Iranian Missiles | News and Discussions

[PeeD]

The future is path is already clear for Iran as said.

BMs.

All weapon systems have one goal --> deliver something to somewhere to cause destruction.

Here we have a huge range of different capability levels that are in direct connection with the costs.

Everything is judged by following key parameters:
- Range = attack vector = distance survivability
- Extend of destruction = payload = terminal velocity = payload type
- Velocity = delivery time = envelope and speed capability of countering system
- Size = launch concept = position/basing flexibility = reconnaissance footprint = survivability
- Logistics/support = system robustness = indirect reconnaissance footprint
- Survivability = basing = velocity = hardening = availability = system robustness = trajectory

Based on this key parameters we can decide which systems are the best.

Warfare is basically a erosion process, something is thrown against something to degrade it.
BMs basically do just that, from an arrow --> artillery --> aircraft dropped bomb --> BM

At the start of a peer-level conflict, the most effective weapons will be used until the adversaries capability are degraded to a extend that the next lower capability system can be used (a cheaper more cost-efficient weapon).
Therefore at one point Iran would stop using BMs and switch to conventional airpower or even drone based airpower.

BMs are hence everything that counts for now.

In future Iran will have early warning assets which have low survivability but high reconnaissance capability. These will be small imaging/SAR satellites and a static OTH radar network. These will ensure that Iran knows its targets prior to the start of the warfare phase.
If this is coupled with the BM force, a large portion of enemy capability will be degraded in the first hours.
Once enemy ASAT and BMs neutralize these strategic early warning assets, speed will decrease.

The next thing Iran will need are hypersonic glide vehicles (waverider). How do they look like? Simply an unpowered warhead for existing and future BMs. What capability do they add?
Not speed as many may think.
It adds a more flexible attack vector and a depressed trajectory for later detection by enemy EW and ABM. It may be able to stay longer in the plasma phase of the re-entry (depending on the thermal shielding). The rest of the capabilities are same as a BM.
This capability is only needed to counter future ABM systems = a very small portion of enemy warfare capability.

Current ABM capability already would have immense problems against new generation MaRV and space released submunition strategies Iranian BMs employ.

In conclusion: They key performance parameters of BMs are so superior to LACM/supersonic bombing/conventional airpower that the key reasoning is this: Can Iran afford to use BMs to neutralize enemy tier-1 assets or is it necessary to go for a cheaper solution of lower capability.

 

[aryobarzan]

Beautiful discussions..happy to see so many smart ideas being put forward..but lets consider this:
If Iran is ever going to be invaded intentionally (not accidental war), it will be a combined forces of Arabs,Israel and US/Nato. No amount of BM or CM or Hyper velocity supper weapons can prevent them from neutralizing Iran once and for good....so the only and best option that Iran has is to prevent such a decision ever being made by the enemy.. and how to do that....the answer is OIL and Nuclear.

1- Oil and Oil starvation of world economy....make sure the current and future weapons Iran develops can ensure the destruction of the entire Oil/Gas infrastructure of the arab producers beyond doubt and let the enemy know damn well it is a real capability (this is Persian Gulf and Red sea underwater pipelines, refineries and oil wells). Also includes extended closure of Hormoze to all trade traffic and Gulf of Aden (I mean more than 6 months)..

2- Have the bomb or at least make sure they know you have a real latent nuclear device capability ( as I understand Iran may already have this or soon will have that).

The above two options will ensure that if Iran is ever invaded we also have the samson option..Once the enemy knows these two options are in place their calculations will change and they will try to either make a deal or subvert Iran from within (they are practising in Venezuela now..lol).

 

[Mithridates]

The future is path is already clear for Iran as said.

BMs.

All weapon systems have one goal --> deliver something to somewhere to cause destruction.

Here we have a huge range of different capability levels that are in direct connection with the costs.

Everything is judged by following key parameters:
- Range = attack vector = distance survivability
- Extend of destruction = payload = terminal velocity = payload type
- Velocity = delivery time = envelope and speed capability of countering system
- Size = launch concept = position/basing flexibility = reconnaissance footprint = survivability
- Logistics/support = system robustness = indirect reconnaissance footprint
- Survivability = basing = velocity = hardening = availability = system robustness = trajectory

Based on this key parameters we can decide which systems are the best.

Warfare is basically a erosion process, something is thrown against something to degrade it.
BMs basically do just that, from an arrow --> artillery --> aircraft dropped bomb --> BM

At the start of a peer-level conflict, the most effective weapons will be used until the adversaries capability are degraded to a extend that the next lower capability system can be used (a cheaper more cost-efficient weapon).
Therefore at one point Iran would stop using BMs and switch to conventional airpower or even drone based airpower.

BMs are hence everything that counts for now.

