Syria in 2018-2019

[Azor]

What say you to the contention that 2 Israeli fighters fired 8 missiles (Popeyes or Delilahs?), of which 3-5 were shot down by Syrian air defenses?

[Azor]

From Babak Taghvaee (https://twitter.com/BabakTaghvaee/st...85568260804608):

• Russia has asked Iran to provide the Russian Air Force with access to the IRIAF's 3rd Tactical Fighter Base in Hamedan to deploy heavy bombers and tankers, and to use it as a refueling base for fighter jets deployed over Syria
• Earlier in August 2016, the RuAF was permitted to deploy 8 Su-34 fighters and 4 Tu-22M3 bombers Hamedan, but after the Russians deliberately leaked pictures of their bombers in the base, Iran forced them to leave
• It is possible that Iran will refuse Russia access to Hamedan, but may offer the 5th Tactical Fighter Base at Omidiyeh again
• The motivation behind Russia's request is concern that Russian aircraft may need to evacuate Hmeimim Air Base in the event of US-led airstrikes on Syria
• This information comes from a "valid" source in the IRIAF, according to Taghvaee

[Azor]

Also from Babak Taghvaee:

• Israeli F-15Is used Delilah cruise missiles to target the maintenance hangars of the Syrian Arab AF's Tiyas Air Base
• One was being used for the repair of Su-24MK2s of the SyAAF's 819th Fighter Squadron
• The other hangar was being used by the IRCG's Aerospace Force (IRGCAF), which was probably the target of the Israeli strike

See links for images of the damage to Tiyas:

• https://twitter.com/BabakTaghvaee/st...30599122194432
• https://twitter.com/BabakTaghvaee/st...54020226801664

[CrowBat]

What say you to the contention that 2 Israeli fighters fired 8 missiles (Popeyes or Delilahs?), of which 3-5 were shot down by Syrian air defenses?

Except 'for PR purposes', there are always at least two, more likely four times more Israeli aircraft involved in every such operation. That's that way already since the Battle of Saunu, in November 1966.

I've got no idea who launched this nonsense about 'two F-15Is', but at least eight were involved.

And re. Taghvaee: check any translation of the Iranian Constitution you can get. Basing of foreign military in Iran is strictly prohibited, so also (quote), 'in peace'. The IRGC did attempt to ignore that paragraph back in 2016, and still: when Majlis (Iranian Parliament) began to protest, the Russians had to be kicked out.

Now, Omidiyeh - former TFB.5 of the IRAF, near Agha Jari - was meanwhile taken over by the IRGC. That's contrary to TFB.3 (near Hamedan), which remains an IRIAF base, and where the Russians landed back in August 2016. Means: the IRGC might try it basing the Russians at one of its own bases in the future.

However, that's not changing anything about the Iranian constitution: such an action would be a gross violation of fundamental Iranian laws.

And re. his claims about 'maintenance hangars' at T-4: actually one of hangars was used to store one Su-24MK that was out of service since quite early during the war, and few helicopters. No 'maintenance' there was undertaken, while everything that was inside was destroyed. And, funny that he's mentioning 'SyAAF's 819th Fighter Squadron': when I published that designation in an article about the SyAAF, in AirForces Monthly Feb/2017, he wrote to the editor that no such unit exists.

[Azor]

From CNBC (https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/12/trum...ly-soon.html):

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he would meet with Defense Secretary James Mattis and Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – and that a decision on whether the U.S. military will respond to alleged Syrian chemical attacks will be made "fairly soon."

A source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told CNBC the U.S. was considering striking eight potential targets. Those targets include two Syrian airfields, a research center and a chemical weapons facility.

The source also noted that Syria's military has repositioned a significant amount of air assets to Russian-controlled airfields in hopes that Washington would be reluctant to strike there.

"We're looking very very seriously, very closely at that whole situation and we'll see what happens folks," Trump told reporters Thursday.

Over the past five days, Trump has sharpened his rhetoric against Syria and its most powerful ally Russia and issued a threat via Twitter of a potential U.S. strike against the war-torn country...

