U.S. Will Not Let Iran Buy Arms When U.N. Embargo Ends: Pompeo

[Rukarl]

That's a lot man xD, like any nation coming under fire from a country housing fielding that many missiles is gonna have a really bad day.

Its reserved for special days.

 

[PeeD]

Pentagon numbers of Iranian BMs are for their home consumption.

Anyone who wants to get an idea how large the arsenal is, can check Iranian missile bases that are not very difficult to find and identify.

Based on the size and number of bases and units it's clear that 2500 is a joke.

 

[zartosht]

Pentagon numbers of Iranian BMs are for their home consumption.

Anyone who wants to get an idea how large the arsenal is, can check Iranian missile bases that are not very difficult to find and identify.

Based on the size and number of bases and units it's clear that 2500 is a joke.

ive noticed this new trend.. at first people were doubting Iranian missile quality and accuracy.. always comparing it to saddams scuds or north Korean missiles in some capacity.

After Iran demonstrated and proved their pinpoint accuracy in a real world scenarios beyond all question... the debate now has shifted amazingly to quantity.

now their biggest talking point is Iran simply does not have enough of them. because Iranian leaders were decades ahead of the trend and saw how effective ballistic missiles could be in a conventional conflict. Yet they were dumb enough to neglect on the numbers...

the entire Iranian nation, with its extreme dedication to missiles has only produced 2000~ in 20 years of effort~.

I guess whatever makes them sleep better at night, and keeps dumbass customers lined up buying their overpriced legacy equipment and support their defense industries.

 

[VEVAK]

The point of the posts above are these:

1) airforce is crap----better buy ballistic missiles----only Iran does it because it CAN while the rest of the world can't---Iran is smarter than the rest of the stupid world who spend billions buying useless planes instead of developing and producing own missiles---world needs to learn from Iran probably

2) Guerilla warfare in Yemen and Afghanistan is evidence that air force is useless crap LOL. Why they spend billions on fighters-- all these countries--better need to learn from Iran....2700 missiles that make 2700 hits will win war LOL----Of course example of 1991 Gulf War and Yougoslav bombing campaign that delivered more ordinance that all Iranian missiles combined doesn't matter

3) Missile quantity is around 10.000 or even fantastic 100.000....Believing IRGC propaganda is better than analysis by US CENTCOM

4) Terror bombing that failed to cripple Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan still can bring enemy to its knees---Evidence----Third world state-- Iraq's---- compliance in face of global superpower

5) Iranian missiles can be a substitute for airpower and cheaply deliver tons and tons of payload---no need for useless airforce----so probably Iran has revolutionized warfare and everybody needs to learn from it

6) It takes years to rebuild power station-----and the fact that it took 5 days to repair Abqaiq doesn't matter

7) missiles will cripple Turkey and its economy because of damage to tourism----(idea that tourism is 2% of Turkish GDP of course doesn;'t matter)

8) air force in general is not very useful in supporting ground forces---example yemen and afghanistan----useless aircrafts--why they even buy them

9) Syria doesn't have courage to hit back at Israel---and the fact that Israel bombs Iranian targets and Iran doesn;t hit back with its "deadly" missiles of course doesn't matter

10) the guy believes that his missiles can totally destroy airfields and power plants-------rather it will be damage that can be quickly fixed-----taking out airfields by cluster munitions for example can be fixed withing 5 hours---damage to Abqaiq was fixed in couple of days

11) Guy claims that destroying infrastructure is more important than defeating enemy's army----example of massive bombing campaign by Allies during WWII that failed to bring Germany to its knees of course doesn';t matter

And after all this nonsense the guy claims I think of wars like video games....


The truth, however, is that 2700 ballistic missiles is only 2700 hits compared to airforce that can make 270.000 hits.

Ballistic missiles can do temporal damage and even detter aggressor but it will never win war --not through terror ---nor through making temporal damage to infrastructure

Ballistic missiles are low tech response made out of despair---because of inability to produce or purchase fighters jets who are true kings of war.

Truth is that there is no need to develop own amateur theories that contradict globally accepted idea of importance and even crucial nature of airpower.

