<%@LANGUAGE="VBSCRIPT" CODEPAGE="1252"%> WorldTribune.com: Mobile Ñ Report: Without Russian air defense system, Iran is sitting duck

Report: Without Russian air defense system, Iran is sitting duck

Monday, May 4, 2009   E-Mail this story   Free Headline Alerts

WASHINGTON ÑIran's current air defense umbrella is antiquated and could not stop an Israeli or U.S. strike, a report said.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies said Iran's air defense network could be easily penetrated by the air forces of Israel and the United States. The Washington-based center said Iran's aging U.S.- and Russian-origin assets could not intercept Israeli F-15 and F-16 fighters.

"Iran lacks the modern weapon systems, integration and C4I battle management to reduce the potential destructive effectiveness of any offensive interdiction missions by Israel," the report, titled "Study on a Possible Israeli Strike on Iran's Nuclear Development Facilities," said. "One can predict a very low attrition rate to an Israeli strike."

The report, authored by senior associate Abdullah Toukan, said Iran has sought to protect key facilities, including nuclear assets, with such systems as the SA-5. The SA-5, with a range of 250 kilometers, has been deployed to protect Iranian ports and oil facilities along the Gulf coast.

"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.

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