[davidbfpo]

Anthony Cordesman, from CSIS, a 'long read' entitled 'Syria: When and How Does This War End?'; which opens with:

In early 2003, when he was still commander of the 101^st Airborne Division and still preparing for the invasion of Iraq, General David Petraeus asked a key question: “How does this war end?” Some fifteen years later, we are no closer to an answer than we were then in Iraq, and we seem to be no closer in Syria. The purpose of war is never to win military victories. The purpose is to shape a peace that serves the lasting strategic objectives of the nation that fights it. We have not been able to focus on this goal in any of our “wars”. Not only Iraq and Syria, but Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, and the other much smaller fights against terrorism and extremism in west and east Africa

(Ends with) The full message of the previous quotes from the World Bank and CIA on the civil impact of the fighting in Syria should be all too clear. It is just as important to have a sound civil-military strategy in fighting terrorism – and to focus on stability and peace – as it is in counterinsurgency. As the Syrian example shows all too clearly, focusing on the fighting and terrorism alone can never be enough. Even if one wins some form of tactical victory, one still must live with the reality that follows, and purely military solutions will always account to the equivalent of cut and run.”.

Link:https://www.csis.org/analysis/syria-...w-does-war-end

From the News Statesman (a UK weekly magazine, usually on the Left) two Kings College War Studies academics have 'Syria’s world war; How Britain and the US are being dragged into the defining conflict of our times'. It closes with:

Once again, Syria has proven to be the problem that cannot be ignored, however much the West has tried. The ugly status quo engineered at great human cost by the Syrian regime – with the support of Russia and Iran – has been disturbed. Assad has brazenly continued to deploy chemical weapons on a regular basis with no great fear of any serious costs. For many years, the West has pursued diplomacy neutered by the absence of any willingness to deploy force; today, the danger is of a reflexive use of arms without any considered diplomatic strategy. These whimsical and fleeting fits of moral panic directed towards the defining crisis of our generation do little to defuse a febrile international climate.

Link:https://www.newstatesman.com/science...trangers-lives

[Azor]

Military Movements after the April 2018 Chemical Weapons Attack: http://iswresearch.blogspot.ca/2018/...pril-2018.html

• 2 Russian Su-24M aircraft harassed the USS Donald Cook and the French frigate Aquitaine on April 11. The Russian Navy also conducted a firing drill off the Syrian coast
• Russia reportedly deployed four Tu-95MS and Tu-160M strategic bombers as well as Il-78M tanker aircraft from the Engels Air Base in Russia. Their final destination is unknown although they may be bound for Syria or the Hamedan Air Base in Iran; Russia previously targeted locations in Syria from the Engels Air Base
• Pro-regime forces deployed SAMs, including six Russian Pantsir-S2s, to the Mezzeh Military Air Base and other sites in Damascus
• Pro-regime officials also reportedly issued an alert to the Syrian Arab Army to evacuate personnel and assets from military bases across Syria.
• Regime and Russian aircraft relocated closer to heavily-defended commercial airfields across Syria: from the Seen (Sayqal), Dumayr, Shayrat, and the T-4 (Tiyas) Air Bases, to the Bassel al Assad International Airport in Latakia, the Nayrab Air Base outside Aleppo City, and Damascus International Airport
• Iranian proxies, including Lebanese Hezbollah, reportedly began exiting Syria into Lebanon and Iraq
• Unspecified pro-regime elements reportedly evacuated a branch of the Syrian Scientific Studies and Research Center (SSRC) in Jamraya near Damascus

