Written by Aleksandr Khamchikhin; Originally appeared at VPK, translated by AlexD
Israel and Syria are eternal enemies. The last war between them took place 36 years ago, but nothing prevents it to happen again, and at any moment.
For Damascus, the situation is extremely unfavourable because the country and its army are extremely exhausted by years of civil war. And vice versa, very advantageous in the sense that on the Syrian territory there is a contingent of the Russian Armed Forces.
Syria fought against the Jewish state in the first Arab-Israeli war as part of the coalition, in the Six Day War of 1967, in October 2073 and alone in the Lebanese 1982. All of them were lost, although each time Israel had more problems.
During the current civil war in Syria, Tel Aviv has long pretended to remain neutral. In fact, it supported all opponents of Assad, including radical Sunni Islamists. Now it is impossible to hide it – too many Syrian troops seized from opposing groups various Israeli medicines, devices, equipment and even weapons. Such a position is completely inept, if not insane. Its cause is its irrational hatred of Iran, Assad’s most important ally, which has reached national paranoia. This is despite the fact that Iran has never fought with the Jewish state, and Tehran’s anti-Israeli rhetoric, as it is easy to understand, is aimed almost exclusively at the domestic audience. Yes, Iran-backed Shi’ite Hezbollah is occasionally fighting from the Lebanese territory, but it is impossible to consider it a real threat, their capabilities are too disparate, especially now that the organization is deeply involved in the Syrian war and suffered serious losses. The threat to Israel from the Sunni Palestinians, supported by the Arabian monarchies, is much more serious. But Israel is already almost openly friends with them (primarily with Wahhabi Saudi Arabia) against Iran.
Over the past years, the Israeli Armed Forces (“Ally on two fronts”) have repeatedly launched air and missile attacks on Syrian territory. In this case, it was officially stated that the goals are the Iranian formations, and at the same time air defence facilities. The results of these attacks are extremely difficult to determine. The Syrian Air Force (“Damascus and his Chariot”) lost one anti-aircraft missile gun system “Pansir-S1” and even some elements of the various SAMs. In addition, the Israeli Air Force “Patriot” shot down in 2014 over the Golan Heights an SU-24 bomber and in 2018 it attacked an SU-22 attack aircraft of the Syrian Air Force. In turn, the Israeli Air Force in February 2018 lost a fighter-bomber F-16I, shot down, apparently by an S-200. The Syrians also claim a large number of Israeli missiles shot down, but it is not possible to verify this.
Currently, the Syrian Army has from 1700 to 2600 tanks, of which 1100 to 1200 T-72 and about 30 T-90, the rest are the ancient T-55 and T-62. Israel has about 900 Merkava MK3/4 tanks and about 800 Merkava MK1/2 in storage. Ancient “Centurions” and “Magahi” (M48/60), not to mention the “Tyrants” (trophy Soviet machines T-54/55/62), apparently completely recycled. That is, the quantitative superiority, oddly enough, is still on the side of Syria, although the quality, of course, is on Israel’s side. Damascus has 1300 to 1700 BMPs-1/2. Tel Aviv has just over 300 BMPs “Namer” and “Achzarit”, and these machines are on tank chassis and are much more steady in battle than the usual BMPs. Regular APCs (Soviet in the SAA, American M113 in the IDF) in both parties are actually taken out of combat units, these machines either are held in the rear groups, or in storage, because they do not fit for modern warfare; they are too vulnerable.
Self-propelled artillery (Soviet 2S1 and 2S3 for Syria, American M109 for Israel) is approximately equal in number and age (production of the 60s and 70s). The same applies to towed artillery, only in Damascus it is in service, and in storage in Tel Aviv. Syria has numerical superiority in jet artillery, and all of it is combat ready. Israel has in the ranks only American M270 MLRS. Syrian “Hurricanes”, “Tornadoes” and TOS-1 with them, in general are quite comparable in terms of combat characteristics. Both sides have a large number of portable anti-tank missile launchers. Israel has the most modern “Spikes” in several versions; Syria has a wide stock from the ancient “Malytka” to the latest “Kornet”.