Countries acquire weapon based on their own threat assessments compared to their own capabilities and for Iran one of the reasons Air Force is NOT a logical investment to throw large portions of your expenditure towards is the U.S. now in the future that may change but for now that is absolutely the case!
1.US has built 30 Bases around Iran and has puppet stats equipped with US Aircraft that will obey their masters like a good little dog.
2. Has a defense budget that if far greater than Iran's entire GDP(Nominal)
3. U.S. Fighter Jets regardless of what fighter jet Iran buys will have a technological superiority which will give them a 1st look 1st shot 1st kill against anything in the sky.

And so the only way to overcome such an enemy is to deny them battel in a battle field they clearly have superiority in and for the U.S. that's in the air and in blue waters out at sea while you focus on your own strengths and force them to fight on your battlefield using domestically produced weapon you can actually afford to sustain. Because simply put, even if Iran had somehow "magically" put most of it's defense budget over the past 2 decades towards purchasing, equipping and maintaining all the Su-57 & J-20 in existence today + All the Su-35's in existence today + 100 Su-30 instead of a vast stock of Missiles & UCAV's today we would have been easy pickings for the U.S. because even in a 1-1 kill ratio against the U.S. we would of still come up short due to the size of US Air Power and the budget of their military.


As for the number "Ballistic Missiles" Iran more likely than not the U.S. unclassified estimates are rather different than their classified estimates. As to why they would lie that's simple, they have over 120 billion reason a year as to why they would want to under estimate Iran's capabilities compared to ppl that buy their weapons!

 

[Aspen]

Countries acquire weapon based on their own threat assessments compared to their own capabilities and for Iran one of the reasons Air Force is NOT a logical investment to throw large portions of your expenditure towards is the U.S. now in the future that may change but for now that is absolutely the case!
1.US has built 30 Bases around Iran and has puppet stats equipped with US Aircraft that will obey their masters like a good little dog.
2. Has a defense budget that if far greater than Iran's entire GDP(Nominal)
3. U.S. Fighter Jets regardless of what fighter jet Iran buys will have a technological superiority which will give them a 1st look 1st shot 1st kill against anything in the sky.

And so the only way to overcome such an enemy is to deny them battel in a battle field they clearly have superiority in and for the U.S. that's in the air and in blue waters out at sea while you focus on your own strengths and force them to fight on your battlefield using domestically produced weapon you can actually afford to sustain. Because simply put, even if Iran had somehow "magically" put most of it's defense budget over the past 2 decades towards purchasing, equipping and maintaining all the Su-57 & J-20 in existence today + All the Su-35's in existence today + 100 Su-30 instead of a vast stock of Missiles & UCAV's today we would have been easy pickings for the U.S. because even in a 1-1 kill ratio against the U.S. we would of still come up short due to the size of US Air Power and the budget of their military.


As for the number "Ballistic Missiles" Iran more likely than not the U.S. unclassified estimates are rather different than their classified estimates. As to why they would lie that's simple, they have over 120 billion reason a year as to why they would want to under estimate Iran's capabilities compared to ppl that buy their weapons!

My opinion has always been that while its tempting to upgrade Air Force, Iran should really stick to its strength with missiles. Iran has a big edge over US presence in GCC with its missiles and as long as Iran keeps investing in better missiles, this capability will get even stronger and more accurate. Iran's missiles are an unknown quantity as US doesn't know much about them and cannot verify, thus US has to assume what Iran says about their missiles is true, which is another big advantage.

I have no clue to be honest, but a pessimistic number is about 10,000 missiles. An optimistic number will be like 25,000 missiles or so. But that's just a guess. It's obviously a classified information.

My guess is somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000 missiles. I think its mostly for deterrence but I never doubt that Iran would use them if necessary. One of the IRGC generals said that there is an underground missile city in every single province and they are so stuffed there is no more room. I have no idea if that is true but if it is then I would definitely expect at least 20,000 missiles.

 

[Kastor]

It's funny when you zoom out and look at the propaganda against Iran.....they call the 3 stage rocket's payload a tumbling web cam....but when it comes to the rocket that put it there....they're silent. Yet, we see Israel's leadership going into a frenzy over it. There has been a half dozen Israeli backed think tank and zombie journalistic outfits that have sounded the alarm. Then there is the other hardware, the drones, the Air defense network and radars....even the sheer military prowess that led to eradication of ISIS from Iraq and Syria...and let's not forget the defeat and gradual withdrawal of the American forces from Iraq. They will always downplay Iran's achievements. It reminds of the battle of the 300, Persia won the battle and sacked Athens...yet thanks to Herodotus who was an orator that got paid for pandering and retelling epic, mostly fictional stories at rich Greeks gatherings that battle has turned into a false legend.