In future Iran will have early warning assets which have low survivability but high reconnaissance capability. These will be small imaging/SAR satellites and a static OTH radar network. These will ensure that Iran knows its targets prior to the start of the warfare phase.
If this is coupled with the BM force, a large portion of enemy capability will be degraded in the first hours.
Once enemy ASAT and BMs neutralize these strategic early warning assets, speed will decrease.

The next thing Iran will need are hypersonic glide vehicles (waverider). How do they look like? Simply an unpowered warhead for existing and future BMs. What capability do they add?
Not speed as many may think.
It adds a more flexible attack vector and a depressed trajectory for later detection by enemy EW and ABM. It may be able to stay longer in the plasma phase of the re-entry (depending on the thermal shielding). The rest of the capabilities are same as a BM.
This capability is only needed to counter future ABM systems = a very small portion of enemy warfare capability.

Current ABM capability already would have immense problems against new generation MaRV and space released submunition strategies Iranian BMs employ.

In conclusion: They key performance parameters of BMs are so superior to LACM/supersonic bombing/conventional airpower that the key reasoning is this: Can Iran afford to use BMs to neutralize enemy tier-1 assets or is it necessary to go for a cheaper solution of lower capability.

the question is how we are going to neutralize enemy THAAD batteries to target them or the area they protect?? or more importantly how we gonna figure it out were are they?? their launchers, radars, command post??
in the scenario you mentioned we need low flying/stealth bombers to neutralize enemy air defense (THAAD) or maybe specops/proxies to infiltrate and take them out. we should have other cards to play in case of war, thinking unidirectional and focusing only on BMs is a weakness, i know the value of our BMs but the enemy knows that too. we should develop other deterances just in case that the first plan fail.
we need better surveillance assets and striking capability.

 

[Bahram Esfandiari]

the question is how we are going to neutralize enemy THAAD batteries to target them or the area they protect?? or more importantly how we gonna figure it out were are they?? their launchers, radars, command post??
in the scenario you mentioned we need low flying/stealth bombers to neutralize enemy air defense (THAAD) or maybe specops/proxies to infiltrate and take them out. we should have other cards to play in case of war, thinking unidirectional and focusing only on BMs is a weakness, i know the value of our BMs but the enemy knows that too. we should develop other deterances just in case that the first plan fail.
we need better surveillance assets and striking capability.

Its not necessary to neutralize THAAD if you can overwhelm it with superior number of BMs. Is it ideal? No!

 

[PeeD]

Following ABM defeat concepts are known or theorized:

- Superior speed: Gives the BM/HGV the capability to pull higher G's for evasive maneuvers. It also means more such evasive maneuvers can be performed.

- Decoys

- exo-atmospheric released sub munitions

- Multiple guided warheads to ensure superiority in cost-effectiveness

- Potential stealth due to buildup of a plasma layer. This can be exploited by "waveriding" HGVs if that thermal state can be sustained long enough

We can envision the following scenario:

2025 Iran has developed a ICBM that has 3 hypersonic glide vehicles, completely unpowered and in terms of thermal shielding true "waverider" designs.
A network (100+) of cost effective reconnaissance cubesats with 1m resolution cameras is online and allows a update rate of one overfly per hour globally.
A preemptive plan identifies all relevant ABM systems.
An ASAT capability is also available. In the first second of the scenario enemy reconnaissance sats, foremost infrared signature warning sats are taken out.
Once this has been achieved, the ICBMs with HGV are launched at a depressed trajectory. This accelerated the unpowered HGV to mach 18.
The HGV have VLO/stealth shaping as well a thick fragile RAM coating, preventing enemy early warning to pick them up. Their depressed trajectory also reduced ABM radar line of sight range.

Once altitude is lost and 80% of the distance achieved they have reached 40km altitude at mach 10. The RAM coating is lost due to the friction and thermal loads but the high speed created a plasma film around the HGV that has the same or better effect.

Enemy long range radar sensor are fooled by the HGV but short range thermal sensors eventually pick them up. Quite late, as the attacking HGV are well timed to attack the ABM system from a 180° spectrum of attack vectors (defeating sector scan radars as the THAAD's).
ABM interceptors are launched to intercept via IR sensors or once the plasma effect has sufficiently decreased.
ABM interceptors reach mach 6 peak after their boost phase has ended while the HGVs approach at mach 8. A random maneuvering program is performed by the HGVs at 200km from the target and the ABM interceptors are forced to perform the necessary course corrections. This leads to following situation at the interception point:
HGV has reached 20km altitude and lost speed down to mach 5, the interceptor has lost speed to mach 4.
This is the final situation and the HGV is able to pull more G's at that interception point.
The HGV pulls a random maneuver and the interceptor is too low on energy to pull enough G's for a direct hit interception.