With a small quantitative superiority of he Syrians. the Israelis have a qualitative advantage, whom over and above always totally out do all Arabs in terms of combat and morale and psychological training of personnel. There is no reason to assume that the situation has changed now. In addition, the Syrians have many military personnel killed or deserted, and the current army is a very peculiar conglomerate of old regular units and new, in fact, volunteer formations. This is the civil war army, not the traditional Armed Forces. On the other hand, those who continue to fight for Assad, already have good combat experience and high motivation. In addition, they are inspired by the victories of the last three years. The IDF has not fought a major war for a while, so lost its once excellent experience and fighting spirit, which was confirmed during the Lebanese war of 2006. At a minimum, the situation has not improved since then, as some Israeli officers and generals have said with great concern recently. In addition, this summer, Israel did not prevent Syrian troops from defeating Islamist groups in the province of Quneitra, adjacent to the Golan Heights. Thus, the potential advanced foothold in the Syrian territory has been lost.
After 1982, both armies got used to fighting in conditions of complete domination in the air. For Israel, it even became a certain problem; it is the fascination with American concepts of “contactless”, pure air war led to the erosion of previously impeccable fighting spirit. Because of this, Jews began to have problems even with Palestinians and Hezbollah on land. But the Syrian army is still stronger in both. Accordingly, if Israel decides on a large-scale military campaign in Syria, it is highly unlikely that the Merkava will go to Damascus. The IDF will try to limit itself to a purely air war. Moreover, here Israel has an overwhelming superiority.
Heil Ha-Avir is armed with about 60 F-15A/B/C/D fighters, 25 F-15E strike fighters, at least 220 F-16C/D/I, as well as 12 F-35A. In storage, there is still more than 100 F-15A/V and F-16A/B, one hundred “Phantoms”, several dozen “Kirov” to one hundred “Skyhawks”, which, however, are unlikely to be needed. To this are added 45 attack helicopters AH-64A/D “Apache” and about 30 AN-1 “Cobra”, as well as an indefinite number (the count goes to hundreds) of tactical ground-based missiles “Laura”, “Extra”, Spike”-NLOS and others.
Ground air defense of Israel includes its own missile defense system “Arrow” (3 batteries) and “Iron Dome” (10 batteries), the American air defense system “Patriot” (7 batteries), the old American air defense system “Advanced Hawk” (up to 17 batteries) plus hundreds of short-range air defense (MANPADS “Stinger”, anti-aircraft armoured trucks, anti-aircraft guns).
In Syria, half a dozen SU-24 bombers and 45 MiG-29 fighters are considered relatively modern, even if they were released in the late 80s. Formally, apparently, several SU-22, MiG-21, fighter-bombers, MiG-23, MiG-25, kind of an attack aircraft L-39Z are listed in the Air Force. How many of them are in flying condition, it is extremely difficult to tell. The important thing is that all this, the 60s and 70s aircraft are the same age as those “Skyhawks”, “Kirovs” and “Phantoms”, which in Israel are in deep storage without any prospects of return to the system, even in the event of a major war. It is quite obvious in the repulsing of the latest Israeli raid involved only Syrian ground air defenses, even the MiG-29 did not take to the air. If in a ground collision, the T-55 can also hit someone, then in an air battle, the MiG-21 and MiG-23 will be for Jewish pilots just targets regardless of their number.
Syria has up to 80 Mi-24 combat helicopters and French AS342L, but they can theoretically be useful only in the event of an invasion of the country by Israeli ground forces, in an air war they are useless.
Syria’s reliance is in the ground air defense. Formally, it is still very large, but, alas, it is also generally very out-dated. The number of divisions of the Soviet SAMs S-75, S-125, S-200, “Square” can exceed one hundred, but to put it mildly, not all of them are combat-ready. The same can be said about the short-range SAMs (“Arrow-1”, “Arrow-10”, “Wasp”) and the anti-aircraft armoured trucks “Shilka”, of which there are several hundred. There are at least a thousand different MANPADS. The real combat assets are three or fours divisions of “Bukov” and 35 anti-aircraft missile and gun systems “Carapace-S1”. But that is not enough. If Israel starts to fight seriously, it will press the Syrian with “air-to-surface” and “surface-to-surface” missiles until complete destruction, after which Israeli aircraft will be able to fly over Syria almost freely, losses even in the worst case for Israel will be in the single digits. In February 2018, the Israelis, frankly, got a little carried away, and for this reason lost an F-16I, and most likely this will not happen again.
