Article

2008-08-27 Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.

Posted by Fred 2008-08-27 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11127 views ] Top
File under: Govt of Iran

#1 Hmm. About time to reveal the existance of our nuclear depth charge.

Posted by gorb 2008-08-27 01:46|| 2008-08-27 01:46|| Front Page Top

#2 I think one Los Angeles class sub could handle their entire fleet.

Posted by Jumbo Shaique9016 2008-08-27 10:08|| 2008-08-27 10:08|| Front Page Top

#3 I'm thinking in the other direction. The Iranians have the attitude of "a lot of little boats will win" for surface warfare, so why not the same attitude for underwater?

That is, mass produced littoral submarines with just a two or three man crew and a torpedo, or just to ram other ships and boats. A suicide submarine bomb.

That might actually be pestiferous. And it would not have to be subtle in any way. Active sonar pinging from a dozen such boats would be really annoying to a real submarine.

And what would a real sub do if it was in fairly shallow waters itself, and had only large torpedoes to attack pissant targets? Parts of the Strait of Hormuz are only 100-500m deep.

Posted by Anonymoose 2008-08-27 10:17|| 2008-08-27 10:17|| Front Page Top

#4 Wouldn't some explosive device in the swarm do some serious damage, like a duPont spinner does in a school of fish? Shock waves propagate quite well in a water medium.

Posted by Alaska Paul in Tok, AK 2008-08-27 10:45|| 2008-08-27 10:45|| Front Page Top

#5 From Strategy Psge...

Iran And the Paper Submarine

August 26, 2008: Iran has announced that is has begun production of a new class of submarines that can fire both torpedoes and missiles. Iran has, as far as anyone can tell, no submarine building capability. Over the last few years, Iran has announced several new submarine construction projects. But no one can find any evidence that any of these subs exist. But all this is nothing new for the Iranians.

For the last month, Iran has made about one new weapons announcement a week. All these breakthroughs in military technology involve new systems that, on close examination amount to, well, nothing. First there was the announcement of a new robotic submarine. No details were given, but it was soon discovered that such devices are available on the commercial market, mainly for scientific research. Some nations buy them for military purposes. Apparently Iranian submarine designers know how to use Google, but their counterparts in the publicity department did not.

Then came the announcement of having combat aircraft that can fly 3,000 kilometers without refueling. Amazing? No, as Iran has had such aircraft (the U.S. F-4 fighter) for over thirty years. What were the Iranians thinking when they issued this press release?

Then a ballistic missile launch, which the Iranians touted as a successful test of a satellite launcher. Up until now, Iran has been buying satellite launching services from Russia (as does the United States and many other countries). The reality, as monitored by the radars of U.S. warships off the Iranian coast, was a launch failure. When the missile reached an altitude of about 16 kilometers, it broke up as the second stage fired. Information later leaked out of Iran that the missile was carrying a low tech communications satellite. Apparently even the Iranians were not willing to entrust this new version of their Safir ballistic missile with an expensive satellite. Finally, there was the recent announcement of the new submarine entering production, as well as two other Iranian built (over the last three years) subs that were delivered (but never seen by anyone).

The real mystery here is, why go ahead with these lies when it is so obvious that the truth will eventually come out? Apparently the Iranians believe that the initial lie will impress more people, than the eventual debunking. The Iranian religious dictatorship is preaching to their base, which tends to be poorly educated and suspicious of anyone who would criticize their religious leaders.

All this hype is nothing new. It's been going on for years. If you go back and look at the many Iranian announcements of newly developed, high tech, weapons, all you find is a photo op for a prototype, if that. Production versions of these weapons rarely show up. Iranians know that, while the clerics and politicians talk a tough game, they rarely do anything. Even Iranian support of Islamic terrorism has been far less effective than the rhetoric. The Iranians have always been cautious, which is one reason Arabs fear them. When the Iranians do make their move, it tends to be decisive. But at the moment, the Iranians have no means to make a decisive move. Their military is mostly myth, having been run down by decades of sanctions, and the disruptions of the 1980s war with Iraq. Their most effective weapon is bluster, and, so far, it appears to be working.

