Iran has become a significant supplier of Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs) to Russia for its war in Ukraine. Iran’s agreement to violate the unofficial arms embargo that the world imposes on Russia has political and military significance to Israel that may be reflected in limiting Israel’s freedom of action in Syria. In the short time since their introduction on Ukraine’s battlefields, the Iranian UAVs proved their lethality and the difficulty in defending against them. Undoubtedly, Iran’s armed forces will gain valuable lessons from the operation of its UAVs in a high-intensity war. Israel must follow the developments closely.
The powerful Russian invasion of Ukraine that began at the end of February 2022 has encountered many difficulties, and at this point, it is rather stumbling. Although the Russians occupied about one-sixth of the territory of Ukraine (apart from the Crimean Peninsula, which had been already occupied in 2014), they suffered three humiliating defeats: first, in the failed assault on Kyiv immediately at the beginning of the war, second, in Ukraine’s counterattack in the Kharkiv region seven months later, and third, in the liberation of Kherson city from Russian occupation in November. In all these battles, the Russian forces suffered significant losses and left behind hundreds of armored vehicles in the field, some in good condition that allowed the Ukrainians to salvage them and integrate them into their own armored forces.
In retrospect, it is quite clear that President Vladimir Putin and his entourage overestimated Russia’s ability to prevail over Ukraine. At the same time, they underestimated Ukraine’s resilience and the resolve of the US and Europe to support it economically and militarily. This mistake was quite understandable. Ukraine at the time was headed by Volodymyr Zelensky, a popular television entertainer turned politician who lacked any previous experience in public service. His government was embroiled in financial scandals, and public support for him was declining. Although President Zelenskyy was an enthusiastic supporter of integration with the West and asked to join the European Union and the NATO alliance, nothing much beyond lip service and foot-dragging was done as yet by Europe or NATO to accept Ukraine as a member of their organizations.
The lukewarm reaction of the West to the seizure of the Crimean Peninsula and its annexation by Russia, as well as to the seizure of the eastern regions of Ukraine by pro-Russian separatists in 2014, gave the impression that the West assigned low priority to the integration of Ukraine into its political and military structures. The panicked withdrawal of the US and its allies from Afghanistan in August 2021 called into question the very willingness of the West to use force to protect its interests. It may well be that the hasty American withdrawal from Afghanistan dispelled the last hesitations and encouraged Putin to cross the Rubicon and begin the planning of a war of aggression aimed at forcing Ukraine back into the “Russkiy Mir” – the Russian world – from which it had defected (according to Putin) in the Maidan Revolution of 2014.
In his early morning speech in which Putin announced to his people and the world the launching of the “special military operation” in Ukraine, he set two goals: one, to “save” the Russian population of the eastern regions of Ukraine from the clutches of the “Kyiv regime,” and the second – the “de-Nazification” of the country, which amounted to the overthrow of the current government and the establishment of a pro-Russian regime that would cooperate in disarming Ukraine.[1] The Russian military moves at the beginning of the war corresponded to these two objectives. A large Russian force exiting from Crimea invaded the eastern regions of Ukraine and connected with the Russian separatists of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions (the plan may also have included a deployment southward along the Black Sea and the occupation of Odessa. If there was such a Russian plan, it did not succeed for reasons that are beyond the scope of this paper). This operation in eastern Ukraine was meant to fulfill Putin’s first goal of “rescuing” the local Russian population from the klatches of the “Kyiv Regime.” Once this was achieved, Russia’s army was tasked to overrun most of Ukraine’s territory and “rescue” its entire population, except for the western Lviv districts that are infested, per Putin, with a hard core of incorrigible anti-Russian “Nazis.” [2]
To carry out the second goal of the plan – a regime change – a large Russian armored force entered northern Ukraine from the border of Belarus, moving toward Kyiv with the aim of seizing the seat of government and expelling or physically eliminating Zelensky and his government. The success of this effort would have made it possible to establish a pro-Russian government with the help of local collaborators, who would have ordered the Ukrainian military to lay down their arms. This move included an attempt to capture the Hostomel airport north of Kyiv by a force or helicopter-borne commando units. Once captured, Russian transports would fly in with more troops and vehicles that would rush into downtown Kyiv and, with the help of Special Forces (Spetsnaz) already infiltrated into the city, capture or kill Zelensky and his government. The personal danger to Zelensky was so great that the US offered to fly him and his government to safety (Zelensky’s response was: “I need ammunition, not a ride”). The Russian effort failed fairly quickly due to the stubborn struggle of the Ukrainians for control of Hostomel Airport and the success of Zelensky’s personal guard in repelling the assassination attempts.
