Posted on 11/16/2009 4:38:08 PM PST by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Increasingly irate over a delayed arms deal, Iran has threatened to manufacture an advanced missile system itself if Russia does not deliver it to Tehran soon. The warning, sounded by Alaeddin Bouroujerdi, a senior Iranian lawmaker, was the latest in a series of threats by Iranian officials angered at Russia for delaying delivery a much-vaunted missile sales agreement.
"Iran is not a country to come to a halt in the face of non-cooperation of other countries," Bouroujerdi was quoted as saying in a local newspaper.
"Naturally, and in light of Iran's capabilities, it will be able to produce missile defense systems in the near future," the Aftab Yazd daily added.
The controversy centers on a deal in which Russia would supply its high-grade S-300 air defense missiles to Iran.
Moscow, however, has come under strong pressure from the West to refrain from advancing arms deals with the Islamic Republic, which is at odds with Washington over its nuclear and missile program.
Last week senior Iranian lawmakers accused the United States of trying to scupper the deal for fear that Iran may reverse-engineer the S-300 system.
"The United States and certain Western countries are afraid that the contracts between Iran and Russia in the economic, political and military sphere will increase Iran's political and military might," Hassan Sobhaninia, an Iranian member of Parliament, said.
"They are making efforts to impede the implementation of these contracts," he told the Mehr News Agency.
The S-300 system, which can shoot down cruise missiles, track targets and fire at aircraft up to 90 miles away, features high jamming immunity. It is able to simultaneously track up to 100 targets.
Mounted on a truck, the S-300MPUM1 can fire missiles traveling at more than 2 kilometers per second, experts say.
(Excerpt) Read more at spacewar.com ...
6500 ft/second for a missile? That seems like BS.
Iran is desperate to get the S-300. It is the only thing likely to be able to blunt an Israeli airstrike. It is a formidible weapon.
I have strong doubts that Iran can produce a knockoff of the S-300 unless they have one and Russia provides certain
strategic parts - ie: proximity detnators and computer software source code.
That’s only Mach 2.5 or so.
It would be a multi-year project even in the best case; most likely, though, it will be a failure. You can't just wake up one fine morning and decide to build a working copy of the Space Shuttle. You need infrastructure, you need science, you need engineering, you need materials, you need money, and you need time.
USSR, where the development of S-x00 started, had plenty of all of the above; people were working nearly for free under Socialism, and USSR was largely self-sufficient. Iran today has very little; they are still struggling with medium range ballistic missiles (they had to photoshop a few in). They probably can't even build a missile for S-300 that flies on its own and doesn't crumple under the acceleration. Aiming it is a completely different problem, perhaps even a more complex one. All in all, Iranians are welcome to try, but I don't expect usable results any time soon.
oops, got me :(
You know that is taken from the Edward Munch painting “The Scream”.
They can always get the parts from a number of sources such as from North Korea and China.
yes
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