
Each launcher vehicle carries 4 missiles,
so a total of 24 missiles in a ready state.
As per reports, Iran as placed these batteries
in capital Tehran and around some of the nuclear sites.
The S 300 can be configured with many types
of radars depending on threat analysis.
Some of these radars are reportedly capable
of detecting stealthy aircraft like F 35 or
F 22 or B 2 Spirit.
On the very capable one is the Nebo M. Developed
by Russia, Nebo M is thought to be able to
detect and track stealth aircraft.
Importantly most of these radars have electronic
counter-measures like the ability to change
the frequency of their signals very rapidly
to prevent jamming.
The maximum detection range of the main radar
against aircraft sized target is estimated
to be 300 km.
It can guide up to 12 missiles simultaneously,
engaging up to 6 targets at once.
S 300 also use multiple types of missile to
target different types of threats.
For example, the 9M82 missile has a range
of 100 km with a speed of Mach 7.5 and 48N6E2
missile has a range of 195 km and speed of
Mach 6.
The speed of these missiles makes them almost
impossible to outrun in a battle space.
Also, many of the missiles like 48N6E2 are
not only guided by S 300 radars but also have
active radar homing, making them very agile
and hard to shrug off even with very high
G maneuvers.
It is not clear how many of these missiles
and of which variant is available to Iran.
But it can be said a decent number of these
is expected to be in stocks as Iran has in
total 4 batteries of S 300
U.S war doctrine relies heavily on achieving
air superiority.
So, it is paramount that the S 300 batteries
are neutralized.
The U.S has mainly 2 options - a saturation
attack with cruise missiles or a precision
airstrike from fighter jets.
For a saturation attack, U.S can use Arleigh
Burke class destroyers or Ticonderoga class
cruisers.
Some of these are already in the region.
They have the capability to launch long-range
Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles.
An Arleigh Burke-class destroyer has 96 VLS
(Vertical Launch System) cells whereas Ticonderoga
class cruisers have 122 VLS cells.
Each of these cells can accommodate a Tomahawk.
So, there is enough firepower available for
a saturation strike.
Real-time satellite intelligence could be
used to locate the S 300 and then a barrage
of Tomahawks could be launched.
Tomahawks are subsonic and if launched from
the Arabian Sea, they will need an hour to
reach the location.
Iran has many radar sites that will probably
detect these missiles.
S 300 variants available to Iran are mobile
and hence they could easily move out.
Iran also has many Russian Tor short to medium
range air defense systems that can intercept
these slow moving missiles.
In an eventuality, S 300 can itself defend
itself from these missiles.
The option is safer as fighter pilots will
not in the harm's way but the probability
of success is also lower.
For precision airstrikes, the U.S can deploy
AGM-88 High-Speed Anti-Radiation Missile (HARM)
from the F-16 and F/A-18.
The missile has a range of 150 km or 92 miles
and has a speed of 1.8 Mach.
The aircraft will have to fly at very low
altitude to avoid detection.
The range of the missile enables it to be
launched without going deep into the engagement
envelope of S 300.
The other option is using the F 22 or F 35
to attack the S 300 with precision bombs.
U.S has in its arsenal a good variety of these
which includes JDAM (Joint Direct Attack Munition)
bombs or GBU-39 Small Diameter Bombs.
These options have a much higher probability
of success but have higher risks associated with it.
S 300 brings in a different kind of challenge
since the system has very little chinks to
exploit.
The U.S's ability to conduct successful air
strike against an S 300 battery will depend
on the culmination of multiple factors like
mission planning, hardware, and skill of the
pilots.
Keeping the lethality of S 300 in consideration,
the U.S will have to give special attention
and use a very precise game plan to take out
the system.
S 300 like all other air defenses is not invulnerable
but the U.S will have to be ready to accept
losses on its side when engaging it.
