from Great Game India:
Russian military historian and director of the Museum of Air Defense Forces, Yuri Knutov, said that the Hamas attack revealed the Iron Dome’s inefficiency.
The Iron Dome air defense system, developed by Israel, is widely recognized as one of the best in the world. Despite this, it appears to have fallen short of entirely invalidating the Saturday Palestinian rocket fire.
TRUTH LIVES on at https://sgtreport.tv/
Russian military historian and director of the Museum of Air Defense Forces, Yuri Knutov, commented on this failure by pointing out that while the Iron Dome is a very complex and modern air defense system, it has flaws that can be exploited by any adversary.
For starters, a single Iron Dome battery can only cover around 150 square kilometers of ground.
Second, the Iron Dome is quite effective against a small number of incoming targets that all approach from the same direction, according to Knutov.
“IN CASE OF A MORE INTENSIVE BARRAGE, INVOLVING AT LEAST ABOUT 100 ROCKETS, THE IRON DOME USUALLY FAILS TO DO ITS JOB AND UP TO 90 PERCENT OF THE ROCKETS BYPASSES IT AND STRIKE THE INTENDED TARGETS,” HE CLAIMED.
The historian also noted that Hamas fighters purposefully fired large numbers of rockets in a variety of directions, possibly in an effort to overwhelm Israeli Iron Dome defenses.
“WHEN IT (AN IRON DOME SYSTEM) INTERCEPTS THE FIRST SALVO, WHEN IT IS DEALING WITH THOSE ROCKETS, IT IS UNABLE TO DEAL WITH THE SECOND SALVO THAT WAS FIRED PRACTICALLY A MINUTE AFTER THE FIRST ONE. AND SO THE ROCKETS FROM THE SECOND, THIRD AND FOURTH SALVOS REACH THEIR TARGETS PRACTICALLY UNOPPOSED,” HE SAID, ARGUING THAT THIS TACTIC ESSENTIALLY CAPITALIZES ON IRON DOME’S “INEFFICIENCY.”
Additionally, Knutov noted that whereas Palestinian jury-rigged rockets, the threat that Iron Dome systems typically have to deal with, only cost between $2,000 and $3,000 each, a single Iron Dome interceptor missile costs at least $20,000.
Despite this, Knutov praised the Iron Dome’s radar unit and the interceptor missiles it employs, calling both of them “interesting.”
Read More @ GreatGameIndia.com
