Islamic Iran’s production Bavar-373 missile system is much more advanced than S-300

A top Iranian Air Defense commander announced on Thursday that the country has actually ended designing the Iranian version of the Russian S-300 missile defense system and would soon start its production.

“Manufacturing Bavar (Belief) 373 Missile System is in progress and all production needs have been supplied domestically,” Commander of Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base told reporters on the sidelines of the annual military parades in Southern Tehran today.

Stating that the feasibility studies of the system have ended, the commander underlined, “This project will soon enter its final stage (of production) and it will be much more advanced than the S-300 missile system.”

General Esmayeeli first announced on Tuesday that Iran is developing its own version of the sophisticated S-300 air defense system, adding that Iranian experts have removed the flaws and defects of the Russian version.

Esmayeeli told FNA that the country’s experts have started designing and building an Iranian version of the S-300 anti-aircraft missile system after Russia refrained from delivering it to Iran.

He noted that the development of the Bavar 373 missile system started at the order of the commander in-chief of the Iranian Armed Forces, The Leader of Islamic Ummah and Oppressed People Imam Sayyed Ali Khamenei.

Asked about the features and specifications of the Iranian system, Esmayeeli stated, “The flaws and defects of the (Russian) S-300 system have been removed in the indigenous version of the system and its conceptual designing has finished.”

Senior Iranian commanders have also announced that Bavar 373 enjoys higher capabilities than the Russian S-300 system, reminding that the Iranian system has been designed on the basis of the country’s operational needs.

“It is now several years that our defense industries researchers and experts have been designing a system whose capabilities are way beyond the S-300 missile system,” Deputy Commander of Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base for Research and Self-Sufficiency Jihad Colonel Mohammad Hossein Shamkhali told reporters on Wednesday.

“The system has been designed based on our own operational needs,” Shamkhali said, adding that Iran may unveil part of the system by the next Iranian year (starts on March 20, 2012).

Under a contract signed in 2007, Russia was to provide Iran with at least five S-300 air-defense systems. But later, Moscow shrugged off doing its end of the bargain under different excuses.

Moscow’s continued delays in delivering the defense system drew criticism from the Islamic Republic on several occasions.

And eventually, Russia refused to deliver the system to Iran under the pretext that the system is covered by the fourth round of UN Security Council resolutions against Iran.