IRGC Readying to Launch Top Secret Air Defense Shield

The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps has built a top secret air defense missile system, IRGC Lieutenant Commander Brigadier General Hossein Salami announced on Saturday, implying that the missile shield is more advanced than the Russian S-300 long-range air-defense missile system.
“An air defense system more advanced than what they didn’t supply to us due to their strategic interests went on display in the IRGC’s recent exhibition,” Salami said in Tehran on Saturday, adding that the missile system won’t be displayed to the media or the public as it should “remain confidential” for now.

The IRGC Commander did not mention who he was referring to as ‘they’, but Russia is the only state which was due to supply Iran with a missile defense system, but refrained from doing so.

The exhibition mentioned by General Salami was an expo of the latest achievements of the IRGC Aerospace Force which was not open to the public and was visited by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei and a number of senior military commanders.

Salami further stressed that the IRGC’s ballistic missiles now enjoy “pinpoint precision capability when fired at mobile targets; this might be impossible in terms of science, but it is true and, in addition to us, only the Russians might possess this technology and even the Americans do not have it”.

Salami also said that the IRGC drones which can fly in high altitudes are capable of conducting different missions without being limited in range.

He further noted the IRGC’s power in ground battles, and said, “As regards the ground force power, the IRGC stands atop the world, given its hundreds of martyrdom-seeking battalions and hundreds of highly trained combat battalions.”

In 2007, Iran signed a contract worth $800mln to buy five Russian S-300 missile defense systems but the deal was scrapped in 2010 by then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who was unilaterally expanding on sanctions against Iran imposed by the UN Security Council.

Iran filed a $4bln lawsuit against Russia in the international arbitration court in Geneva, which is currently pending review.

Moscow has struggled to have the lawsuit dropped, including by offering the Tor anti-aircraft systems as replacement, media reported in December, adding that the offer was rejected by Tehran.

The S-300 is a series of Russian long range surface-to-air missile systems produced by NPO Almaz, all based on the initial S-300P version. The S-300 system was developed to defend against aircraft and cruise missiles for the Soviet Air Defense Forces. Subsequent variations were developed to intercept ballistic missiles.

The S-300 system was first deployed by the Soviet Union in 1979, designed for the air defense of large industrial and administrative facilities, military bases, and control of airspace against enemy strike aircraft.

The Russian version of the missile shield can trace around 100 flying targets simultaneously and destroy a part of them, while the Iranian version is said to be enjoying a higher targeting capability among its other optimized features.

Iran has also optimized the S-200 missile defense system. Mobility and a narrower ready-for-operation time is among the features of the optimized version.

In February, Iran’s top air defense commander announced that the country would launch Bavar (Belief) 373 missile defense system – the Iranian version of the sophisticated S-300 long-range air-defense missile shield – in the next two years.

Commander of Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base Brigadier General Farzad Esmayeeli told FNA that bottleneck problems for the construction of Bavar 373 infrastructures have been resolved, adding that development and construction of the highly advanced anti-missile defense system would be accomplished by the end of Iran’s Fifth Five-Year Development Plan (2010-2015).

“We hope to witness a very good system with higher capabilities than the (Russian) S-300 in our air defense structure by the end of the (Development) Plan”, added the General.

The air defense commander reiterated that “the indigenized system will be more powerful than S-300 missile system”.