 

[Kastor]

ive noticed this new trend.. at first people were doubting Iranian missile quality and accuracy.. always comparing it to saddams scuds or north Korean missiles in some capacity.

After Iran demonstrated and proved their pinpoint accuracy in a real world scenarios beyond all question... the debate now has shifted amazingly to quantity.

now their biggest talking point is Iran simply does not have enough of them. because Iranian leaders were decades ahead of the trend and saw how effective ballistic missiles could be in a conventional conflict. Yet they were dumb enough to neglect on the numbers...

the entire Iranian nation, with its extreme dedication to missiles has only produced 2000~ in 20 years of effort~.

I guess whatever makes them sleep better at night, and keeps dumbass customers lined up buying their overpriced legacy equipment and support their defense industries.

Yes, the sow discord and death everywhere they go.
Here's a nicely written article.....I wish that we could post this in multiple international news outlets as an Op-ed.

https://en.farsnews.ir/newstext.aspx?nn=13990221000957

 

[Philosopher]

This attempt at downplaying the capability of their adversary is only effective at influencing the minds of their own followers and those that lean towards their narratives. But this has very little effect in the overall picture. The truth is, the development of Iran is happening and this is not hindered by words. They start with these mocking reservations towards development of their adversaries, but in the end, they are left with no choice but to accept the truth. This has played out time and again already.

 

[Surenas]

Countries acquire weapon based on their own threat assessments compared to their own capabilities and for Iran one of the reasons Air Force is NOT a logical investment to throw large portions of your expenditure towards is the U.S. now in the future that may change but for now that is absolutely the case!
1.US has built 30 Bases around Iran and has puppet stats equipped with US Aircraft that will obey their masters like a good little dog.
2. Has a defense budget that if far greater than Iran's entire GDP(Nominal)
3. U.S. Fighter Jets regardless of what fighter jet Iran buys will have a technological superiority which will give them a 1st look 1st shot 1st kill against anything in the sky.

I would agree. To great extent. And while I do believe that a country should prioritize its threats based on potential impact, the probability of Iran facing an Israeli attack is just as high as an American one, if not higher. That is because Israel considers Iran to be an existential threat, while the United States operates with lesser fright.

I have followed the opposition against the end of this arms embargo, and the criticism initially came from Israeli officials, including Netanyahu, before the United States suddenly revealed its diplomatic campaign to prevent its expiration in the UN. So while I do believe that the United States prefers the arms embargo to be extended, it isn't as much of an issue for the Americans as it is for the Israelis. The Trump administration is just politically operating on this issue on behalf of Israel.

Remember that it was Israel that heavily campaigned in Russia to stop the delivery of those S-300 systems, which they managed to do so for a number of years. For Israel, any conventional armament by Iran makes a unilateral attack nearly impossible. It means that Israel would become completely dependent on a sympathetic administration in Washington that would be willing to militarily intervene if Iran would cross any red line. While they may have that assurance right now, they fear a more reluctant and passive American administration in the future.

So they have every reason to prevent Iran from buying sophisticated weaponry on the arms market.

 

[Sineva]

The point of the posts above are these:

1) airforce is crap----better buy ballistic missiles----only Iran does it because it CAN while the rest of the world can't---Iran is smarter than the rest of the stupid world who spend billions buying useless planes instead of developing and producing own missiles---world needs to learn from Iran probably

2) Guerilla warfare in Yemen and Afghanistan is evidence that air force is useless crap LOL. Why they spend billions on fighters-- all these countries--better need to learn from Iran....2700 missiles that make 2700 hits will win war LOL----Of course example of 1991 Gulf War and Yougoslav bombing campaign that delivered more ordinance that all Iranian missiles combined doesn't matter

3) Missile quantity is around 10.000 or even fantastic 100.000....Believing IRGC propaganda is better than analysis by US CENTCOM

4) Terror bombing that failed to cripple Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan still can bring enemy to its knees---Evidence----Third world state-- Iraq's---- compliance in face of global superpower

