RUNNING ON EMPTY: HOW BUDGET CUTS HAVE DAMAGED IRANIAN NAVAL AVIATION
- Aviation Features
- Running on Empty: How budget cuts have damaged Iranian Naval Aviation
By
Babak Taghvaee 27th June 2023
FEATURE
Repeated budget cuts have had a drastic impact on Iranian Naval Aviation, as Babak Taghvaee discovers.
Once one of West Asia’s largest and most potent naval forces, the Iranian Navy currently lacks modern equipment, including helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. As the
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has priority when it comes to
Iran's annual defense budgets, the Iranian Navy has faced a lack of funding, making it difficult to maintain and operate the existing fleet of 33 helicopters, eight aircraft, and nine hovercraft of its
Navy Aviation (IRINA). Today, only 16 helicopters, five aircraft, and three hovercraft are operational simultaneously in the force.
Seen landing on IRINS Makran forward base, is one of 16 IRINA ASH-3Ds (serial 8-2301) and the oldest of its kind in Iran. Ali Naderi
In Exercise ‘Zolfaghar 1401’ which took place six months ago, from December 29, 2022, until January 2, 2023, six helicopters, two aircraft, and two hovercraft of the IRINA, alongside several of its support ships, frigates, and other vessels of the Navy, participated in joint exercise . They worked alongside Iranian Army Aviation AH-1J Sea Cobra Attack Helicopters, and Iranian Air Force Su-24MK and F-4E Phantom II fighter-bombers, and many drones. The exercise was staged in the Oman Sea off the Jask coastline.
The Twin Twelves fleet
The Iranian Navy currently operates 12 Italian-built
Agusta-Bell AB.212ASV (Anti-Surface Vessel) utility helicopters which, in the past, could launch Nord AS.12 anti-ship and anti-tank missiles. All in service with the 11th Helicopter Squadron at the Iranian Navy’s 2nd Naval Aviation Base in Bushehr, they currently form the backbone of the search and rescue capability of IRINA. Although currently only seven are operational simultaneously, they are incredibly active in terms of performing search and rescue (SAR) and medical evacuation (MEDEVAC) missions.
As mentioned above, the home base of the fleet is Bushehr but the Iranian Navy always has one AB.212 on deployment at Jask, Konarak, and Rash to provide SAR helicopters in all four Maritime Zones of Iran; the Caspian Sea, Persian Gulf, Hormuz Strait, and Oman Sea. In addition to SAR and MEDEVAC, the Iranian Navy Marines often use these helicopters during hostage rescue operations and anti-piracy missions.
IRINA’s D139 Free Bird ultralight training aircraft during the December 3, 2019, handover ceremony. Fatemeh Razavi
With the depletion of stocks of AS.12 anti-ship missiles in service of IRINA during the Iran-Iraq war, the AB.212ASVs capable of using the missile had their targeting sight units (TSU) dismantled and removed. In addition, the 6-2415, 6-2416, and 6-2418, the three surviving AB.212ASVs of the Iranian Navy, had their LN-66 X-Band surface surveillance and short-range navigation radar removed after the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988).
In the past 30 years, the Iranian Helicopter Support and Renewal Company (IHSRC), which performs depot maintenance of AB.212s of IRINA, has slightly upgraded and modified some of them. Most of the modification work has been done on their instrumentation, and as a result, multifunction displays capable of showing GPS-integrated moving maps have been installed.
Also, since the late 1990s, IHSRC has restored the attack capability of several AB.212s, through which they regained the ability to use weapons. So far, they have been capable of using GPU-2/A lightweight gun pods (fitted with the M197 20 mm cannons inside) and LAU-68 rocket launchers capable of using 2.75-inch fin-folding unguided rockets. In addition to these, an AB.212 was equipped with anti-ship radar and was wired to carry and launch C-704KD anti-ship missiles. The Iranian Navy decided to halt plans for equipping the helicopters with anti-ship missiles but kept the capability to use LAU-68 rocket pods and GPU-2/A gun pods on some.
