Iran has taken possession of Chinese surface-to-air missile batteries as Tehran rapidly moves to rebuild defensives destroyed by Israel during their recent 12-day conflict, sources have told Middle East Eye.
The deliveries of Chinese surface-to-air missile batteries occurred after a de-facto truce was struck between Iran and Israel on 24 June, an Arab official familiar with the intelligence told MEE.
Another Arab official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive intelligence, said that the US’s Arab allies were aware of Tehran’s efforts to “back up and reinforce” its air defences and that the White House had been informed of Iran’s progress.
The officials did not say how many surface-to-air missiles, or SAMs, Iran had received from China since the end of the fighting. However, one of the Arab officials said that Iran was paying for the SAMs with oil shipments.
These can’t shoot down F35, can they?
I mean they theoretically can but they’d have to hide one under like a false rock, keep the radar off until they somehow know an F-35 is very close, flick it on and then hope that’s close enough for a track and launch.
Israel has huge intel on where their SAM sites are located in real time, so this already makes it near impossible.
A better solution would be a fully integrated radar system with a modern airforce to run and protect it, but that’s expensive and would require years of buildup.
Then you could use some stacked radar tricks to identify F-35s from further out, and use data link to avoid alerting them on RWR. It would still be hard just due to the low RCS so any non stealth fighters would likely be prime targets as the F-35s slip by.
Nobody really knows what Chinese tech can do because China does not participate in war.
The only thing we really know is that the Pakistanj Chinese made fighter jets shot down a bunch of French Rafale jets when India attacked Pakistan. Though the Indian Rafale’s are fourth generation jets not 5th.
If China sent their top end SAMs then I have no doubt it could shoot down F35’s. Though they probably didn’t do that.
https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/china-rebuilding-iran-air-defence-hq9b
Iran would actually need airborn early warning and control (AEW&C) to effectively defeat F-35 fighters with anti-air defenses. But if Iran were to deploy a few J-10C that were used by Pakistan, they would at least put an obstacle in acquiring air superiority in Iranian territory, since the jets would not be able to maneuver freely in Iranian territory.
Let’s keep in mind that J-10Cs are 4th gen as well. But I think Iran would be able to replace their old fleet with newer J-10Cs as quickly as Pakistan did with their older jets.
Or this you call up the H team
If they’ve already shot down F-35s with inferior/older equipment doesn’t that show that they already have the systems capable of effectively defeating F-35s?
The only thing I see in that article is that it wouldn’t be as effective as it could be due to their lack of their own fighters and an AEW&C, not that it wouldn’t be effective.
No confirmations of downed F35’s were made after the war. Several Israeli $30m Hermes 900 drones smaller ones were downed which might have been translated to plane and then misreported as f35’s.
The US will never admit their F-35 got shot. They alleged a few F-35 fell into the ocean after defensive maneuvers done by a carrier. Note that this happened at least twice.
Those were F18A hornets