5) Iranian missiles can be a substitute for airpower and cheaply deliver tons and tons of payload---no need for useless airforce----so probably Iran has revolutionized warfare and everybody needs to learn from it

6) It takes years to rebuild power station-----and the fact that it took 5 days to repair Abqaiq doesn't matter

7) missiles will cripple Turkey and its economy because of damage to tourism----(idea that tourism is 2% of Turkish GDP of course doesn;'t matter)

8) air force in general is not very useful in supporting ground forces---example yemen and afghanistan----useless aircrafts--why they even buy them

9) Syria doesn't have courage to hit back at Israel---and the fact that Israel bombs Iranian targets and Iran doesn;t hit back with its "deadly" missiles of course doesn't matter

10) the guy believes that his missiles can totally destroy airfields and power plants-------rather it will be damage that can be quickly fixed-----taking out airfields by cluster munitions for example can be fixed withing 5 hours---damage to Abqaiq was fixed in couple of days

11) Guy claims that destroying infrastructure is more important than defeating enemy's army----example of massive bombing campaign by Allies during WWII that failed to bring Germany to its knees of course doesn';t matter

And after all this nonsense the guy claims I think of wars like video games....


The truth, however, is that 2700 ballistic missiles is only 2700 hits compared to airforce that can make 270.000 hits.

Ballistic missiles can do temporal damage and even detter aggressor but it will never win war --not through terror ---nor through making temporal damage to infrastructure

Ballistic missiles are low tech response made out of despair---because of inability to produce or purchase fighters jets who are true kings of war.

Truth is that there is no need to develop own amateur theories that contradict globally accepted idea of importance and even crucial nature of airpower.

