The Iranian Navy plans to expand its fleet by launching three [renovated] warships later this week, a senior Navy commander announced on Wednesday.
“Two missile-launcher warships, namely Neyzeh and Tabarzin, as well as Sirjan logistic warship will join the Navy’s military fleet on December 1 (Sunday),” Commander of Iran’s Second Naval Zone Rear Admiral Mohammad Reza Abbasian told reporters, addressing a press conference in the Southern city of Bushehr...That would comprise:
- IRINS Sirjan (472) Delvar class (AEL: ammunition ship capable of underway replenishment, small )
- IRINS Neyzeh (P 231) Kaman class (PGGF: =/>76 mm gun, force guided missile system, speed >35 kt)
- IRINS Tabarzin (P 232) Kaman class (PGGF: =/>76 mm gun, force guided missile system, speed >35 kt)
File photo: Delvar class replenishment ship, small (IRINS Delvar)
File photo: Kaman class guided missile patrol boat (IRINS Falakhon)
Was kaman of the class of ships that tried to attack a us app in 1988 and promptly got sunk?
ReplyDeleteYes it was; the Iranians were very lucky that the U.S. mercifully didn't sink their entire navy that day.
DeleteThe Joshan, an Iranian Combattante II Kaman-class fast attack craft, challenged USS Wainwright (CG-28) and Surface Action Group Charlie. The commanding officer of USS Wainwright directed a final warning (of a series of warnings) stating that the Joshan was to "stop your engines, abandon ship, I intend to sink you". Joshan responded by firing a Harpoon missile at them.[5] The USS Simpson (FFG-56) responded to the challenge by firing two Standard missiles, while Wainwright followed with one Standard missile.[5] The attacks destroyed the Iranian ship's superstructure but did not immediately sink it, so USS Bagley (FF-1069) fired a Harpoon of its own; the missile did not find the target. SAG Charlie closed on the Joshan, with Simpson, then Bagley and Wainwright firing guns to sink the crippled Iranian ship.[5]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Praying_Mantis
Yeah, a disaster indeed, Iran was undergoing the full effects of a 8-year devastating war + a total international embargo against it while the other side was getting its massive support intact from every major power in the world, including both superpowers... the country was literally exhausted, and yet the regime found a way to force some under-armed forces into some totally unequal battle with the world's most powerful navy, doomed to end with them getting pulverized... it is beyond ludicrous and unfortunately cost lives...
DeleteBut with that said, that certainly doesn't mean the situation would be the same today... considering the belt of 300-400 anti-ship batteries Iran is known to have deployed and camouflaged along the Persian Gulf coast, notably copies of the C-802 and C-803, the same types that Hezbollah used to almost sink a cutting-edge Israeli frigate modeled after major USN ships for self-defense against cruise missiles, the INS "Hanit", killing 4 on board (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INS_Hanit), plus a quasi-ballistic missile called the Khalij-Fars derived from proven DF series of Chinese missile technology (and which cost them sanctions in regards to US dealings in the future, with a demonstrated ability to perform pin-point strikes against a cruiser-sized vessel, the USN would never risk itself by fighting Iranian forces while sitting in the vicinity of the Persian Gulf.
Indeed, IRI propaganda-for-the-blind-enthusiast/fanboy put aside, a lot has effectively changed in Iran's ability to control the straits for a limited but guaranteed period of time. To cancel their hold on their shores, USN naval elements would first and foremost have to leave the Gulf to position themselves far away from Iranian shores and out of range of their anti-ship forces, somewhere in the Indian Ocean for example. Iran can on top of that perform saturation attacks on the USN's major naval base of Bahrain, which sits in range of thousands of its most powerful missiles, that is a fact that has long been considered by the USN's commanding brass, and it has kept a lot of them awake at night, from their own admission. That absolutely doesn't mean Iran can win a standoff with the US on the long run, but that certainly does mean it will take the latter much more than a bleeding nose to put their foe to the ground. In this scenario, I am not even counting the significant fleet of modern submarines Iran has consistently expanded in areas of interest, and that do pose a real threat to cruising USN surface ships in the Gulf's shallow waters where they have little room for maneuver. One shouldn't forget the fate of the South Korean pretty modern ship "Cheonan" that got sunk by a less-sophisticated North Korean submarine. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ROKS_Cheonan_sinking Iran in 88 barely had a capable army to speak of, all branches considered, let alone possessing home-grown arsenals of anti-ship missile or critically important submarines anywhere...
Hence their stated and concrete preference for settling things diplomatically, even if it means infuriating their major ally in the region, Israel, followed by no-less important Saudi Arabia, which have been sparing no effort in pushing hard-line elements within the American political class to scuttle the deal one way or another, fortunately without great success for now.
