Free Republic

The Russian military has claimed that the Syrian air defences, whose most modern weapon is a three-decades-old Russian-supplied anti-aircraft system, shot down 71 of 103 missiles fired by the US and its allies, the UK and France, a claim denied by the Pentagon. As further details began to emerge about the sites targeted by the US-led strikes, Col Gen Sergei Rudskoi of the Russian military said the strikes had not caused any casualties and that Syrian military facilities suffered only minor damage. It was not possible to verify the claims. The most up-to-date system that Moscow has supplied to the...

A U.S. Patriot missile battery has arrived in Poland as part of an agreement to upgrade the NATO ally's air defenses, the U.S. embassy said on Monday, in a deployment likely to irritate neighboring Russia.The battery, manned by up to 150 U.S. troops, will be stationed for about one month four times a year in Morag, northern Poland, close to Russia's exclave of Kaliningrad. Its main mission is to train Polish military personnel. U.S. troops were unloading 37 railway cars of equipment on Monday, the embassy said. U.S. and Polish officials are due to visit the site on Wednesday and...

Reports surfaced yesterday about continued US involvement in collecting intelligence in Iran. The account is not verifiable since all sources are anonymous. Still, it raises some very interesting and plausible points. What is being alleged revolves around US attempts at mapping Iranian military resources and facilities in the event that the military option must be exercised. Apparently, USAF flights in both Iraq and Afghanistan are crossing into Iranian airspace in an effort to force the Iranians turn on their defensive radar systems. By triangulating the signal, the location of the radar, which also guides anti-aircraft batteries, can be located and...

Mar. 11, 2003 Report: India looking to Israel to supply air defense systems By THE JERUSALEM POST INTERNET STAFF Faced with mounting threats from its nuclear neighbor, India has turned to Israel to supply it with air defense systems, the Hindustan Times reported Tuesday. In particular India has sought to buy unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for reconnaissance purposes from Israel after indigenous efforts to produce such aircraft yielded no results. According to the report India recently awarded a $130 million contract to Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI) for 18 Heron UAVs, which are expected to be delivered within a year. Orders...