In the opening speech of the war given by Putin on the eve of the invasion, nothing was said about the expected duration, nor was a quick victory forecasted. Yet all indications are that Russia was expecting a short campaign lasting a few weeks at most, resulting in the elimination or expulsion of the current “Nazi” government and the establishment of a new government, sponsored by Russia, as things were before the overthrow of President Viktor Yanukovych in the Maidan Revolution in 2014. At the same time, it seems that Putin and his entourage assumed that the West would stand aside and support Ukraine morally but not materially. As a result, the size of forces that Russia committed to the campaign was limited, logistical support for the military forces was quite poor, and Russian military industries continued to operate at a peacetime tempo.
As mentioned, the Russian attempt to shorten the war by decapitating the Ukrainian government did not succeed for the reasons listed above. Zelensky, an entertainer by profession, was revealed in one fell swoop as a Great War leader who energized the Ukrainian people behind him to resist the invader, winning the sympathy of public opinion in the West, which in turn encouraged its various governments to provide increased military and economic support to Ukraine. Russia’s failure obliged Putin and his entourage to recalculate their entire position. On April 19, 2022, the Russian High Command announced the beginning of the “second phase” of the “special military operation,” the main focus of which was now to “liberate” those parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk districts remaining under Ukrainian control. The Russian forces besieging Kyiv were pulled back and redeployed in Eastern Ukraine. It started as an attempted blitzkrieg and became a grinding war of attrition. Any Russian hope for a quick victory vanished, and Moscow was forced from that moment on to reorient its armed forces and the national economy toward a long war that may continue for several years. At the same time, it appears that the frustrated hopes for a quick victory did not affect the determination of Putin and his entourage to continue the war as long as it takes until the stated goals of the war are achieved. Yet there was now an urgency to close the gaps, correct the deficiencies that had been revealed in Russia’s force structure, and prepare Russia and its army for a prolonged war.
One of the gaps that were discovered was the ability of the Russian defense industry to supply its army with modern weapons in adequate quantities. Although Russia has doubled and tripled its defense budget since its nadir after the collapse of the Soviet Union, progress in the product range and production capacity of Russian military industries appears to have been uneven. According to the American military commentator Stephen Bryan, despite the increase in defense budgets, Russian “defense production and modernization still lag badly. In practical terms, the lack of money for defense investment in Russia meant that equipment was not maintained or upgraded. It also meant money would go first to prestige items and only after that to improve older hardware. For example, improving armor and fire control systems on tanks was very slow. Important upgrades – including active protection systems – were never implemented.”[3] Russia developed and deployed a stealth fighter plane but did not install active defense systems against anti-tank missiles in its tank fleet. The major investments were mainly in impressive weapon systems such as stealth fighter jets and modern warships, but “routine” systems were neglected. Besides this wrong prioritization of investments in research and development, it seems that wrong prioritization also applies to investments in production lines. Even before the outbreak of the Ukraine war, Michael Koffman, head of the Russian studies department at the American research institute CNA, stated that “The biggest problem of all… is the limited capacity of Russia’s defense industry, including shortages of skilled personnel, machine tools, and components.” [4]
What are the shortfalls that Russia must overcome to win a protracted war? To see things through Russian eyes, it is necessary to speculate what strategy Russia might pursue to achieve its stated goals. Here, there is more than meets the eye. Analysts in the West make diverse and sometimes contradictory predictions about the unfolding of events in Ukraine, from Russian admission of failure and willingness to negotiate a settlement that would salvage Putin’s pride through a flickering war that will flare up periodically for decades between unstable ceasefires, all the way to a nuclear world between Russia and the West.
In October, the Russian blog SOUTHFRONT, a mouthpiece for the most radical circles in Russia and hence of low credibility, predicted how Russia would win the war. The article reviews three developments that will decide the war in Russia’s favor. First is the weather: the coming rainy season will turn the terrain into a morass that will block major land maneuvers – just as in WWII when the confronting Soviet and Nazi armies were stuck in place during the spring and autumn mud seasons (the Rasputitsa). The lapse in fighting during the Rasputitsa from October to January will provide Russia with the breathing spell necessary to equip and deploy its newly inducted reservist troops. In January 2023, with the ground frozen solid, Russia will launch a winter offensive with its refreshed and enlarged army. Russia’s quantitative advantage in troops, artillery, and armor will give the Russian army the edge and cause it to break down Ukraine’s resistance and overrun large chunks of its territory.