At sea, Israel’s superiority over Syria is no less overwhelming than in the air, but it is unlikely to significantly affect the course of hostilities.
But a Russian group can have a huge impact of them, located in the northwest of Syria. To suppress the ground-based air defense at the Khmeimim Air Base will be not so easy, because the latest AAMs and SAMs are based there. Russia, unlike Syria, has very effective means of EW, and the SU-35S fighters are much better in terms of combat characteristics of the MiG-29 of earlier modifications available to Damascus. If the Russian pilots have no experience of air battles, the same applies to the Israeli counterparts; the last time air battles their predecessors took part in was in 1982, and none of those pilots are still in the ranks of course. Now in Syria, there are only a few SU-35S, but they are able to inflict losses on Israeli aircraft, besides additional fighters can be rush from Russia, and not only SU-35S, but also SU-30SM and SU-27SM3.
Obviously, the Israelis will not be the first to strike our group. But Russia, philosophically observing the limited single raids on Syrian facilities, may change its mind in the event of massive attacks that will call into question the results of the military campaign, especially in light of the tragedy with the IL-20. Of course, the Russian Air Force and Navy will not be the first to hit the territory of the Jewish state, but may join the air defense of Syria. And then, the losses of Heil Ha-Avir will not be in the single digits, a certain number of pilots will be captured, and such things for the Israeli society is extremely painful. In addition, there will be extremely unpleasant political consequences for both sides, the possibility of involving the US in the war (which is extremely undesirable for Russia and Syria) and the creation of an open tight military alliance between Moscow and Tehran, which is completely unacceptable for Israel and the United States.
A very peculiar situation is created from the reception from Russia of a three-battalion regiment (8 launchers per division) of S-300PM by Syria. For this reason, comments have already been made in the range of “now the sky of Syria is securely covered” to “the appearance of the S-300 will not affect the actions of the Israeli Air Force”. Truth, as usual, is in the middle. Strictly speaking, the Israelis can suppress the “three hundred” described above by the simple way of ammunition depletion, followed by a blow to the empty launchers and other elements of the SAMs. But this will require a very different outfit forces than the previous raids. If Syria with the help of Russia will use modern means of EW, a significant part of the Israeli missiles may miss for this reason, to waste on them anti-aircraft guided missiles are not necessary, and then the ammunition depletion can happen earlier in Tel Aviv than Damascus. Israel may try to use against the S-300 the “invisible. F-35, but if suddenly at least one such aircraft is shot down, it will cause an acute internal crisis in Israel itself and in its relations with the United States, because it will discredit the latest American aircraft. If Israel is able to strike at least partially a successful blow to the S-300 itself or to objects under its cover, it will discredit the “three hundred” and the Russia Air Defense system as a whole, which is why Moscow will be very offended. In addition, for quite a long time in the cockpits of the S-300 next to the Syrian soldiers will sit Russians, and the Israeli strike could lead to their death. Which will offend Moscow even more. In this case, at least the above-described scenario of joint work of the Syrian and Russia air defense will be involved.
There is a situation unfolding where for Israel success and failure are almost identical, as they lead to a common military and political defeat. Understanding these circumstances will be a strong deterrent to all parties to a potential conflict. Most likely, Israel will continue to deliver single strikes against Iranian forces in Syria at the maximum distance from the positions of the “three hundred” (this is how the first Israeli strike was carried out since the deployment of the S-300 in Syria on the night of November 30, on targets in south of Damascus, obviously beyond the reach of this SAM) and at the same time convince Russia to achieve the withdrawal of these forces. Moscow is not against limiting Tehran’s influence in Syria, but a complete break with it is impossible, at least until the end of the war. The probability of the continuation of such “swings” still seems much higher than the fifth Syrian-Israeli war.