Theoretically the Zolfaghar and Dezful for example can already now perform a somewhat similar attack scenario, depends on their capability details.

 

[Mithridates]

Its not necessary to neutralize THAAD if you can overwhelm it with superior number of BMs. Is it ideal? No!

it should be ideal, the theory of overwhelming enemy air defence works for US bases and israel, small areas. if you launch 50 missiles toward israel they will overwhelm all of their ADs but saudis and to some extent emiratis have larger country and their assets are spread all over the land so our missiles are less deadly for them compared to israelis. maybe that's why iran AF refused russians su-27 production line offer and went after su-30, a multirole plane to suppress enemy air defences, also we all remember how our military attache in ukraine tried to smuggle a kh-31 to iran i guess it explains all the matters.

 

[Hack-Hook]

it should be ideal, the theory of overwhelming enemy air defence works for US bases and israel, small areas. if you launch 50 missiles toward israel they will overwhelm all of their ADs but saudis and to some extent emiratis have larger country and their assets are spread all over the land so our missiles are less deadly for them compared to israelis. maybe that's why iran AF refused russians su-27 production line offer and went after su-30, a multirole plane to suppress enemy air defences, also we all remember how our military attache in ukraine tried to smuggle a kh-31 to iran i guess it explains all the matters.

If you want to saturate air defence ,why wasting missiles attacking enemy infra structure .
Why not in saturating phase not targeting air defence radars . then you'll have free reign to target anywhere you want without wasting missiles for overwhelming air defence .

 

[Mithridates]

If you want to saturate air defence ,why wasting missiles attacking enemy infra structure .
Why not in saturating phase not targeting air defence radars . then you'll have free reign to target anywhere you want without wasting missiles for overwhelming air defence .

how you gonna know where they stationed their radars, launchers and command posts??

 

[Hack-Hook]

how you gonna know where they stationed their radars, launchers and command posts??

You need to target radars the rest is not that important . and they had to turn on those radars otherwise the system is useless and when they turn that RADAR on there is no way hiding the location of it.

 

[VEVAK]

For those that care: this article from 1999! Talks about a DARPA program to build an affordable hypersonic long range cruise missile. It theorizes a Missile could be produced at a price of 200K (1998) dollars per unit.

https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/d3d4/27585e6d4a7db1d036ca2124c204b1849dc3.pdf

If Iran can build such a Missile even at that price, it would be a immensely valuable strategic weapon.

Nonetheless, missiles (BM or CM) can not be the only route. Enemies will simply calculate your inventory and wait for you to exhaust most of your supply. Given during period of war, Iran’s production of additional missiles will be low.

Thus Iran needs a 3rd dynamic: Supersonic unmanned bombers at a affordable price that can penetrate enemy airspace and drop high altitude ordnance.

The drone should be built at a cost that provides it survivability, but allow for mass production. A unit cost of $3 million per drone will allow Iran to amass 100 high supersonic unmanned bombers for $300 Million. The force multiplier of such a concept is high.

Ideally if Iran was a more developed nation with a bigger budget, I would propose an elite hypersonic UAV that could skip across the upper atmosphere, basically an Avangard in form of UAV and reusable. This UAV weapon if realized would easily become the most deadly on the planet and make the B-2 look like child’s play.

Nonetheless, if Iran can build a stealth flying wing supersonic UAV capable of high altitude flight and ordnance dropping at an AFFORDABLE price, it would be a GameChanger along side the BM/CM Arsenal.

Currently Iran is too 1 dimensional.

I wouldn't say Iran is 1 dimensional in it's approach and although BM are the most vital retaliatory system we have they are not the only means of retaliation but are simply the most effective and the largest one we have.

That said, your right Iran can't afford to be so fixated on BM's alone especially single warhead BM's because at the end of the day BM's are not an easy system to store, fuel, transport and launch regardless of the costs.

And yes having a good size fleet of supersonic UCAV's that can get within ~100-200km of a highly protected target release a good number of high glide PGM's against defensive systems and come home & have the capability to get even closer to use cheaper ordinances once the defense systems are gone would be vital for Iran and a great add on to our current capabilities and personally I would take high altitude supersonic at even Mach 1.5(Cruise) over weapons that can be taken out by SHORAD systems BUT the main problem is that building such a weapon systems is not so easy especially in a country that still imports materials for it's domestically built Kowsar(F-5) and doesn't yet have a credible Aircraft industry....