Second, the erosion of the military and economic infrastructure in Ukraine’s hinterland by the incessant Russian cruise missile offensive that has been ongoing since the beginning of the Ukraine war. It is anticipated that Russia’s winter offensive will coincide with the collapse of Ukraine’s nationwide infrastructure, depriving Ukraine’s government of the power to resist.
Third, the energy crisis in Europe was expected to reach its peak during the coldest months of this winter, which in turn would cause a change in Europe’s public attitude leading to public pressure on EU governments to stop supporting Ukraine. Hence – thus SOUTHFRONT – the winter of 2022-2023 will see a turning point in the Ukraine war: a fresher and larger Russian army, built up from hundreds of thousands of trained reservists, will launch a powerful winter offensive into the interior of Ukraine, which by that time will be powerless to resist due to the collapse of its vital transportation and energy networks, and will also be shorn of any support from NATO and EU countries.
It is impossible to know to what extent this vision represents the train of thought of the Russian government, if at all. At the time of this writing (January 2023), there are no indications of any letup in the Western resolve to help Ukraine – if anything, the opposite is true, as was made clear by US President Joe Biden’s promise to Zelensky during their December 21 summit that the “US will support Ukraine as long as it takes.” A milder winter than expected has alleviated some of the energy shortfalls in Europe, and there are few, if any, indications of a brewing Russian winter offensive. However, Putin’s basic strategy for winning the war – eventually – may not be much different than what SOUTHFRONT outlined a few months ago: increase the Russian army, destroy Ukraine’s infrastructures and sow discord among Ukraine’s Western supporters.
What it all boils down to, from Putin’s viewpoint, is the need to gear up for a long and attritional war that will witness at least the completion of the occupation of the four regions of Ukraine that have been officially annexed to Russia.
There may be even broader goals, such as the occupation of Odessa and the rest of the Black Sea coast that is still in Ukraine’s hands, and perhaps even linking up with Transnistria, which anyway sees itself as part of Russia. With this under his belt, Putin could afford to be magnanimous and permit a rump Ukraine to preserve the appearance of an independent state.
To achieve all this, Russia’s military forces must overcome three shortfalls. The first is the lack of troops. Correcting this deficiency has been addressed quite vigorously by the Russian government in two ways: first, the call-up of reservists (officially 300,000, with Ukraine’s military predicting a call-up of 500,000 more). The second way goes through the annexation and declaration of most of Eastern Ukraine as Russian territory. In terms of Russian law, this will allow freshly drafted soldiers to be stationed there (which the law prohibits from being stationed outside the borders of Russia), thus further disrupting the size of Russia’s forces on the Ukrainian front.
Second, equipment and arms must be made available to the new armies, from personal gear and medical supplies to armored fighting vehicles and lots and lots of ammunition. We will not deal with this gap in detail but remind the reader that Russia still has large fleets of tanks, armored vehicles, artillery, as well as ammunition dumps left over from the Cold War era that were not scrapped but mothballed somewhere in the depths of the country. The task of refitting and modernizing these legacy weapons will not be easy, but neither will it be impossible.
Third is the airpower gap. According to the US Air Force commander in Europe, since neither side has achieved air superiority, “they avoid coming into contact with each other.”[5] Russia has no shortage of manned fighter and bomber aircraft, and transport and attack helicopters. On the other hand, due to the lack of air superiority, the Russians try to avoid operating manned aircraft over Ukraine’s territory. The strategic offensive is not carried out by WWII-style carpet-bombing but by cutting-edge 21st-century cruise missiles launched from bombers cruising hundreds of kilometers outside Ukraine’s airspace, as well as from submarines and warships sailing in the Black Sea. For tactical observation and artillery spotting, Russian forces use self-developed small UAVs (Orlan-10). The main lack is in long-range surveillance UAVs and attack drones that can launch accurate weapons to hit supply convoys, tanks, and GBAD batteries deep inside Ukraine, as the Azeris successfully did with the help of Turkish BAYRAKTAR-armed UAVs in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war. Another lack is small-sized but long-range “suicide” UAVs that could penetrate through all warning systems and accurately hit infrastructure and quality targets deep inside Ukraine – like what Iran had achieved in the Saudi oil installation attack in September 2019.
