Iranian Air Defence Systems | News and Discussions

[Comandante]

"In short, it's practically undetectable."
As long as you are not able to shoot down radar-hunting missiles, yes. As long as your systems can be disrupted and you cannot avoid it, yes, otherwise the statement is false.

 

[Persian Gulf]

They had such overwhelming air superiority that their drones werent just doing 24/7 surveillance and target identification but also continuous post strike battle damage assessment. That alone shows near total air dominance.

Honestly it makes you wonder if chasing more advanced air defence systems from China or Russia is even worth it anymore. they will just get detected and destroyed anyway.

the best defence is always offence

and these drones are easy to destroy in theory, but incompetent IRI didn't even bother deploying SHORAD systems at SSM bases so what do you expect

 

[FUB]

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[Immortals]

the best defence is always offence

and these drones are easy to destroy in theory, but incompetent IRI didn't even bother deploying SHORAD systems at SSM bases so what do you expect

Israel simply overwhelmed Iranian radar systems during TP1 & TP2. Then during the war it destroyed even more radars (including the OTH ones which completely failed at providing early warning).

Then the second wave - Electronic warfare disabled or blinded many air defense points - which made many launchers like Khordad family, Bavar prototypes, S-300s, out of commission. That’s why the most successful air defense system was Majid —because it’s passive and relies on IR not radar.

So until Iran can’t stop Israel electronic wave attacks in future war, it is gonna have similar performance. But Majid wouldn’t be able to protect SSM bases since its range is too limited and not built to intercept PGMs or CMs. Israeli drones can also drop munitions well aside its engagement envelope. I suspect many of its shoot downs were due to Israel not realizing the system was even there. Just like how Israel lost so many drones in Lebanon.

 

[hasssanali8998]

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make the drones shiny to the wavelength this laser system uses , and this laser becomes useless or very close to it

 

[Kyussis]

They had such overwhelming air superiority that their drones werent just doing 24/7 surveillance and target identification but also continuous post strike battle damage assessment. That alone shows near total air dominance.

Honestly it makes you wonder if chasing more advanced air defence systems from China or Russia is even worth it anymore. they will just get detected and destroyed anyway.

You really want to take your white underwear off and surrender, don't you?

 

[Shams313]

old photo of first gen 3rd khordad fire control radar

 

[vizier]

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This one seems to work well against mini-jet or piston engine equipped kamikaze drones. Lock on after launch is a good option against saturation attacks and in a high jamming environment.

It can also work against anti radar missiles. Since agm-88 is high speed using a rocket engine it has a high infrared signature. Infrared guided missile can lock onto it easily. Testing can be done engaging similar mock missiles emulating agm-88 missile size-speed. If the sam can handle high gs and has similar speed to aim-9 like mach 2.5 it can intercept a mach-3- mach-4 missile flying onto your radar in a very predictable pattern head on.

It may not work well against electric engine equipped drones though. They are generally shorter range but masks infrared signature better. Better image recognition on the iir seeker like aim-9x or python-5 would have trained models to better engage low ir signature target models.

It wont also work against glide bombs which dont have an engine as an ir source. Short range jam resistant Radar+good optics and a machine gun using ahead rounds is necessary in that case.

make the drones shiny to the wavelength this laser system uses , and this laser becomes useless or very close to it

Also it needs several seconds to down a single target. It cant instantly zap the target down. In a saturation attack it wont work well. But lasers have a future in my opinion especially in short range point defense combined with high voltage electric current. Laser guided lightning is another researched area for laser based defenses.

Why The Army’s Experimenting With Laser-Guided Lightning | CSBA

CSBA is an independent, non-partisan policy research institute established to promote innovative thinking and debate about national security strategy and investment options.

csbaonline.org

Picatinny engineers set phasers to 'fry'

Scientists and engineers at Picatinny Arsenal, N.J., are busy developing a device that will shoot lightning bolts down laser beams to destroy its target. Soldiers and science fiction fans, you're welcome.

www.army.mil

 

[Persian Gulf]

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restoration of OTH radar networks (not that they were useful in the last round)

 

[ToddE]

^ ALBMs and Supersonic/stealth SOWs have rendered non stationary Air defence assets as highly vulnerable. Long ranged search radars like OTHs were useful in 2000s or early 2010s when hypersonic, supersonic attack weapons were not wide spread like they are today. IRIAD invested in them around that time but their utility in a war is almost none. They are useful in peace time though to understand movement of enemy. In war they will take hits. New IRGCASF arsenal if revolves around Fattah and KS will more damage in response as well. Warfare is changing and attack weaponry is far exceeding defense options.

Only defense solution is to create an attack capability so strong that enemy stays away from you anyways.

 

[Persian Gulf]

^ ALBMs and Supersonic/stealth SOWs have rendered non stationary Air defence assets as highly vulnerable. Long ranged search radars like OTHs were useful in 2000s or early 2010s when hypersonic, supersonic attack weapons were not wide spread like they are today. IRIAD invested in them around that time but their utility in a war is almost none. They are useful in peace time though to understand movement of enemy. In war they will take hits. New IRGCASF arsenal if revolves around Fattah and KS will more damage in response as well. Warfare is changing and attack weaponry is far exceeding defense options.

Only defense solution is to create an attack capability so strong that enemy stays away from you anyways.

fine to take hits

but not hit to not fulfil their basic function which is to provide some form of warning that the enemy's jets are on airborne and seem to be approaching Iranian territory (even if still 500km+ away)

the strikes throughout West Iran and Tehran (simultaneously) caught IRI totally off guard. it's not like they destroyed every single OTH Radar system. so it suggests the OTH radars did not work as expected or Israel simply exposed their natural limitations

 

[vizier]

Another necessary item next time is passive radar coverage. It has pretty long range that you can use against drones and aircraft at medium high altitudes.