You really do seem quite intent on ignoring the dominant factor here,dont you?.
The dominant factor here is irans unique geo-political situation and to ignore that is folly.
For iran investing heavily in airpower makes little sense for what should be 3 very obvious reasons:
#1: Even if iran were to massively increase its military budget to the point that say one third of its entire national budget was spent on the military,say like the dprk for instance,and that the bulk of this huge new military budget was used purely for the airforce,iran would still be at a considerable disadvantage because not only would it have to deal with whatever numbers of aircraft that the us could deploy to the region via its land bases and carriers but it would also have the airforces of the us regional vassal states to deal with as well.
#2:Since iran does not produce aircraft it would have to purchase these from other nations,but this poses some very,very big problems.For a start the only real potential suppliers of aircraft would be either china or russia,but both of these are extremely problematic to put it mildly.Take china for a start,altho it has made enormous leaps in the design and production of modern fighters in the last 30 years it is still considered to lag behind both russia and the west in certain areas,now it is improving but it would probably take another decade before it will have likely reached rough parity.The other problem is logistics and after sales back up,because without these you would be left with a fleet of non functioning aircraft.This is one of the critical problems with foreign purchases of this type,as iran has learnt to its cost,as you are heavily dependent on the foreign supplier for the continued supply of critical logistics ie spare parts and other back up in order to keep the air fleet flying and if for any reason they decide to halt that supply then you have enormous problems ie you either wind up with an air fleet that you cannot use,like iran when the us halted the logistics supply to the iriaf, or you have to devote a great deal of time,money and effort to reverse/reengineering these various parts indigenously,again like iran did.
Now the other potential supplier would be russia.Now from a technological perspective russia is far closer to technological parity with the west,however,and this is a VERY BIG "however",russias past record in its arms deals with iran does not speak very highly of either its trustworthiness or reliability as a potential supplier of these sorts of very big ticket items to iran,and that sort of reliability is of critical importance for very obvious reasons.The russians for whatever reason often preferred to treat iran as nothing more than a political bargaining chip with the west despite the fact that it sacrificed some very lucrative deals in the process and gained little in return apart from perhaps a pat on the head from its former western bffs.Now this may have changed since crimea and the resulting deep freeze in western russian relations,but until the russian can credibly demonstrate that they`re through with pulling that sort of treacherous sh!t like the s300 debacle then frankly I dont expect to see iran being very keen on taking any risks with orders for large numbers of sukhois or migs,about the only way I could conceivably see iran agreeing to buy any russian fighters under the current circumstances would be if they were entirely built in iran ie license manufacture.
In a nutshell the huge problem here for iran is that both russia and china have sadly shown themselves to be very vulnerable to western pressure in this respect,either in the sales and supply of military weapons and equipment or civilian equipment,hardware,technology etc.. and so this makes purchases of this type a potentially very,very big gamble/risk.
Effectively the problem with buying someone elses aircraft is that you are then reliant on them for spare parts,logistics and other after sales back up and these can often come with various risks or strings attached or can be used as potential political blackmail.Now for vassal states like the gulfie regimes this isnt a problem because as "loyal" vassals they will always put the interests of their political overlords ahead of their own national interests,that is simply part of the price of vassalage.However for a nation like iran ie an independent neutral non aligned nation with its own independent foreign policy,a nation that in fact threw off the yoke of vassalage,potentially allowing others to have a say or veto over its military or foreign policy is at best very problematic and at worst utterly unacceptable.
#3 The third and last option would be iran developing an indigenous fighter production capacity of its own based on the reverse/reengineering of either the f14 or the mig29.The obvious problems here would be both the time involved in doing this and the enormous financial costs,and there would of course be no chance to try and recoup some of these through foreign sales either.Not to mention when you look at all of the countless other weapons that you could`ve produced for the same money and at far less risk and effort.
Irans leaders could also not have failed to notice that during the iran-iraq war that despite on paper having the strongest airforce in the region and one that was very strong by global standards,this did not translate into a war winner even tho it clearly had a considerable edge over the iraqi airforce.In addition as the war continued the fighting capability of the airforce declined as it burned through aircraft and spares at a huge rate,as airpower is the most demanding of all of the branches of the military in terms of logistics and support.In addition the airforce,at least at the time,was also considered to be the least politically reliable branch of the pahlavi era military.
Iran in the early 90s had more opportunities to acquire replacement aircraft,but apart from some chinese f7s,the only other machines were small numbers of mig29s,su24s and su25s to bring up the numbers of seized iraqi aircraft of the same types to make operating them worthwhile.
Deciding to take a calculated risk with an indigenous ballistic missile force was far from a "low tech response made out of despair",it was a gamble but a calculated one as even by the late 70s/early 80s the potential of precision guided ballistic missiles was becoming apparent.Ultimately it would`ve been a far more reckless gamble to have ignored irans unique geopolitical circumstances and just reinvested in the old previous pahlavi regime era ww2/cold war airpower heavy model,and if it had done that then iran very likely would`ve not only wound up spending far,far more on its military,but it would`ve been far weaker militarily as well and it wouldnt have had anything like the very credible deterrent capability that it has today,and it is DETERRENCE that is the entire basis of irans defence strategy and one that has served it quite well militarily speaking.Now of course manned airpower does have its role to play in this strategy but it can only ever be in a purely back up role,not as the star of the show.
PS
All radical new doctrines are unproven,and often controversial,until they`re proven to work at which point they simply become accepted orthodoxy.
I`ve no doubt that the battleship admirals of the first 4 decades of the 20th century thought and said exactly the same things about their battleship fleets that you are saying now about airpower,yet even at the end of ww1 one could see the potential of airpower to challenge the battleship tho it would take another 31 years for this to be conclusively proven with the sinking of the prince of wales.So who knows what revolution in military affairs the future of long range precision guided missile power may bring about.

 

[GWXP]

