Iron Dome defense system saved lives

Israel's anti-missile defense shield Iron Dome performed spectacularly during the recent Israeli-Hamas confrontation. Israeli's defense capabilities are by far the best in the Middle East.

 

You can bet the IDF is working to improve Iron Dome's performance. Looking for zero penetrations.

You can also bet US observers are very interested.

Iron Dome could be integrated in with longer range Patriot or Standard missile systems and Phalanx CWIS to make layered air and missile defence system. That would be truly inpenetrable.

 

It would have been cheaper for the US to develop such a system itself rather than the massiavely overpriced subsidization of Israel to get it.

 

Developing and trying it out under Israel's particular existential threats is a great laboratory to examine such systems on a small scale under 'real time' conditions, and by proxy, rather than waiting to try it out on your own forces and borders; it's much cheaper, and the brunt of unforeseen failures and mistakes and the tweaking fall on somebody else, so it's very, very cheap in that regard. The Israelis are doing most of the work.

 

Israel is not handicapped by the Federal Acquisition Regulations, and

If a rocket gets though, it's their people who get killed - not Americans

 

And the Democrat liberal fools along with the leftist MSM were making fun of Reagan for what they called 'Star Wars'.....Yet another reason liberalism is definitely a mental disorder.

 

Right.

Because as we all know, Iron Dome involves x-ray lasers and particle beams on satellites just like the Star Wars program...

 

America does have a system, Patriot missile system. Been around for at least 25 years to my knowledge, they were used in Gulf War I...there were plenty of mobile Patriot missile batteries around Riyadh, designed to shoot down Scud missiles launched by Iraq. The Iron Dome is probably a cheaper version of the Patriot Missile system. At least the missiles are cheaper, the tracking technology is where it is very high tech...figuring out the incoming rocket track and whether it's worth shooting down or not.

 

Two completely different systems. The Patriot is a theater ballistic missile defense/surface to air missile launcher.

Iron Dome is more like an anti-artillery system. More like Goalkeeper or the land version of Phalanx. It is meant to kill small artillery rockets, not ballistic missiles.

 

Again, another misquote...
Nowhere did I say the two are identical..I simply said the U.S. has a missile defense system already in the Patriot...it also happens to be mobile, but that's beside the point.
Well you're incorrect.
The Iron Dome is a scaled down version of the U.S.-built Patriot missile defense system ...Iron Dome and the Arrow 2 missile defense layers buttress the existing system which includes a series of Patriot missile batteries and Arrow missiles.

You just like argue for the sake of semantics...

Both systems are missile defense...they shoot missiles to shoot down missiles....Phalanx is closer to a mini-gun than a missile system.

Based on your reply I'm guessing you've seen neither systems in action.

 

My understanding is that the complete U.S. system involves several different systems that are all integrated into a layered defense. The Iron Dome isn't some magical system from my understanding. I believe the U.S. has something rather similar for that layer.

 

The difference: the Patriot will not intercept a Katyusha. The Iron Dome will. You clearly don't understand the intended purposes.

Like the Iron Dome, the land version of the Phalanx is meant to shoot down artillery shells and rockets, not to be used to shoot down ballistic missiles.

 

I see I have to repeat myself in here...yet again.

The Iron Dome is a C-RAM...system...counter-rocket, artillery and mortar...like the Army Phalanx...which is basically taking the technology from the Navy Phalanx and going land based...it uses a 20mm cannon for C-RAM...unlike the Iron Dome which uses smaller self-guided missiles.

HOWEVER...the principals behind the Patriot missile system are closer in similarity to the Iron Dome system than the Phalanx. Both the Patriot and Iron Dome used ground based
radar to detect incoming objects, track them and then shoot a self-guided IR missile at the tracked object...the Iron Dome is a scaled down version of the Patriot. I never said the systems were identical...or served the same identical purpose. The Iron Dome is part of a layered defense system for smaller targets...in essence a cheaper Patriot battery.

Yes I have access to the internet also....anyone can google "Iron Dome" and read up on it...or view a youtube video and see it in action...having SEEN actual Patriot missile batteries in use in Saudi Arabia to shoot down larger Iraqi Scud missiles, I thought the analogy between the two systems adequate to explain to a layman. The Phalanx, while also designed to shoot down similar targets as the Iron Dome was designed...uses a radar guided 20mm cannon...and I do not find the two systems analagous other than both share similar purposes.

Counter-rocket, artillery and mortar.

I hope we are clear.

 

I should correct, that the Tamir missiles are guided while the Patriot's are self guided....with the Phalanx, the gun is also radar guided...the projectiles themselves are in essence linear...while the Tamir missiles used in the Iron Dome are steerable.

 

Its quite inappropriate to suggest that Israel is a guinea pig for US military developments. Bordering on anti-semantic.