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It may not be accurate enough to start a kill chain and guide a missile to target but for scanning and alerting other anti-uav anti-aircraft systems without getting detected or jammed it seems to be accurate enough.

For example enemy hermes drones can be detected by the passive radar over a roughly estimated position and karrar(or other potential a2a drones) can be vectored there to take down the targets by their own sensors and man in the loop. Similarly it can inform majid iir-optical guided sams to track certain areas.

Passive radar reciever sensor which is the manned and expensive part cannot be detected easily just like Majid was almost invisible to enemy drones. Fm, vhf transmitters can be detected but they are unmanned items. they can be towed-carried around by other vehicles periodically to not to be detected by spy sats. Transmitters can also be stationed far from frontlines unlike the reciever.

This leaves out low flying targets like israeli f15s flying over Syria, Iraq. For that mission a highly expensive, hard to protect awacs plane would be an overkill which also needs a large airbase. Helicopters can be converted to early warning roles. Lower detection range than an awacs but at least does not require a large airbase and it can detect incoming low flying cruise missiles drones and alert other items.

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Drones can carry aesa pods for the same role as well but the range would be shorter than an awacs.

Sweden Just Turned a Reaper Drone into an AWACS

This might be the perfect solution to US AWACS drama

www.wesodonnell.com

Ideally a stealth platform should do this job but even these can be useful. They can be shot down from long ranges losing the expensive aesa radars in the process. The expensive parts are the aesa pods and processor on this drone. These pods can be dropped down by parachute with chaff when rwr activates(missile warning from close range) maybe. So you only lose the carrier platform and recover the aesa radars and processing.

 

[Flotilla]

fine to take hits

but not hit to not fulfil their basic function which is to provide some form of warning that the enemy's jets are on airborne and seem to be approaching Iranian territory (even if still 500km+ away)

the strikes throughout West Iran and Tehran (simultaneously) caught IRI totally off guard. it's not like they destroyed every single OTH Radar system. so it suggests the OTH radars did not work as expected or Israel simply exposed their natural limitations

Yes, OTH are really AEW systems. But Emirzad is right, you can´t not defend them from very long range aeroballistic missiles.

So that means that IRI will count in a foreeseable future with long range aircrafts to tackle with the launcher aircrafts.

OTH are really big installations but... their TX/RX emitters are not that complicated and heavyweight like AESA TX/RX modules. Why IRI doesn´t build in large quantities and pre-assemble them in kits just to redeploy them in another place when those have been targeted and destroyed?. Pre-assemble kits could replace them in weeks instead in months.

 

[ToddE]

fine to take hits

but not hit to not fulfil their basic function which is to provide some form of warning that the enemy's jets are on airborne and seem to be approaching Iranian territory (even if still 500km+ away)

the strikes throughout West Iran and Tehran (simultaneously) caught IRI totally off guard. it's not like they destroyed every single OTH Radar system. so it suggests the OTH radars did not work as expected or Israel simply exposed their natural limitations

There are dozen ways in combat aviation or missile warfare to dodge the defense. Stealth, Terrain masking, flight in blind spots, ECCM, hypersonics etc.

These assets are useful in peacetime or as early warning like I said but they would be priority wise attacked. IRIAD has mobile search radars as well that can create a network centric search and track web instead of solely relying on OTHs. May be they are already changing the tactics as we speak.

 

[Flotilla]

Another necessary item next time is passive radar coverage. It has pretty long range that you can use against drones and aircraft at medium high altitudes.

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It may not be accurate enough to start a kill chain and guide a missile to target but for scanning and alerting other anti-uav anti-aircraft systems without getting detected or jammed it seems to be accurate enough.

For example enemy hermes drones can be detected by the passive radar over a roughly estimated position and karrar(or other potential a2a drones) can be vectored there to take down the targets by their own sensors and man in the loop. Similarly it can inform majid iir-optical guided sams to track certain areas.

Passive radar reciever sensor which is the manned and expensive part cannot be detected easily just like Majid was almost invisible to enemy drones. Fm, vhf transmitters can be detected but they are unmanned items. they can be towed-carried around by other vehicles periodically to not to be detected by spy sats. Transmitters can also be stationed far from frontlines unlike the reciever.

This leaves out low flying targets like israeli f15s flying over Syria, Iraq. For that mission a highly expensive, hard to protect awacs plane would be an overkill which also needs a large airbase. Helicopters can be converted to early warning roles. Lower detection range than an awacs but at least does not require a large airbase and it can detect incoming low flying cruise missiles drones and alert other items.

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Drones can carry aesa pods for the same role as well but the range would be shorter than an awacs.

Sweden Just Turned a Reaper Drone into an AWACS

This might be the perfect solution to US AWACS drama

www.wesodonnell.com

Ideally a stealth platform should do this job but even these can be useful. They can be shot down from long ranges losing the expensive aesa radars in the process. The expensive parts are the aesa pods and processor on this drone. These pods can be dropped down by parachute with chaff when rwr activates maybe. So you only lose the carrier platform and recover the aesa radars and processing.

That is very interesting. I also suggested months ago something like MBDA Twinvis radar which is essentially passive. It works like this one. High angle off boresight missiles like IRIS-T can be locked after launch (LOAL) that makes them capable of working combined with passive radars. They would be just ejected when passive radar detects the incoming stealth fighter or cruise missile.