ALCON,
Bit of a brain storm here folks so I apologize in advance of the length of this post.
First, lets be perfectly clear. "On paper", it's hard to see how the Saudis could be more prepared for a conflict with Iran (with a few exceptions addressed below). The question is, how well can they use their excellent kit?
It's interesting, at least to me, how the Saudis & Iranian defenses are set up to deal with certain threats, and the possible pitfalls they face. For example..
1) Cruise Missiles (regardless of target)- Iranian military planners have clearly paid attention to the USAF/USN use of LACMs in nearly every conflict since 1991. These are still a difficult threat to deal with for any military.
> For the Saudis, due to their aging Shahine SAMs (their only real low-level SAM), they relay on the RSAF to not only provide early warning (via E-3s/Saab 2000s, likely much earlier than any ground-based radar could) but also likely in their neutralization via fighter jets.
> For Iran, they have no airborne early warning to a cruise missile attack and instead are forced to relay entirely on ground-based radar units. Likewise, as the IRIAF is ill-suited to task of dispatching large #s of LACMs, ground-based SHORADs and deception (GPS jammers for example) are their only real defense.
2) Runway Attack- The reliance on long, undamaged runways, was identified VERY early in the Cold War and was one of the chief drivers behind the development of the British Harrier (folks forget that putting it on a carrier was something of an afterthought). Curiously though, the idea eventually fell out of favor (for any number of reasons). Such attacks can come from accurate, sub-munition warhead equipped ballistic missiles, low-flying strike aircraft, or cruise-missiles with sub-munition warheads.
>As such, a successfully attack on the runways of RSAF air bases is a real threat. Their only real defense is their Patriot batteries or the preventive elimination of enemy launch sites & TELs. Hiding their valuable combat aircraft is fine and dandy, but if the Patriots fail to keep a majority of missiles from impacting, quickly repairing the runways after each wave of attack will become a game of persistence and possible futility.
>>WILDCARD- Given growing signs of a greater Egypt-Saudi alliance, Egypt could potentially open her airfields to the RSAF to evacuate to temporarily. Putting their most valuable assets (tankers, AWACs, & F-15S/SA) as far West as possible will allow them to still be able to operate in their own airspace from a safer distance (where Iran would be forced to use her more long-range BMs, which limits the saturation factor and gives Egyptian Patriot & S-300V batteries better odds of success). Not to mention if Iran does attack these new locations for the RSAF, it drags another powerful military into the conflict, expanding the conflict likely beyond Iran's ability to control.
>For Iran, this threat doesn't come from ballistic missiles but from the RSAF. The inventory of weapons available to the RSAF to attack IRIAF bases from afar (aka outside of most of their SAMs, including the S-300PMU2 in some cases). How many such weapons are configured with sub-munition warheads is unknown. Only options to protect runways is via SHORADs and electronic jamming.
3) Hardened Aircraft Shelters or HAS- I'm NOT as confident Iran is prepared to deal with these. For modern HAS, a true bunker-buster bomb would be needed, something Iran has not demonstrated having yet. The Ghased (not to detract from it) is "just" a normal 2000lb bomb with a TV seeker and wing kit. Bunker-busters have specially designed warheads and often hardened tips to maximize penetration upon impact. Iran's KAB-1500Ls are probably the closet to real bunker-busters we know about and more so due to their larger warheads.
4) Wild Weasel Attacks- aka attacks on ground-based air defense sites. This can come from manned/unmanned platforms and from cruise missiles.
>The threat to Saudi radar sites would likely come from a combination of Iranian suicide drones, LACMs (if the Soumar has been built in large #s), and ballistic missiles (Hormuz-2 being a prime candidate). This multi-pronged threat would be difficult to deal with. It would difficult for the RSADF and RSAF to determine which targets were real threats or decoys.
>This threat to Iran comes solely from the RSAF, which has a surprisingly large inventory of medium-range LACMs (~1100), ~350 JSOW stand-off weapons & 600 AGM-88s in their inventory. They obviously wouldn't use ALL their LACMs on Iranian radar/SAM sites but they are among the "best" targets. They also have large inventories of many other kinds of smart munitions (thousands of Hellfires, Mavericks, Paveways, JDAMs, and SDBs) which also could be used, depending on the threat level to the aircraft.
5) Naval Attack- Easily the most lop-sided element of any future conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia is on the sea.
> For the RSN, the threats from Iran are numerous. Coastal AshM batteries, ASBMs, mini-submarines, and swarms of variously-armed FACs. Not reliant on runways, the Saudis best strategy (assuming the RSAF is grounded) would be to use their large fleet of AH-64s from the ground forces, combined with the RSN's respectable inventory of helos to try and deal with Iranian swarm attacks and submarines.
> For the IRIN/IRCN, the primary threat is again from the RSAF. Should it be removed from the playing field, the RSN's surface fleet with be very exposed. Even with my proposed helo strategy, equipped every surface vessel over 50 tons displacement with at least 1 MANPAD team (& then spreading some among the smaller vessels) will diminish that threat considerably.
This "little" brain storm excludes a lot of tactics, how I think such a conflict could start, and the very idea of the US intervening...which it ABSOLUTELY would under the current administration, no matter who starts it.
Cheers.
at those websites. These were negotiated as part of the JCPOA, since they are UN sanctions put into place because of the nuclear issue.