The Russian military was very late in recognizing the importance of UAVs on the modern battlefield. According to what is known, the true significance of unmanned aerial weapons dawned on the Russian high command only in the late 2000s. The trigger was the Georgia war in the summer of 2008. Georgia had a small fleet of five Hermes 450 surveillance UAVs made by the Israeli company Elbit. According to one witness, all of these planes were eventually shot down by Russian fighter aircraft during the war, but not before providing a good account of themselves, impressing the Russians with their capability to maintain persistent surveillance of their advancing troops.[6]
According to one report, all attempts by ground-based air defenses failed to shoot down an Elbit UAV tracking the Russian armored column advancing toward Georgia’s capital Tbilisi. Be it as it may, a Russian Defense Ministry delegation visited Israel shortly after the war and purchased $50 million of the first-generation Searcher unarmed surveillance UAVs from Israel Aerospace Industries. The agreement may have also included production rights for this aircraft in Russia.
At the same time, Russia began developing its own UAVs, including modern armed types comparable to the Turkish Bayraktar TB2, which Ukraine had already deployed at the time, as well as tactical surveillance, loitering, and suicide UAVs. However, as soon as the Russians invaded Ukraine, it became clear that except for short-range tactical observation drones, their UAV fleet was quite small due to low production rates. The Russian failures in prioritizing development and the low capacity of the military production lines mentioned above now came to the fore. Consequently, Russia had to resort to outsourcing to urgently obtain drones for the fight in Ukraine.
The choice of potential suppliers was quite limited. Even Western-affiliated countries that declared neutrality, like Turkey and Israel, would refrain from arming Russia in its war against Ukraine. North Korea – a country willing to sell almost anything to anyone in exchange for foreign currency – has only a small number of rather primitive UAVs. The only candidates for supplying Russia with adequate UAVs in the required performance and quantities were China and Iran. China has not officially declared an arms embargo on Russia, but the behavior of its commercial sector clearly indicates a policy of neutrality, at least as far as arms supply.[7] That left Iran as the only feasible source for immediate UAV supply. And indeed, as early as July 2022, the US National Security Adviser disclosed a major drone deal between Iran and Russia.[8] Iran, for its part, did not confirm or deny the deal, hiding behind a general statement that it was pursuing a policy of “active neutrality” regarding the Russian-Ukrainian conflict.[9] Later, the Iranian government confirmed selling UAVs to Russia but maintained that sale went through before the outbreak of the war.
In mid-October 2022, during Ukraine’s successful counterattack in the Kharkiv region, the first evidence of Iran’s involvement in the war was found in debris from Iranian-made suicide UAVs that exploded on Ukrainian targets. Iran’s UAVs, hitherto confined to the Middle East theater, were now operating in Eastern Europe.
What types of Iranian UAVs were transferred to Russia? There is a lack of clarity on the subject. According to one Israeli aviation commentator,[10] the Russians purchased four types of UAV weapons: one type of medium altitude long-range (MALE) armed UAV called Mohajer-6, one type of long-range, stealthy UAV (Shahad 191), and two types of suicide UAVs (Shahad 136 and its earlier, smaller version, the Shahad 131).
The Mohajer-6 armed UAV is more or less equivalent in its performance to the Turkish Bayraktar TB2 deployed by Ukraine. It is a fairly large machine with a wingspan of about 10 meters, powered by an Austrian-made piston engine and cruising at heights of about five kilometers. The aircraft is equipped with a cluster of optical sensors and a laser pointer to guide its precision gliding bombs, themselves a product of Iran’s military industries. The Mohajer-6 is a reusable aircraft that requires runways for takeoffs and landings. Recently, the Iranians delivered some UAVs of this type to the Ethiopian government for its war against the Tigray insurgents. The appearance of these UAVs on Ethiopia’s battlefield stopped the offensive of the insurgent forces and probably saved the capital Addis Ababa from occupation.
At the time of this writing, Mohajer-6 was seen only once in Ukraine when a slightly damaged aircraft, replete with its four glide bombs, was fished from the Black Sea by a Ukrainian naval vessel. That could have been the result of a misshape during a training exercise. There is no evidence that the Mohajer-6 has joined operations on the Ukrainian fronts.