Coalition Strike Options: https://www.iiss.org/en/militarybala...ia-assets-9a80

• In terms of tactical aviation, only two squadrons remain active over Syria: the 336th Expeditionary Fighter Squadron with F-15E Strike Eagles based at Mowafaq al Salti in Jordan, and a half-strength F-22A Raptor squadron at Al Dhafra in the United Arab Emirates, believed currently to be the 94th Expeditionary Fighter Squadron
• The US also still has two Expeditionary Attack Squadrons (46th and 361st) equipped with MQ-9A Reaper UAVs in theatre, based in Jordan and Kuwait, but the utility of these assets and their UK Royal Air Force (RAF) counterparts for the kind of missions being contemplated is limited by the contested nature of the airspace
• The bomber detachment at Al Udeid in Qatar is also still in place: the 34th Expeditionary Bomb Squadron’s B-1B Lancers began replacing the previous B-52H Stratofortress rotation at the beginning of April
• Additional bombers, particularly the B-2A Spirit stealth bombers, either flying from their home bases in the continental United States, or staging from forward bases such as Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, are an obvious way of getting combat power into theatre for an initial strike
• Both the UK and France also have squadron-sized tactical combat aircraft deployments in the region as part of the campaign against ISIS
• The RAF has a mixed force of six Typhoon FGR4s and eight Tornado GR4s deployed to Akrotiri in Cyprus, and the French have six Rafales deployed to Al Dhafra in the UAE under Escadron de Chasse 1/7 Provence and a detachment of four additional Rafales stationed at Prince Hassan airbase in Jordan
• The RAF Tornados and the French Rafales are capable of conducting stand-off attacks from outside Syrian airspace using Storm Shadow and Scalp EG cruise missiles, and additional long-range cruise missile missions could be flown direct from France or the UK, as they previously were during operations over Libya in 2011.
• There is no aircraft-carrier group currently assigned to either the US Navy’s 5th or 6th Fleet
• Of the four Arleigh Burke-class destroyers carrying Tomahawk cruise missiles, which are forward based with the 6th Fleet, only one, the USS Donald Cook, was in the Eastern Mediterranean on 7 April
• Two of the others, USS Ross and USS Porter, were conducting port visits in the UK and France, and the fourth, USS Carney, had recently returned to its homeport of Rota in Spain
• Currently deployed alongside the Donald Cook is the French Navy destroyer Aquitaine, equipped with the new Missile De Croisière Naval (MdCN) cruise missile but with a smaller number of total launch cells compared to her US counterparts
• The UK Type-45 destroyer HMS Duncan is currently in the Eastern Mediterranean as the flagship of NATO’s Standing Maritime Group 2: although she is not equipped for land-attack missions, she may still be diverted to the theatre in order to bolster the air-defence capability of any task group (and indeed RAF Akrotiri) against potential reprisals.
• Below the waves the picture is somewhat better: the USS John Warner, a Virginia-class Block III submarine, left Gibraltar last week, and after a brief stop at Toulon on 9th April is now highly likely to be in the Eastern Mediterranean
• The Ohio-class converted guided-missile submarine USS Florida (capable of accommodating up to 154 Tomahawk cruise missiles) was believed to be in the Indian Ocean in March, but may have subsequently returned through the Suez Canal and re-entered the Mediterranean, and it is possible that additional submarines from the 5th and 6th Fleets have been moved to join them
• Although there is at present no official confirmation from the British government, several media reports have suggested that at least one of the Royal Navy’s submarines, able to launch Tomahawk cruise missiles, may also be en route

[AdamG]

Note: the map with missile ranges is worth socking away for later use.

The Russian military has claimed that the Syrian air defences, whose most modern weapon is a three-decades-old Russian-supplied anti-aircraft system, shot down 71 of 103 missiles fired by the US and its allies, the UK and France.

As further details began to emerge about the sites targeted by the US-led strikes, Col Gen Sergei Rudskoi of the Russian military said the strikes had not caused any casualties and that Syrian military facilities suffered only minor damage.

Although it was not possible to verify the claims, the most up-to-date system that Moscow has supplied to the Syrian regime is the short range Pantsir S-1, which has an anti-missile capability.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ority-missiles

Source is the Guardian, so compensate for the usual spin rate.

[davidbfpo]

A public French 'national assessment' of the Douma CW strike; well-written IMHO and some horrible photos on the last page.
Link:https://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/IMG/p..._cle0c76b5.pdf