IRINA’s last surviving Dassault Falcon 20E (serial 5-2803) is currently in storage. Babak Taghvaee
One of the AB.212ASWs, 6-2406, was deployed with IRINS
Makran forward base as a part of the 75th Fleet of the Iranian Navy, including IRINS
Sahand, a Moudge-class frigate.
They left Bandar Abbas on May 10, 2021, and sailed in the Indian and Atlantic Oceans, the English Channel, and the Baltic Sea to participate in the Russian Navy Day parade at St Petersburg on July 25, 2021. Armed with guns and rocket pods, 6-2406 escorted the ships as they passed from the Gulf of Aden and Bab al-Mandab Strait on their way back to Iran after the parade.
The Sea King fleet
In 1974 the Iranian government ordered 18
ASH-3D Sea King helicopters from Agusta for use by the Imperial Iranian Navy. Their deliveries began in 1976 and continued after the Islamic Revolution. Of the 18 helicopters ordered, 13 had nose-mounted AN/APN-195 weather radars which, besides their use as anti-submarine helicopters, also had SAR roles. The remaining five helicopters had LN-66 search radar installed at the bottom of their fuselage, and they were wired to use and launch Sea Killer anti-ship missiles. However, under the Islamic regime, their anti-ship missiles remained undelivered. Four of these helicopters were delivered to the Iranian Navy in 1981.
Another of the Fokker 27-400M Troopships (serial 5-2601) of IRINA’s 15th Transport Squadron. Babak Taghvaee
In 1980 the Iranian Navy also received two AS.61A-4 Sea King VIP helicopters previously used for the transportation of the Shah and other members of the Royal Family in the Iranian Air Force. These two helicopters, 8-2319 and 8-2320, were also operated by the 12th Anti-Submarine Warfare Squadron of the Iranian Navy, which since 1976 was the operator of ASH-3Ds at the 1st Naval Aviation Base, west of Bandar Abbas.
Iranian Navy Sea Kings were heavily used for various missions such as cargo transport, SAR, combat search and rescue (CSAR), and MEDEVAC. Three of these helicopters were later wired to use AGM-65A Maverick air-to-surface missiles for anti-shipping missions during the war. These three helicopters fired tens of Mavericks at Iraqi and non-Iraqi oil tankers, which carried the exported Iraq oil from Umm Al-Qasr port and the oil terminals of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
Three ASH-3Ds were lost during the Iran-Iraq war, while another was lost in 2004 during a post-disaster relief operation after the Bam earthquake. Starting from 1993, Iranian Navy, which faced substantial budget cuts, began storing and cannibalizing its older ASH-3Ds, resulting in the airworthiness of only six of them in the 12th ASW Squadron in 2008.
An IRINA ASH-3D (serial 8-2313) ahead of a night flight. Keyvan Tavakkoli
As a result of the Iranian Navy awarding a contract to IHSRC in 2009 nine ASH-3Ds which had been kept in storage in Bandar Abbas since the early 1990s, were restored, overhauled, and marginally upgraded under a ten-year-long program. This increased the number of airworthy and operational ASH-3Ds to 11 in 2017. However, within the past two years the decline in the Iranian Navy’s budget has resulted in a further reduction in the number of operational ASH-3Ds . Now, only seven of 16 ASH-3Ds are kept active simultaneously.
During the Iranian Navy Day parade over the Oman Sea on November 27, 2022, two ASH-3Ds of the 12th ASW Squadron, 8-2306 and 8-2311, which are on deployment in Jask, participated alongside three AB.212ASVs serial numbers 6-2406, 6-2412 and 6-2416, and an RH-53D Sea Stallion 9-2703.
The Sea Stallion fleet
In 1975, the procurement office of the Iranian Ministry of War (now Ministry of Defence) placed an order for six
Sikorsky RH-53D Sea Stallion mine-sweeping helicopters for the Imperial Iranian Navy. They were delivered with complete equipment, including Mk 104 Acoustic Minesweeping Device and Mk 105 Magnetic Influence Minesweeping Systems in 1976 and 1977. In 1978, the Iranian Ministry of War began negotiations to procure 12 more RH-53Ds, but the Islamic Revolution in 1979 terminated all of these plans.
One of the four Bell 412EP utility helicopters (serial SN-2202) of the IRGCNA. Ali Naderi