Authored by Mike Fredenburg via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
On Nov. 25, Russia launched some 75 drones at key navy and infrastructure targets in Kyiv. As per ordinary, the Ukrainian navy reported that its air protection techniques had been extremely profitable—capturing down all however one of many drones (74 out of 75)—a few 98 p.c kill fee.
However that feat is chump change in comparison with the claims made on Could 16, 2023, by the commander-in-chief of Ukraine’s armed forces, Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, “that his forces had intercepted the six Kinzhal missiles launched from plane, in addition to 9 Kalibr cruise missiles from ships within the Black Sea and three Iskanders fired from land,” based on Reuters.
If true, this was a really spectacular feat certainly.
However Russia has additionally been making some extraordinary claims. On Aug. 26, Russian media reported that Russia detected 42 drones after which eradicated 33 of them by way of digital warfare and shot down the remaining 9 utilizing its air protection techniques—a 100% success fee. On Nov. 26, Russia claimed to have shot two S-200 missiles and 24 drones over three totally different areas of Russia.
The above are just some out of the various dozens of reviews by Ukraine and Russia claiming terribly excessive success charges in capturing down enemy missiles and drones. These claims are problematic for 2 main causes.
The primary is that each Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in propaganda efforts designed to make themselves look extra highly effective and competent whereas making their opponent look weaker and fewer competent—and clearly this is a vital a part of that narrative. However the different cause comes out of the historical past of air protection improvement and its real-world success fee and finds that such excessive success charges are extremely problematic and thus extra prone to be propagandistic exaggerations.
It has lengthy been recognized that the estimated success charges for intercepting rockets and missiles established by testing vary greatly from those seen in the real world. For instance, that Russia’s vaunted S-400 surface-to-air missile (SAM) apparently by no means failed a check strongly means that Russia wasn’t being clear about all of the unsuccessful check outcomes that got here earlier than the profitable one. Consequently, it will not be dependable relating to reporting on real-world stats. That doesn’t imply the S-400 isn’t efficient, however that it doubtless is not as efficient as reported by Russia.
Nonetheless, if Russian and Ukrainian reviews are to be believed, Ukrainian and Russian protection techniques are usually outperforming Israel’s much-vaunted Iron Dome System regardless of going up towards far more subtle targets equivalent to maneuvering drones that may use terrain to cowl their method, stealthy cruise missiles, and really quick ballistic and maneuvering semi-ballistic missiles. However even the Iron Dome’s estimated real-world success rates have been hotly debated.
One other instance of a missile protection system with much-debated efficiency is the Patriot Air Protection System, of which Ukraine has obtained at the least two. Every Patriot system prices over $1 billion. As is commonly the case, each the service who bought the system (the U.S. Military) and the Patriot provider, Raytheon, have been responsible of overestimating its effectiveness, with claims of 100% effectiveness being downwardly revised first to 52 percent after which to 10 to 20 percent effective. Together with the Patriot, firstly of the battle Ukraine had around 100 operational Soviet/Russian S-300 SAM systems. Whereas the S-300 is very efficient towards comparatively giant jet fighters, when going up towards tactical ballistic missiles, based on Russian checks it’ll fail an estimated 30 p.c of the time. And as is the case with the Patriot Missiles System, the S-300 is not designed to tackle low-flying UAVs that use terrain to masks their method.
In fact, Ukraine has short- and medium-range air protection techniques which might be a lot better towards drones, such because the IRIS-T and the NASAM, and many others., however they too might be fooled, suppressed, jammed, and overwhelmed. Russia’s air protection techniques are additionally topic to being fooled, suppressed, jammed, and overwhelmed. Consequently, when contemplating the complicated and hostile engagement environments by which these air protection techniques function, steady claims of them being 70 to 100% efficient needs to be seen with a wholesome skepticism.
Views expressed on this article are opinions of the creator and don’t essentially replicate the views of The Epoch Occasions or ZeroHedge.
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