Similarly, there is no evidence as yet of the presence of the stealthy Shahad 191 in Ukraine. It is not inconceivable that the report about its sale to Russia was erroneous or premature.
In contrast, the Shahad 136 suicide drone and its smaller version, the Shahad 131, have been extensively employed by Russia since their debut in September 2022. Their former claim to fame was the devastating attack on Saudi Arabia’s oil installations in September 2019. Those are tiny aircraft with wingspans of about two meters, weighing 200 kg. or less, which deliver modest explosive warheads of 20 to 40 kg. with pinpoint accuracy. While loitering versions of these weapons (i.e., versions with onboard sensors that provide the capability to acquire and home on targets of opportunity) may exist, in Ukraine, the Russians use them exclusively as precision cruise missiles against fixed targets like electrical relay stations, command centers, military infrastructures, and transportation hubs. The Shahad 136 is launched from truck-born five-pack containers with the help of an acceleration rocket and is powered in flight by a 50-horsepower piston engine, reverse-engineered by Iran from a German commercial model. It navigates with the aid of an onboard Inertial Navigation System derived from commercial-grade designs, combined with satellite navigation using the US GPS and Russian GLONASS satellite systems. That loitering versions of the Shahad 136 with onboard homing sensors may exist is hinted by at least two cases of successful attacks on moving ships (the oil tanker Mercer Street in July 2021 and another oil tanker, the Pacific Zircon, in November 2022).[11] However, there is no evidence at this time of this version’s presence in the Ukraine war.
The first indication that the Russian army deployed the Iranian Shahad 136 came when tail fragments from a crashed aircraft were found near Kupyansk on September 13, 2022. The fragments were painted light grey and carried the inscription “Geran 2” (Geranium 2) in Cyrillic letters. It later transpired that the smaller Shahad 131 received the designation Geranium 1 in the Russian service.[12] Considering that the deal to supply them to Iran was apparently inked barely two months earlier in July, their arrival in Russia was impressively quick, indicating both the existence of a sufficiently large stockpile of combat-ready UAVs in Iran’s arsenal, as well as Russia’s urgent need for these weapons to shore up its faltering war effort.
The Ukrainians announced their first kill of Shahad 136 on September 24, 2022. It – and its smaller 131 version – have appeared since then in Ukraine’s skies in ever-growing numbers and proved quite effective in destroying various Ukrainian energy and other installations. Following their first appearance in the Kharkiv region, Shahad 131/136 attacks spread to more southern areas of the front as far south as Mykolaiv and Odessa. On September 24, for example, two swarms of Shahad 136 UAVs attacked Odessa and hit a military headquarters and ammunition dump there, causing a significant fire.
Shahad 136 UAVs videoed by Ukrainian civilians in the daytime show them in level flight below the cloud cover at an altitude of several hundred feet while emitting a buzzing noise similar to that of a light motorcycle. Subsequently, they are seen diving steeply toward their targets. The sound of small arms fire can be heard in some video clips, signifying the attempt to shoot them down by rifle fire. Numerous videos of Shahad 131/136 kills by air-to-air and ground-to-air missiles were eventually released by Ukraine’s civilians and soldiers.
With the vulnerability of the slow-flying Shahad 131/136 to air- and ground-based defenses becoming apparent, the Russians began to operate them at night as well. For example, on the night of October 5, six Shahad 136 drones destroyed the headquarters of the 72nd Brigade of the Ukrainian army in the city of Bila Tserkva, located about 80 km. south of Kyiv. The hits to the headquarter buildings were precise, and video clips uploaded to the network show extensive fires, reminiscent of the fires in the Saudi oil facilities at the time.[13]
Following their first appearance in September, the Shahad 131/136s joined Russia’s ongoing strategic operation to systematically destroy Ukraine’s critical infrastructure. They were used extensively to hit nodal points in Ukraine’s electric grid, and other critical installations in Ukraine’s major cities, from Odessa in the southeast to Lviv in the extreme western edge of the country. Deployed from Belarus and Crimea, their 1000+ km. range allows them to hit virtually any point within Ukraine.
The appearance of the Iranian drones caused great concern both in the government of Ukraine and among its soldiers on the frontline. Ukraine’s media debated extensively on whether the Iranian UAVs were game changers and whether it was possible to defend against them. On September 28, Zelensky convened senior members of his security establishment to discuss how to neutralize “Russia’s new weapons systems.”[14]
Ukrainian military personnel interviewed during their visits to Washington defined the Iranian UAVs as a “big problem” and made it clear that they had no efficient defense against them at the time.[15] Zelensky himself conceded their effectiveness in his December 21 speech to the US Congress, where he said that “deadly Iranian drones sent to Russia in the hundreds became a threat to our critical infrastructures.”
