Will Israel be capable of destroying S-300 missiles in Syria?
Russia has decided to deliver the advanced S-300 missiles to Syria after Israeli Air Force was held completely responsible for the downing of Russian IL-20 on September 18.
The delivery of the air defense missiles will radically change the current situation in the region with Israel widely expected to destroy the newly-arrived missiles.
For a long time, Israel bloggers have been discussing various options to ‘neutralize’ the S-300 missiles once delivered to the Syrian Army.
5 options to ‘neutralize’ the S-300 missiles
For example, military historian Alexander Shulman stated 5 options to fulfill this purpose:
- Taking over the S-300 missiles and transporting them to Israel just it was the case in 1969 when Israeli paratroopers took over the Soviet-made P-12 Radar System intended for the Egyptian Army and eventually moving it to Israel.
- Conducting a daring ground military operation to destroy the missiles and eliminate its crews. According to Shulman, a similar operation was carried out in Egypt during the 1969 War of Attrition.
- Carrying out heavy missile strikes targeting the locations of S-300 missiles (similar to the strikes that hit the Syrian Army positions during the 1982 Lebanon war).
- Applying the electronic jamming. On 2007, Israel electronically jammed Syrian radars when its F-16s bombed a military site.
- Simply destroying the missiles through sabotage.
“I think the ground operation and sabotage options can be justifiably ruled out. If ever happened, destroying the S 300 missiles will be achieved by means of long-range, high-precision weapons, or heavy air attacks using high-precision weapons”, Antoine Lavrov, an independent military expert, told Russian online newspaper Vzglyad.
According to lavrov, the Israelis have enough aerial power to carry out the attack but they can never overrun the S-300 systems through electronic warfare without the help of Americans. “This, however, will involve a wide-scale operation with the full engagement of the USA”, he added.
Ability to destroy S-300 missiles
In the same context, an Israeli military expert told Vzglyad that Israel will not attack the S-300 missiles due to political – not technical – reasons.
“Technically, everything is possible. But this is not the case. The main issue lies in that supplying Syria with S-300 missiles might bring Russian and Israel on the brink of a direct military confrontation”, he commented.
“There is a clear understanding in Israel that S-300 missiles will completely close the Israeli airspace”, said Uzi Rubin; founder of the Israeli agency for developing the missile defense system and a co-founder of HETZ anti-missile system.
Translation : Muraselon News website