You really do seem quite intent on ignoring the dominant factor here,dont you?.
The dominant factor here is irans unique geo-political situation and to ignore that is folly.
For iran investing heavily in airpower makes little sense for what should be 3 very obvious reasons:
#1: Even if iran were to massively increase its military budget to the point that say one third of its entire national budget was spent on the military,say like the dprk for instance,and that the bulk of this huge new military budget was used purely for the airforce,iran would still be at a considerable disadvantage because not only would it have to deal with whatever numbers of aircraft that the us could deploy to the region via its land bases and carriers but it would also have the airforces of the us regional vassal states to deal with as well.
#2:Since iran does not produce aircraft it would have to purchase these from other nations,but this poses some very,very big problems.For a start the only real potential suppliers of aircraft would be either china or russia,but both of these are extremely problematic to put it mildly.Take china for a start,altho it has made enormous leaps in the design and production of modern fighters in the last 30 years it is still considered to lag behind both russia and the west in certain areas,now it is improving but it would probably take another decade before it will have likely reached rough parity.The other problem is logistics and after sales back up,because without these you would be left with a fleet of non functioning aircraft.This is one of the critical problems with foreign purchases of this type,as iran has learnt to its cost,as you are heavily dependent on the foreign supplier for the continued supply of critical logistics ie spare parts and other back up in order to keep the air fleet flying and if for any reason they decide to halt that supply then you have enormous problems ie you either wind up with an air fleet that you cannot use,like iran when the us halted the logistics supply to the iriaf, or you have to devote a great deal of time,money and effort to reverse/reengineering these various parts indigenously,again like iran did.
Now the other potential supplier would be russia.Now from a technological perspective russia is far closer to technological parity with the west,however,and this is a VERY BIG "however",russias past record in its arms deals with iran does not speak very highly of either its trustworthiness or reliability as a potential supplier of these sorts of very big ticket items to iran,and that sort of reliability is of critical importance for very obvious reasons.The russians for whatever reason often preferred to treat iran as nothing more than a political bargaining chip with the west despite the fact that it sacrificed some very lucrative deals in the process and gained little in return apart from perhaps a pat on the head from its former western bffs.Now this may have changed since crimea and the resulting deep freeze in western russian relations,but until the russian can credibly demonstrate that they`re through with pulling that sort of treacherous sh!t like the s300 debacle then frankly I dont expect to see iran being very keen on taking any risks with orders for large numbers of sukhois or migs,about the only way I could conceivably see iran agreeing to buy any russian fighters under the current circumstances would be if they were entirely built in iran ie license manufacture.
In a nutshell the huge problem here for iran is that both russia and china have sadly shown themselves to be very vulnerable to western pressure in this respect,either in the sales and supply of military weapons and equipment or civilian equipment,hardware,technology etc.. and so this makes purchases of this type a potentially very,very big gamble/risk.
Effectively the problem with buying someone elses aircraft is that you are then reliant on them for spare parts,logistics and other after sales back up and these can often come with various risks or strings attached or can be used as potential political blackmail.Now for vassal states like the gulfie regimes this isnt a problem because as "loyal" vassals they will always put the interests of their political overlords ahead of their own national interests,that is simply part of the price of vassalage.However for a nation like iran ie an independent neutral non aligned nation with its own independent foreign policy,a nation that in fact threw off the yoke of vassalage,potentially allowing others to have a say or veto over its military or foreign policy is at best very problematic and at worst utterly unacceptable.
#3 The third and last option would be iran developing an indigenous fighter production capacity of its own based on the reverse/reengineering of either the f14 or the mig29.The obvious problems here would be both the time involved in doing this and the enormous financial costs,and there would of course be no chance to try and recoup some of these through foreign sales either.Not to mention when you look at all of the countless other weapons that you could`ve produced for the same money and at far less risk and effort.
Irans leaders could also not have failed to notice that during the iran-iraq war that despite on paper having the strongest airforce in the region and one that was very strong by global standards,this did not translate into a war winner even tho it clearly had a considerable edge over the iraqi airforce.In addition as the war continued the fighting capability of the airforce declined as it burned through aircraft and spares at a huge rate,as airpower is the most demanding of all of the branches of the military in terms of logistics and support.In addition the airforce,at least at the time,was also considered to be the least politically reliable branch of the pahlavi era military.
Iran in the early 90s had more opportunities to acquire replacement aircraft,but apart from some chinese f7s,the only other machines were small numbers of mig29s,su24s and su25s to bring up the numbers of seized iraqi aircraft of the same types to make operating them worthwhile.
Deciding to take a calculated risk with an indigenous ballistic missile force was far from a "low tech response made out of despair",it was a gamble but a calculated one as even by the late 70s/early 80s the potential of precision guided ballistic missiles was becoming apparent.Ultimately it would`ve been a far more reckless gamble to have ignored irans unique geopolitical circumstances and just reinvested in the old previous pahlavi regime era ww2/cold war airpower heavy model,and if it had done that then iran very likely would`ve not only wound up spending far,far more on its military,but it would`ve been far weaker militarily as well and it wouldnt have had anything like the very credible deterrent capability that it has today,and it is DETERRENCE that is the entire basis of irans defence strategy and one that has served it quite well militarily speaking.Now of course manned airpower does have its role to play in this strategy but it can only ever be in a purely back up role,not as the star of the show.
PS
All radical new doctrines are unproven,and often controversial,until they`re proven to work at which point they simply become accepted orthodoxy.
I`ve no doubt that the battleship admirals of the first 4 decades of the 20th century thought and said exactly the same things about their battleship fleets that you are saying now about airpower,yet even at the end of ww1 one could see the potential of airpower to challenge the battleship tho it would take another 31 years for this to be conclusively proven with the sinking of the prince of wales.So who knows what revolution in military affairs the future of long range precision guided missile power may bring about.