But the Iranians know that nuclear weapons would make their bluff and bluster even more muscular. Even the suspicion that they had nukes would be beneficial. And that appears to be the current plan. One new weapon the Iranians do put a lot of money and effort into are ballistic missiles. They are building an extended range (from 1,300 to 1,800 kilometer) version of their Shahab 3 ballistic missile. The new version puts all of Israel within range, even if fired from deep inside Iran. Chemical warheads (with nerve gas) are thought to be available for these missiles. But Israel has threatened to reply with nuclear weapons if the Iranians attack this way. Iran would probably get the worst of such an exchange, and the Iranians are aware of it.

Not all of the clerics that run the country are eager to go to war with Israel, or even threaten it. But because the clerical factions do not want to appear at odds with each other in public, the more radical leaders are allowed to rant away about attacking Israel. That's also the thinking behind the many IRGC press conferences announcing imaginary new weapons. The clerics are not going spend billions on mass production of second rate systems that are most notable for being designed in Iran, and not much else.

Posted by tu3031 2008-08-27 10:59|| 2008-08-27 10:59|| Front Page Top

#6 Iran's Nahang class...

Looks like a North Korean mini sub

Posted by john frum 2008-08-27 12:33|| 2008-08-27 12:33|| Front Page Top

#7 FWIW.. wikipedia

Displacement: 350-400 tons [1]
Length: 20 meters
Beam: 3 meters
Draught: 2.5 meters
Propulsion: Diesel-electric
Armament: 2 torpedo tubes, missiles

Posted by john frum 2008-08-27 12:36|| 2008-08-27 12:36|| Front Page Top

#8
It's a technological follow-on to the Ghadir minisub; likely based on NorK and Italian/Pakistani sub designs as well.

Think cheap, small, and lots of them.

Posted by Pappy 2008-08-27 13:06|| 2008-08-27 13:06|| Front Page Top

#9 I'm thinking even simpler, like the Japanese WWII Kaiten mini subs. Very cheap to build, looked like a big torpedo with a periscope.

If they really wanted to get crafty, don't even make it out of steel, just 3" thick PVC pipe with a 5' diameter. The front end is full of explosives, the back end a battery engine. Max depths would be just a little over max scuba depth of 100m.

They could even be used to attack real submarines underneath them by making their front end detachable, a pressure sensitive depth charge. Their sneaky way to detect a submarine beneath them would be simple--it's called a light. Something I'm not even sure our submerged submarines can detect.

Posted by Anonymoose 2008-08-27 14:08|| 2008-08-27 14:08|| Front Page Top

#10 Looks like it'd be ideal for smuggling drugs.

Posted by Ebbang Uluque6305 2008-08-27 15:45|| 2008-08-27 15:45|| Front Page Top

#11 I recall the old saying.
"Any ship can go down, but it takes a lot of work to come back up".

Posted by Redneck Jim">Redneck Jim 2008-08-27 16:21|| 2008-08-27 16:21|| Front Page Top

#12 That a Kaman class corvette in the background?

C802 vice the old harpoons (thus the humongous launchers)

Damn, where's my Janes...

Posted by OldSpook 2008-08-27 16:55|| 2008-08-27 16:55|| Front Page Top

#13 They got a Subway franchise?

Posted by Deacon Blues 2008-08-27 17:28|| 2008-08-27 17:28|| Front Page Top

23:58 JosephMendiola
23:56 Spike Uniter
23:51 JosephMendiola
23:50 Spike Uniter
23:45 General_Comment
23:45 Slats Glans2659
23:42 General_Comment
23:41 Spike Uniter
23:37 Spike Uniter
23:30 General_Comment
23:28 Slats Glans2659
23:24 General_Comment
23:20 Spike Uniter
23:20 Swamp Blondie in the Cornfields
23:17 Swamp Blondie in the Cornfields
23:13 General_Comment
23:13 Swamp Blondie in the Cornfields
23:09 General_Comment
23:03 General_Comment
23:03 AzCat
22:59 AzCat
22:56 General_Comment
22:55 trailing wife
22:45 Spike Uniter