Issue 863, 23 October 2009

Iran shows off new military projects but its new arsenal fails to impress

Despite an increasingly sophisticated military infrastructure, a fatal crash and a number of technical faults at a recent air show have undermined President Ahmadinejad’s threats of retaliation if the US or Israel were to strike

Iran’s late September announcement of a previously undisclosed nuclear facility, just days before the UN General Assembly session in New York, showed the Islamic Republic at its most unrepentant. The facility, buried in a mountain about 30km north-east of Qom, had been prepared since 2004, and has been monitored since US satellites identified the site in 2005, according to GSN’s sources in the US intelligence community. Everything about the site suggests it is a covert uranium enrichment facility; it is deeply buried, it has multiple entrances, surface ventilation and electrical facilities are hardened and, most significantly, its small size suggests it is not a plant for making fuel for nuclear power plants but a facility where diverted fuel might be quietly run through approximately 25,000 centrifuges in secrecy. According to US government sources, the White House and intelligence community are unsure how Iran learned of the plant’s exposure, but it acted boldly, beating President Barack Obama’s administration to the punch.

Amid mounting pressure from the US and European Union, Russia and China, the Iranians have – as ever – come out of their corner fighting. Chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili told reporters after the UN session that Iran would “go ahead and stick to our nuclear rights” in terms of uranium enrichment. Elsewhere, tougher words were spoken. At the 22 September parade marking the anniversary of the Iran-Iraq war, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned: “If any individual would intend to pull a trigger in any part of the world against the Iranian nation, his hand will be powerfully severed from the arm.”

Military exercises and parades

Iran has responded to growing diplomatic pressure with typical aplomb, launching military exercises and parades that signal the regime’s willingness to stay the course. In Washington, GSN has detected growing confidence – almost giddiness – over apparent cracks in the Iranian regime, and Tehran appears concerned not to give ground. Iran’s post-election protests breathed new life into Washington’s regime changers, a community that had almost been snuffed out by Obama’s determined pursuit of a policy of engagement with Iran. Following the marches and protests, the job of selling engagement is more difficult. Critically, the idea of negotiating (through ciphers) with Rahbar (Supreme Leader) Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has become less palatable following his strong backing of Ahmadinejad.

The anniversary of the Iran-Iraq war always warrants major parades, but according to GSN’s friends in the plane-spotting community in Tehran – a particularly dedicated group of reporters with an eye for detail – the regime pulled out all the stops to give the most impressive air show it could muster. The Sacred Defence parade included the main combat fleets of the Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force (IRIAF): the main air defence fighter, the MiG-29; strike aircraft the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom and Sukhoi Su-24s; and the training and light attack fleet of Northrop Grumman F-5s.

If the parades were meant to signal strength, they were a mixed success. The IRIAF successfully showed off its Saeqeh multi-role combat aircraft, a Frankenstein’s monster of an airframe based on the F-5 and incorporating 20 years of Iranian reverse engineering and tinkering with US, Chinese and Russian combat aircraft. The first Saeqeh – which GSN has been monitoring since the mid-1990s – will become operational with IRIAF frontline squadrons in 2010, though no-one is holding their breath.

The air show was marked by a serious blow to IRIAF prestige with the crash of Iran’s only airborne early-warning and control system (AWACS) aircraft, an old Iraqi Ilyushin Il-76 variant that was kept by Iran after Saddam Hussein flew it there in 1991. All seven crew died in the crash. According to GSN’s sources, a number of the planned F-5 sorties did not take off due to technical faults, and two MiG-29s suffered a near mid-air collision. If the IRIAF ever has to back up Ahmadinejad’s threats with action, they will need to raise their game significantly.

Missile developments

Alongside aerial manoeuvres, the IRGC undertook a series of missile tests in late September and early October. A number of surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) were brought out at the parades, including upgraded Russian S-200/SA-5 missiles and a modernised indigenous clone of the Raytheon MIM-23B Hawk missiles bought by the Shah in the late 1970s. Despite effective tinkering, such large and ageing systems cannot compete with the defensive electronic warfare suites on US or Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) aircraft.