Can you write with spacebar please....it is so difficult to read your posts.

Some people take number of missiles out of thin air......US is a democracy and in US democracy officials must be accountable to US Congress...lying to Congress is ILLEGAL....and Pentagon is not some guy on the forum taking numbers out of thin air....they have intelligence data, knowledge of missile technology and complexities of their production, data on previous Iranian imports of chemicals for solid fuel and metal alloys, intelligence about the size of missile bases and various other data......and after analyzing all this data they make conclusions.....extremely rare claim by senior Pentagon official about 2500-3000 missiles made to US Congress.....I can assume that in reality it is 3500 missiles which is already massive and one of the biggest in the world, if not the biggest

I'm not against missiles---missiles are wonderful and increasing arsenal from 3000 to 5000 precise missiles will be wonderful. (especially by phasing out old unprecise and liquid fuel variants and substituting them with new missiles like Raad 500 and Dezfoul)

However missiles are not final solutions to all challenges and goals that are present in modern wars. They can;t delivery more payload that they do as expensive single shots and they can;t provide support for ground force.....

Example of Israeli wars where some 200 fighters were crucial in defeating armies of Egypt and Syria and Jordan and example of all other countries that maintain air forces show that airpower is super important.

For example Israeli air force, capable of high sortie rates, paralyzed ground force's movements and assaults made by Egypt, Syria and Jordan....Israeli air force also provided massive support for attacking Israeli units thus ensuring their success on the ground. Can missiles do that...no

If airforce is not relevant than why Iran spends money and maintains its old aircrafts? Recently Iran launched Fajr-4 from aircraft, which shows other means of employing airpower

To have 5000 ballistic missile and some 150-200 fighters that can play roles missiles can't is what Iran needs.

UN Sanctions were imposed exactly to prevent Iran from acquiring modern airforce

And whether others will sell or will not sell aircrafts to Iran is another question

 

[Blue In Green]

Can you write with spacebar please....it is so difficult to read your posts.

Some people take number of missiles out of thin air......US is a democracy and in US democracy officials must be accountable to US Congress...lying to Congress is ILLEGAL....and Pentagon is not some guy on the forum taking numbers out of thin air....they have intelligence data, knowledge of missile technology and complexities of their production, data on previous Iranian imports of chemicals for solid fuel and metal alloys, intelligence about the size of missile bases and various other data......and after analyzing all this data they make conclusions.....extremely rare claim by senior Pentagon official about 2500-3000 missiles.....I can assume that in reality it is 3500 missiles which is already massive and one of the biggest in the world, if not the biggest

I'm not against missiles---missiles are wonderful and increasing arsernal from 3000 to 5000 precise missiles will be wonderful. (especially by phasing out old unprecise and liquid fuel variants and substituting them with new missiles like Raad 500 and Dezfoul)

However missiles are not final solutions to all challenges and goals that are present in modern wars. They can;t delivery more payload that they do as expensive single shots and they can;t provide support for ground force.....

Example of Israeli wars where couple of hundreds of fighters were crucial in achieving victory over Egypt and Syria and example of all other countries that maintain air force show that airpower is super important.

If airforce is not relevant than why Iran spends money and maintain its old fighter? Recently Iran launched Fajr-4 from aircraft, which shows other means of employing airpower

To have 5000 ballistic missile and some 150-200 fighers that can play roles missiles can't is what Iran needs.

Iran most likely has around 5,000+ give or take, and I think PeeD's assertions about the veracity of the "2,500" number are also probably true. I personally don't think the number is around 2,500 but even then people do need to realize, and you said it correctly, 2,000-5,000 Ballistic missiles is an absolutely huge amount in its own right.

