In my recent post about Iranian anti-ship missiles, I discussed the debate surrounding the attack on the Hanit corvette by Hezbollah during the 2006 war. I've usually subscribed to the belief that it was a C-701/Kosar that was used because it would account for the small amount of damage as well as be more plausible from a logistic perspective. This is despite the common claim that it was the C-802/Noor.
However, it seems I'll have to eat my words.
The first missile fired during the encounter missed the Israeli ship and hit an a civilian freighter. Up until now I assumed that this ship has been operating in the relative vicinity of the Hanit because a decoyed terminal seeker would be the best explanation for why the missile hit it instead of the Hanit.
However I've recently come across some information that indicates that the freighter was actually 60 km out to sea - well beyond the range of any variant of the Kosar. Even the Hanit, patrolling at 16 km from shoreline is at the absolute maximum engagement range of some Kosar variants (around 15 km). A Kosar could have been fired in conjunction with a Noor, but that seems much more unlikely then multiple Noors being launched (if one believes in Occam's Razor).
Source: http://www.offiziere.ch/?p=2507
I agree. I believe that the Qods force supplied both the missiles and the crews that at the very least supervised the firing of the missiles, at least two. It is also puzzling to me that more damage was not done to the INS ship.
ReplyDeleteWell if I had some 3rd party to launch some of my ASMs I would want them to test as many different kinds as possible to see what works and what does not.
ReplyDeleteI also wonder if it was a 802 then maybe the warhead failed to explode properly. Most of the damage seemed to be down towards the heli deck, I wonder if the 802 might have a tandem warhead, a normal HE warhead and a downwards firing shaped charge or incendiary warhead to damaged equipment. The Otomat missile is like that I think.
Hey Galen check out this PBS article :
ReplyDeletehttp://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2011/08/eight-months-inside-sepah.html#ixzz1VJFOpaCJ
I like how you make use of the Occam's razor for hypothesis testings.
ReplyDeletemaydayfire