The solution to Iran’s SAM requirements – a long-mooted $800m deal for five batteries of S-300PMU1/SA-20 missiles from Russia – is now further out of reach due to mounting pressure on the nuclear file. Though neither Moscow nor Tehran can be expected to admit it, the deal is largely dead. The Obama administration has not only applied the stick of political pressure to Moscow, but brought out the carrots of scaled-back US ballistic missile defence in Eastern Europe. Even the Russian defence press, which is notorious for spreading false rumours of massive Russian arms sales, admitted in early October that no advance payments had been made and there was little chance of a purchase because it had “ceased to be just a commercial deal”.

Iran continues to enjoy more success with ballistic missile technology. Working with Korea, it has made solid steps in developing the single-stage liquid-propellant Shahab-3 medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) and the two-stage, solid-propellant Sajil-2 (Sejil-2) MRBM. On 28 September, days before the UN session, Iran test-fired a Shahab-3 and a number of short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs), including the Shahab-1, Shahab-2, Fateh-110 and Tondar-69. The missile trajectory of the Shahab became unstable, but the SRBM flights were successful. The growing arsenal of unguided SRBMs is of growing concern to the GCC states and the US. The US military considers Hizbollah’s use of tactical rockets in clashes with Israel to be the most significant development in regional military capability for over a decade, and Iranian SRBMs are considered difficult to intercept.

Iranian subs in the Gulf

In addition to aircraft, missiles and rockets, Iran has also unveiled plans to deploy a new class of small submarine in the next two years. On 3 October, it said it would launch the first Qaeem-class 500-tonne submarine in 2011. The class fits into an unusual category; it is not a 120-tonne mini-submarine or “midget submarine” like Iran’s North Korean-inspired six Qadir-class 29-metre submarines or its single Nahang-class 25-metre submarines. Nor is it the size of its three Russian 877 EKM Kilo submarines, which displace 3,076 tonnes.

Instead, the Qaeem is a mid-sized vessel that appears to have been deliberately designed to give the IRGC a longer-range delivery system that can comfortably operate in the shallow waters of the Gulf. The Qadir and Nahang-class mini-subs are too small to comfortably operate against shipping or ports on the GCC side of the Gulf, and they are unable to stay “on station” or carry enough weapons for multiple attacks. The Kilos are too large to safely navigate the Gulf, particularly if maritime patrol aircraft and anti-submarine frigates are hunting them. The Qaeem appears to be designed to harass shipping around Gulf ports, attack US amphibious ships anchored off Iranian beachheads and even hunt ships in the strong currents of the Strait of Hormuz.

Israeli subs in the Indian Ocean?

As Iran tries to figure out a way to use submarines in the Gulf, the Israelis are taking their first (public) steps to bring their 1,900-tonne German-built Dolphin submarines into Iranian coastal waters. Though Israel has long been rumoured to have sent Dolphins around the African coast, the Israeli Navy went a step further when the INS Leviathan, one of three Dolphins, passed through the Suez Canal for the first time. The mission – and plans to deploy two more Dolphins by 2013 – are a warning to Iran, which recently deployed anti-piracy patrol vessels in the Red Sea. The Dolphins – based on the German Type 212A submarine – are able to land special forces and launch nuclear and conventional cruise missiles. New capabilities will allow them to stay submerged for up to 14 days, giving Israel a potent pre-emptive or retaliatory strike capability to add to its long-range Jericho MRBMs and its nuclear and conventional long-range strike aircraft.

After Obama’s first months in power, when observers in Washington discounted the prospect of military action, some sources believe an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities is once more looming into view. US military sources told GSN that Israel had been enquiring – through back-channels – about the likely US reaction to an attack on Iran from the air, which would involve over-flying US-policed Iraq.

Analysts believe that were Israel to strike, the Iranian armed forces have reached a size and sophistication that could make them a major complicating factor. However, Iranian sabre-rattling this autumn has once again revealed a flawed military infrastructure. This suggests that while Tehran could offer a degree of resistance to any incursion, it would ultimately be unable to stop a US strike. Threats of retaliation thus remain its only realistic deterrent.