 

[PeeD]

Missile warfare means no frontlines, neither ground, nor sea, nor air defense.
The idea is to hit the enemy at any time and any space.
No safe areas behind the frontlines, no safe zones were defense systems protect.

This kind of high intensity warfare ends within a week and paralyzes the enemy.

The enemy makes his calculations with regard of all the soft targets it has and if the arsenal is large and survivable the conclusion is always the same: War makes no sense as damage too high.

This is fundamentally different to other kinds of warfare from past centuries and only comparable to nuclear warfare.

Iran managed to do it by using the "Kalashnikov of liquid fuel motors", a highly cost effective design and evolved it to the Ghadr/Emad.
Only via this single motor, single stage approach and 2000km range that covers nearly all tactical threats, conventional missile warfare becomes possible.

Based on number of enemies, country size and amount of pin-pint capable missiles, this detterance objective may be achieved by 3000 missiles 20.000 or 50.000.
Few countries can function if the lose 20.000 locations/objects anywhere in the country in the first week of the war.

Its logical that 2500, even short range BMs included, could never fulfill this tasks given Irans potential enemies.

Now with Khorramshahr and its future multiple warheads the cost equations will further improve while single stage/motor concept is maintained.

I talked about this in my conventional counter force thread.

PS: First generation Shahab-3 with imported NK engines are now more than 20 years old. Only because they are liquid and "airtight" stored they have not needed maintenance in all those years, sitting in those tunnels.
This concept is a investment for a century without running costs of training/operation/maintenance etc.
So if calculated against the cost of the IRIAF for the last 20 years, things may begin to make sense, economy-wise.

 

[GWXP]

Missile warfare means no frontlines, neither ground, nor sea, nor air defense.
The idea is to hit the enemy at any time and any space.
No safe areas behind the frontlines, no safe zones were defense systems protect.

This kind of high intensity warfare ends within a week and paralyzes the enemy.

The enemy makes his calculations with regard of all the soft targets it has and if the arsenal is large and survivable the conclusion is always the same: War makes no sense as damage too high.

This is fundamentally different to other kinds of warfare from past centuries and only comparable to nuclear warfare.

Iran managed to do it by using the "Kalashnikov of liquid fuel motors", a highly cost effective design and evolved it to the Ghadr/Emad.
Only via this single motor, single stage approach and 2000km range that covers nearly all tactical threats, conventional missile warfare becomes possible.

Based on number of enemies, country size and amount of pin-pint capable missiles, this detterance objective may be achieved by 3000 missiles 20.000 or 50.000.
Few countries can function if the lose 20.000 locations/objects anywhere in the country in the first week of the war.

Its logical that 2500, even short range BMs included, could never fulfill this tasks given Irans potential enemies.

Now with Khorramshahr and its future multiple warheads the cost equations will further improve while single stage/motor concept is maintained.

I talked about this in my conventional counter force thread.

PS: First generation Shahab-3 with imported NK engines are now more than 20 years old. Only because they are liquid and "airtight" stored they have not needed maintenance in all those years, sitting in those tunnels.
This concept is a investment for a century without running costs of training/operation/maintenance etc.
So if calculated against the cost of the IRIAF for the last 20 years, things may begin to make sense, economy-wise.

Also take into account that in order to successfully destroy a target 2 missiles per target is required...

Infrastructure targets will require multiple missiles

For example US launches 2 Tomohawks per single target to guarantee its successful destruction

 

[Surenas]

Iran has probably devised a somewhat similar rocket/missile campaign strategy as Hezbollah did in 2006, which is simply to maintain the infrastructure and operational capability to fire a minimum amount of missiles per day, even if it loses air superiority at some stage in the conflict. While not entirely similar due to a different battle space and missile inventory, the general and overlapping idea is the ability to prevail in any prolonged conventional conflict, with missiles functioning as an instrument for retribution as well as leverage in defining and ending the war.

In this sense, by using missiles as a conventional strategy, Iran is truly adopting a unique approach in modern-day warfare. Just see the tremendous leverage that such capability provides, not only demonstrated in the Second Lebanese War but also in Yemen where the Houthis have managed to successfully integrate their missile arsenal into their overall military strategy.