Bottom line is, would the US have deemed the war option a affordable one, both financially and militarily in its current troubled economic and geopolitical context, it would have opted for it many times already. The very fact that they instead accepted a deal that leaves the door open for Iran to keep a major part of its enrichment capabilities intact speaks volume about both the deterrence factor AND a highly opportunistic stance of Iran knowing about the weakening position of the US on other connected issue such as Syria , Iraq or even Afghanistan, where they struggle to enforce their decisions even on weakling puppet Karzai...
Classic iranian mentality - they don't understand or appreciate mercy, making a thrashing inevitable no matter how hard you try to avoid it.
DeleteClassic zionist mentality-making racist statements.
DeleteWell, the US do'nt seem to appreciate mercy too! Afghans and Iraqis have left some alive, but they'd better had killed them maybe ;)
DeleteAnonymous 9:58 PM---- " Bottom line is, would the US have deemed the war option a affordable one, both financially and militarily in its current troubled economic and geopolitical context, it would have opted for it many times already."
Deletenaah, war with Iran is affordable in those respects, but the US hasn't opted for it because the US doesn't desire it.
the US wants Iran's regime to stop doing a few things and allow international inspections to demonstrate that some of those things are not being done.
the US thinks that there's a better than even chance that economic pressure and negotiation will suffice to reach those modest goals and that war won't be necessary.
it's also thinks that should negotiation fail, the political cost of using military force against Iran will have been significantly reduced.
in the event of a military conflict with Iran, there is little that the Iranian military can do to defend Iran or itself and neither the US ships in the Gulf nor the base in Bahrain are vital assets.
"naah, war with Iran is affordable in those respects, but the US hasn't opted for it because the US doesn't desire it." ==> war planning and geopolitics do not respond to such considerations as "desire". They answer to a synthesis between military, political, and economic feasibility on every decision. Would the US determine they can destroy whatever they don't like in Iran without sustaining unacceptable consequences rather than accepting any kind of compromise, they would do it with no second thought, no matter how broad or narrow their objectives are. Like they did In Iraq. Like they did in Afghanistan. Like they do in Pakistan and Yemen, where their interests are even fewer than in critical Iran. Plus, mathematically, their economy today cannot sustain a war effort surpassing both the Iraqi and Afghan campaigns combined. By their own admission.
Delete"in the event of a military conflict with Iran, there is little that the Iranian military can do to defend Iran or itself and neither the US ships in the Gulf nor the base in Bahrain are vital assets." ==> wrong, the homefront cannot sustain such catastrophic losses such as major damage to the principal USN 5th Fleet port in the middle east, let alone the implied human losses that could go with it, or the sinking of even a couple of their major surface ships, a never-seen-before kind of causality since WWII. They do not even make a secret of that. No administration would survive that. No amount of untested ABM systems will help them avoid death and injury against a determined Iranian missile onslaught of combined arsenals of SRBMs and MRBMs, of which Iran has accumulated plenty over the years, no mattre how much one tries to belittle their efficiency. And before you say : yes, in the end of such stand-off, Iran will be the big loser, militarily, but at a cost that neither the Pentagon or the White House seems to be able, thus willing, to sustain.
There are 36 dangerously exposed US bases in reach of Iranian strike capabilities, and the vast majority of them aren't properly equipped to fight anything other than low-intensity warfare in Afghanistan. They would be easy targets with thousands of troops directly exposed to Iranian missile fire in the opening days of a conflict. No matter how hard they avenge them, they will loose them, and that again, they can't afford. Hence our current situation.
"it's also thinks that should negotiation fail, the political cost of using military force against Iran will have been significantly reduced." ==> if they fail, they will revert to massive crippling sanctions and validate whatever killing package Congress is readying as we speak, and this time with maximum legitimacy to do so, and won't go an inch further militarily.
It's delusions like 3:01's that will spell Iran's doom. I don't know why Iranians are so addicted to dishonesty.
DeleteListen, Khamenei is not divine, he's a filthy mafioso thief accumulating billions of dollars of wealth and power like any filthy mafioso.
Iran's military would be defeated by the west worse than Iraq's military was (do you remember what Saddam did to Iran and Khomeini?) It would be 99-1 kill ratios or something along those lines.
You know this is true, that's why you're scared to even go and live in Iran, because you don't trust that evil government enough to even live under it. Never mind actually joining the Iranian military and fighting a western country.
The UAE's 60 F16s alone could gain complete air superiority over Iran and its fleet of a few dozen obsolete creaky planes that they can barely get into the sky.