How many Shahad 131/136 did Russia buy from Iran? Initial media reports offered wide-ranging estimates, from 4,000 to 7,000 units. According to a statement by the armed forces of Ukraine, from November 30, a total of about 400 units were launched by Russia. On January 2, 2023, the Ukrainian Air Force claimed to have shot down a total of 540 Iranian Shahad 131/136 since they first appeared in the war.[16] Assuming a very optimistic kill rate of 80%, as sometimes claimed by Ukraine, this indicated that the Russians launched at least 700 of the Iranian-made UAVs in the space of about three and a half months or an average of almost 200 per month. At this rate, the Russians could consume about 2,400 of them per year, making the estimate of the purchase of 4,000 to 7,000 such drones from Iran not unreasonable, considering that Putin is gearing up for a protracted war. It stands to reason that Russia will eventually set up its own production line for mass-producing Shahad 131/136 locally to alleviate Iran’s obvious discomfort at being seen as an arms supplier of Russia against Ukraine.
Defending large areas against small-size, slow-flying UAVs is a challenging task, as proven in Saudi Arabia, where for years its ground-based air defenses, as well as its air force combat aircraft, failed to seal the country entirely against such threats launched from Yemen by the Houthi insurgents. While Ukraine’s own ground-based air defenses and fighter aircraft scored notable successes against the Shahad 131/136 menace, this was not enough. The Iranian suicide UAVs are highly precise, which means that even a kill rate of 80% is not sufficient – the 20% that break through the defenses are enough to wreak havoc on the defender’s infrastructure and population. Help from abroad to bolster Ukraine’s defenses began to arrive soon after the Iranian suicide UAV appearance on the battlefield. The US has supplied NASAM short-range air defense systems, while Germany supplied both its Gephardt mobile anti-aircraft gun and its IRIS T short-range missile defense system. Israel, too, while observing formal neutrality in this war, has reportedly authorized Poland to transfer to Ukraine the Israeli-supplied system against UAVs – presumably early warning devices.[17] While the US- and German-supplied defenses were attributed with some success in the battle against the Iranian UAVs, no details were yet released for publication.
Still, the growing capabilities of the defensive arrays seem to bear some fruit. The success rates claimed by Ukraine have been slowly climbing, up from 60%-70% initially to 80% more recently. Earlier this month (January 2023), the Ukrainians, for the first time, claimed a success rate of 100% against Iranian suicide UAV attacks during the first two days of January, claiming the destruction of 84 Shahad 131/136 within 48 hours, although this information cannot be verified.
Iran’s willingness to supply Russia with offensive weapon systems could have significant political consequences. The diplomatic isolation of Russia in its war in Ukraine is evident in the international community in general and among the countries of the former Soviet Union (save Belarus) in particular. Iran is probably the only country so far that has agreed to supply offensive weapons systems to Russia in support of its invasion of Ukraine – albeit in secrecy and under a veil of obfuscation, risking its relations with Europe. It stands to reason that the Iranians will demand an adequate reward for the risk they took in violating the unofficial arms embargo on Russia. This reward could be in the form of major Russian armaments such as top-of-the-line fighter aircraft, although they may have to wait for quite a while until the Russian aerospace industry becomes available for new export orders. It is not improbable that the reward will be a free hand for Iran in Syria, allowing it to establish control over the Assad regime and arm its Hezbollah proxies by ending Russia’s silent consent to Israel’s “war between wars” attacks against Iranian incursion and arms shipments.
For Israel, the appearance of Iran’s UAVs in Ukraine’s battlefields has its downside and upside. On the downside, there is no doubt that the Iranians will derive significant operational lessons from the performance of their UAVs in a real war, lessons that will lead to improvements and increased capabilities that Israel will have to face and overcome eventually. On the upside, Israel is apt to learn the lessons from Ukraine’s experience in combating Iran’s UAVs, thereby improving its own defenses. Israel’s defense establishment will do well to closely follow the air battle in Ukraine between the best of Iran’s UAV and the latest of the West’s defensive weapons and tactics. The lessons learned from this campaign might be crucial to Israel’s future safety.
