"What is known about the Iranian air defense system clearly shows how it
has become largely obsolescent even though some SA-2 upgrade has been
reported to have taken place," the report said. "So it has become easy to
apply ECM [electronic counter-measures] against them and destroying them
using anti-radiation air to surface missiles."
The report said Iranian air defense assets would be unable to rapidly
respond to an intrusion by Israeli fighter-jets. CSIS said Iran's fleet of
F-4, F-14 and MiG-29s were plagued by low operational readiness.
But Toukan said the deployment of the Russian-origin S-300 would mark an
immediate and significant improvement in Iran's defense network. He cited
reports that Russia has already supplied Iran with the mobile S-300V system,
manufactured by Almaz-AnteyG.
"If this is the case then the whole analytic model beginning from C4I
early warning to response and scramble times in the engagement of Israeli
combat aircraft with this integrated mobile air defense system will have to
be recalculated," the report said. "The attrition rates of the Israeli air
strike will be high, could go up to 20 to 30 percent. For a strike mission
of some 90 aircraft, the attrition could then be between 20 to 30 aircraft,
a loss Israel would hardly accept in paying."
The report warned of an Israeli air strike on Iran's Bushehr nuclear
reactor. CSIS said at least three Gulf Cooperation Council states --
Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, would be harmed.
"Any strike on the Bushehr nuclear reactor will cause the immediate
death of thousands of people living in or adjacent to the site, and
thousands of subsequent cancer deaths
or even up to hundreds of thousands depending on the population density
along the contamination plume," the report said.