"that's why you're scared to even go and live in Iran," "Never mind actually joining the Iranian military and fighting a western country." So why haven't you joined the western armed forces and gone to fight their wars, instead of writing desperate hasbara propaganda here?
DeleteThe truth is, hasbara shills and other warmongers are devout followers of the "do as I say, not as I do" mentality.
"It's delusions like 3:01's that will spell Iran's doom. I don't know why Iranians are so addicted to dishonesty."==> still, you have yet to prove me wrong on any of the points I brought up, even on a theoretical level. I support my thesis through facts, you just spit out looping, belittling, racist comments against Iranians in general every time one touches the military issue.
DeleteListen, Khamenei is not divine, he's a filthy mafioso thief accumulating billions of dollars of wealth and power like any filthy mafioso." ==> thanks you for breaking me the news. You probably weren't even born I already had come to realize he is not some Shiite Santa but rather a totalitarian , murderous thief. But thank you for the effort.
"Iran's military would be defeated by the west worse than Iraq's military was (do you remember what Saddam did to Iran and Khomeini?) It would be 99-1 kill ratios or something along those lines." ==> I'm suspecting you're the same person that started abusively and inappropriately gauging Iran's prowess against Iraq in the Imposed War as a sample of study for its projected ability today. And plenty of documented proof taken from recognized, and accepted military history regarding that unfair war got posted to literally destroy your filthy, ludicrous perception of Iran's supposed demise in the face of Saddam.
But just for quick reminders : Operation Kaman 99 : occurred less than 24 hours after the initial Iraqi attack, mobilizing about 200 planes from the IRIAF in total, who devastated every single major Iraqi air base in Iran's vicinity in a single operation. IrAF's efficiency was reduced by 55% for the year following that hit. The only saving grace that spared them total annihilation, Six-Day War style was that almost every neighboring Arab country helped Saddam in preemptively sheltering the bulk of its planes abroad.
Then comes operation Morvarid , occurred on November 28th,1980, the results were :
-Destruction of 80% of the Iraqi Navy
-Destruction of the oil terminals at Mina al Bakr and Khor-al-Amaya
-Blocking of the port of Al Faw
-Destruction of many Iraqi oil installations, early warning bases and SAM sites
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Morvarid
So far, your 99-1 kill ratio seems correct, but upside-down to me. It was ONLY after the war dragged on beyond 1982 and that the Iranian started to increasingly feel the heat of the internationally imposed arms embargo (while Saddam could simply ask for Saudi money and get every lost piece of equipment replaced by either the US , Europe or the USSR) that the tide slowly changed back in Iraq's favor. We can thank Khomeini's delusional madness of trying to reach Baghdad in his quest of making a Shiite empire out of the ME for that, but it's another story.
"You know this is true, that's why you're scared to even go and live in Iran, because you don't trust that evil government enough to even live under it. Never mind actually joining the Iranian military and fighting a western country." off-topic, and ridiculous attempt at making things personal, attempt that I won't dignify.
"The UAE's 60 F16s alone could gain complete air superiority over Iran and its fleet of a few dozen obsolete creaky planes that they can barely get into the sky."==> the UAE and its mostly foreign, mercenary pilots wouldn't ever want to go it alone against Iran. Having almost zero strategic depth, and thus its few assets concentrated in one or two single airbases sitting at a mere 2-minutes missile flight-time from Iran, they would get toast on the ground by a barrage of ballistic missiles of varying types the second they declare war of show aggressive behavior. And it's not by quoting a recognized major bullshiter such as former General Petraeus that made a joke of himself in his completely flawed assessments of the Afghan situation so many times, that you are going to grow any additional credibility i'm afraid.
Because at the moment they do not need me to kill terrorist scum, which they are doing easily from the air at will, which is what will happen to iran's terrorists if it dares act on its fantasies.
DeleteJust please be quiet and enjoy the fact that a Western country let's you live in it, saving you from the people you fantasize about.
"Because at the moment they do not need me", yeah, sure. People who are quick to call for war and criticise others for not joining one, are predictably quick with excuses for why not.
DeleteAnonymousDecember 2, 2013 at 7:14 PM
DeleteWell said!
AnonymousDecember 1, 2013 at 10:17 AM
It was those western countries and their allies that helped to create the very same extremists they are now forced to fight.Its rather funny that you,such a big fan of the west,arent willing to go off and "fight the good fight" in defense of the west and its ideals,but then you seem to be pretty fond of one of those western ideals in particular,its called hypocrisy
Ah, i was wondering when they were going to bring those storaged ships back into service. Does the renovation include anything else, other than making sure that they are seaworthy? Any reports out there about possible upgrades to the armament of those ships?
ReplyDelete