[1] For the full transcript of Putin’s February 24, 2022, speech, see https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-24/full-transcript-vladimir-putin-s-televised-address-to-russia-on-ukraine-feb-24?leadSource=uverify%20wall
[2] For one view of Russia’s original war plan, see Harris, S. DeYoung, K. Khurshudian, I. and Parker, A. “Road To War: US Struggled to Convince Allies and Zelensky of Risk of Invasion,” The Washington Post, August 16, 2022 https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/interactive/2022/ukraine-road-to-war
[3] Bryen, S. “Is Russian Weaponry Mainly Junk?” Asia Times, September 2, 2022 https://asiatimes.com/2022/09/is-russian-weaponry-mainly-junk
[4] Kofman, M. “Russian Military Forces Dazzle After A Decade of Reform,” The Economist, November 2020 https://www.economist.com/europe/2020/11/02/russian-military-forces-dazzle-after-a-decade-of-reform
[5] Cohen, S.R and Gould, J. “With A Mix of Donated Weapons, Ukraine’s Defenders Adapt to War,” Defense News, September 26, 2022 https://www.defensenews.com/flashpoints/2022/09/28/with-a-mix-of-donated-weapons-ukraines-defenders-adapt-in-war/?utm_source=linkedin&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=dfn-rss-zap
[6] This information is based partly on personal communication from an official from the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and from a retired officer of the Georgian armed forces.
[7] For example, the DJI corporation, which specializes in drones, announced that it would stop supplying its products to Russia https://www.reuters.com/technology/chinese-drone-maker-dji-suspends-business-activities-russia-ukraine-2022-04-26
[8] Warren, J. and Wang, A.B. “Iran To Send Hundreds of Drones to Russia For Use in Ukraine, US Says,” Washington Post, July 11, 2022 https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/07/11/iran-drones-russia-ukraine
[9] Iran’s foreign minister dismissed the news about an impending UAV sale to Russia as “unsubstantiated rumors.” but added that Iran maintains a policy of “active neutrality” vis a vis the Russian-Ukraine war. See Manziar, M., “Iran Responds to Ukraine Diplomatic Demotion Over Russian Drones,” Al Jazeera, September 24, 2022 https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/24/iran-to-respond-to-ukraine-diplomatic-demotion-over-russia-drones
[10] Sadan, N. Iran’s suicide UAVs will save Putin’s war, Calcalist, September 30, 2022 (In Hebrew) https://www.calcalist.co.il/calcalistech/article/rybvypzgi
[11] For a more detailed description of the attack on the MV Mercer Street and other ships, see Rubin, U., Iran’s drones Tip the Balance of Power in the Middle East, The Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, January 25, 2022https://jiss.org.il/he/rubin-irans-unmanned-aerial-vehicles
[12] The Russian mouthpiece SOUTHFRONT claimed that the Geran 1 and Geran 2 are license-produced versions of the Shahad 136 and Shahad 131, respectively – thus exonerating the Iranians from the accusation of their direct supply to Russia. See Russian Loitering Munitions Destroy Tanks, Howitzers Air Defense Systems of Ukrainian Forces https://southfront.org/russian-loitering-munitions-destroy-tanks-howitzers-air-defense-system-of-ukrainian-forces-videos
[13] Malsin, J. and Coles, I., “Russia Uses Iranian Made Drones to Strike Military Base Deep Inside Ukraine,” Wall Street Journal, October 5, 2022
[14] “Russia-Ukraine War, List of Key Events Day 126,” Al Jazeera https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/27/russia-ukraine-war-list-of-key-events-day-216
[15] Seligman, L., “Huge Problem, Iranian Drones Pose New Threat to Ukraine,” Politico, September 26, 2022 https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/26/iranian-drones-ukraine-russia-war-00058802
[16] Sundries Internet magazine: Since September, Ukrainian Air Defenses Shot Down 540 Iranian Drones and 500 Cruise Missiles, January 5, 2023 https://sundries.com.ua/en/since-september-ukrainian-air-defenses-shot-down-540-iranian-drones-and-500-cruise-missiles-zsu/
[17] Goldstein, T., “Israeli Defense Firm Selling Anti Drone Systems to Ukraine by Way of Poland” The Times of Israel, September 12, 2022 https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-defense-firm-selling-anti-drone-systems-to-ukraine-by-way-of-poland
Photo: IMAGO / ITAR-TASS
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