And with scramjet and ramjet type engines you need an engine and a platform that can achieve such high speeds that it's average on a 5-10 min burn can get you at a sufficient enough range while caring a sufficient amount of ordnances for the system to make sense which is not easy to do at all and that's why countries developing scramjet missiles try to use the kinetic energy of the missile it's self rather than adding the added weight of a sufficient size warhead and therein lies the problem in developing a reusable scramjet powered UCAV because you not only need an Airframe capable of withstanding the heat and pressures of high speed flight but you also need to carry a sufficient amount of ordnances for the system to make sense.
So I'm all for Supersonic UCAV's but I just don't believe that Technologically we are at a level where a scramjet UCAV could potentially make sense.... In the future maybe but not yet!

 

[Websorber]

Iran won't back down on its position on missile program

https://en.mehrnews.com/news/144793/Iran-won-t-back-down-on-its-position-on-missile-program

 

[VEVAK]

Iran won't back down on its position on missile program

https://en.mehrnews.com/news/144793/Iran-won-t-back-down-on-its-position-on-missile-program

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Iran would quite literally have to be suicidal to give up on it's missile program one iota!

The U.S. sanctioned Iran's military for 40 years! They have successfully prevented Iran from gradually upgrading it's Air Force for 4 decades now so even if they remove all sanctions on Iran's military tomorrow and handed Iran 200 F-35's for free it still wouldn't make a difference & Iran still couldn't afford to hand it's missiles over so there is absolutely nothing to negotiate about! This is a hole the west has spent 40 years digging it's self into and Iranian leaders would truly have to be suicidal to negotiate on it's missile program especially since Iran's own self restrictions on ICBM's have proven ineffective and are clearly not enough for them.

 

[Kastor]

Iran would quite literally have to be suicidal to give up on it's missile program one iota!

The U.S. sanctioned Iran's military for 40 years! They have successfully prevented Iran from gradually upgrading it's Air Force for 4 decades now so even if they remove all sanctions on Iran's military tomorrow and handed Iran 200 F-35's for free it still wouldn't make a difference & Iran still couldn't afford to hand it's missiles over so there is absolutely nothing to negotiate about! This is a hole the west has spend 40 years digging it's self into and Iranian leaders would truly have to be suicidal to negotiate on it's missile program especially since Iran's own self restrictions on ICBM's have proven ineffective and are clearly not enough for them.

Iran needs to start breaking it's word also....just like the West, this is war, a war on the economy, a war on growth and stature of Iran.......the problem is we have people in power that make it easy for the Westerners and Zionist to do this to us. We need professionals people, diplomats, politician, tacticians not clergies.

 

[VEVAK]

Iran needs to start breaking it's word also....just like the West, this is war, a war on the economy, a war on growth and stature of Iran.......the problem is we have people in power that make it easy for the Westerners and Zionist to do this to us. We need professionals people, diplomats, politician, tacticians not clergies.

I don't think the problem stems to whether a person is a clergy or not people are people and just as some people are idiots and some quite the opposite some clergies are also idiots & some quite the opposite.... Unfortunately, in Iran there are a few illogical and absurd social policies like Hejab by Force that are giving all clergy's regardless of that individuals views a bad rep.
Also, many Iranian clergies in power today aren't simply educated in religious studies but yes if a clergy is simply educated in religious studies with no real experience then yes I totally agree with you and they should either go back to school or stick to being a simple clergy..... (But, people like Iran's Supreme leader have 4 decades of leadership experience that I'd consider invaluable to any Iranian administration in power and the fact that he is a clergy or that you or I don't agree with all his social views shouldn't negate 4 decades of invaluable experience that he does have....)


And despite what the West say's when it comes to actions and in particular international relations Iranian leaders have so far acted far more rational and calculative than many so called secular governments & their so called moderate regional allies.

BUT the problem I see is that when you become too calculative in your approach and on top of that you put yourself on constant defensive footing like the Rohani Administration has done so far then you not only risk becoming predictive and outmaneuvered but in international relations your risking setting precedents that others will naturally follow.
So Iran could easily wait out Trump even if he is reelected but there is no guarantee that with the examples Iran is setting today the next U.S. administration wont use the same type of tactics in achieving their own goals. And whether your a boxer or a country you can only take punches for so long until your completely worn out.

 

[scimitar19]

Iran would quite literally have to be suicidal to give up on it's missile program one iota!

The U.S. sanctioned Iran's military for 40 years! They have successfully prevented Iran from gradually upgrading it's Air Force for 4 decades now so even if they remove all sanctions on Iran's military tomorrow and handed Iran 200 F-35's for free it still wouldn't make a difference & Iran still couldn't afford to hand it's missiles over so there is absolutely nothing to negotiate about! This is a hole the west has spent 40 years digging it's self into and Iranian leaders would truly have to be suicidal to negotiate on it's missile program especially since Iran's own self restrictions on ICBM's have proven ineffective and are clearly not enough for them.

I second this from head to toe.