 

'Anti-semantic'? ...

I don't see any Israelis complaining, and weapons testing under real conditions is nothing new, even for Israeli arms industries, who also develop and sell systems to other countries. There is nothing 'antisemitic' about it.

 

[video=youtube;-vhRmQ_lqBU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vhRmQ_lqBU[/video]

The rocket attacks by Hamas were ineffective because of the Iron Dome defence system which took down about 300 rockets fired at Tel Aviv and targeting unpopulated areas instead was meaningless, which was why Hamas agreed to an early ceasefire and the advent of this revolutionary technology could lead to Hamas' pacification in the long run.

 

Does anybody think the success of this system will lead to complacency in the political arena, i.e. voters in Israel feeling more like they can make unnecessary concessions and the like, or trading them off too cheaply?

 

I can understand why many criticised the Star Wars program as a huge waste of money. But the plus side is it did develop several new technologies. And before all the research, no one was really sure whether energy weapons would be a critical part of military technology in the 21st century. It turned out they were not so practical as many thought.

 

Best of all, Iron Dome completely frustrated the Paleos' rocket offensive.

Like Wile E. Coyote, they gotta go back to the drawing board. Rockets don't work, and the Israelis are too good at spotting splodeydopes.

 

Iron Dome is actually a very different system then PATRIOT. While both use missiles to intercept the target, that pretty much is where the similarities end.

Iron Dome is operated with a launcher that has holds 20 missiles, each of which is 3 meters long and weighs 200 lbs. PATRIOT on the other hand operates out of launchers that have from 4-16 missiles per launcher (5 out of 6 only have 4), fire missiles that are just under 6 meters long, and weigh 1,500 lbs. It also reaches out to 160 km, where Iron Dome is only designed to reach from 4-70 kilometers.

The role of Iron Dome is much closer to that of SHORAD, and there has been talk of getting it for use in the Army for base defense. And while an excellent system for what it is designed to do, it is a much more limited system then PATRIOT is.

 

Actually, most of the Star Wars program involved Phased Array RADAR, kinetic kill weapons, and computers able to predict the collision of objects in flight.

Well, just like modern PATRIOT, THAAD, and SM-2/SM-3.

The mistake you are making is that you are confusing the public claims of those for and against the program, and ignoring/ignorant of what was actually done while it was in development.

In reality, "Star Wars" was never about such things. Those were the public displays given out, which caused the Soviets to spend huge amounts of money in those areas. Which turned out to be black holes. Meanwhile, most of the serious research went into things like Kinetic Kill and the capability to intercept from ground based launching systems.

 

That is actually a pretty good analysis of the 2 systems.

Yea, Iron Dome pretty much is a scaled down version of PATRIOT. In fact, if you look at the German version of the PATRIOT RADAR unit, it looks a lot like that which Iron Dome uses. And there is a lot in common between the Iron Dome and PATRIOT launchers.

However, there are a lot of differences also.

Iron Dome is a great system, for the threats that they are facing. Essentially, it uses an older version of the PATRIOT system, which uses armed warheads with proximity fuses to try and destroy the incoming missile with essentially a large shotgun blast. And this works very well against the small, light weight and cruse missiles that are being launched at them from Hamas.

However, these would be much less effective against something heavier, such as the SCUD missiles that Iraq fired at them in 1990-1991. Against those heavier, better designed and longer range (which makes them faster), sich an approach would not work.

And in the inverse, the threats Israel is facing is not a good choice for PATRIOT either. A great many of those rockets fired against them do not meet the minimum engagement height of the PATRIOT system (1km). In essence, for the rockets being fired against Israel at this time, trying to use PATRIOT would be like trying to kill flies with a blast from a double barreled 12 guage shotgun. Or hunting rabbits for food with a 40mm grenade launcher. Yea, you might get them, but the results are not really what you want in the end.

What we have here is a perfect weapon for it's intended mission. It is not PATRIOT, it is not SHORAD, it is something in between, that combines the two.

Oh, and Raytheon (the major contractor of both PATRIOT and C-RAM) is in talks with Israel to acquire this to add to the C-RAM system (PHALANX on a trailer basically), to add to it's base defense capability. I bet within 5-10 years we will see some of these attached to SHORAD units, with PATRIOT RADARs providing the targeting information for them.
http://www.jpost.com/Defense/Article.aspx?id=245031

But we have been talking about this in the AD (Air Defense) community for quite a while now. It is only in the last month or so that most people on the outside have really become aware of Iron Dome and what it can (and can't) do.

 

Actually, yes and no.

The PATRIOT system is actually closer to 50 years old. If you ever go to White Sands, the original launcher is in their museum, part of a program started in 1964. However, it was only designed to shoot down aircraft, not missiles. That is a newer part of it's mission, first tested in 1990.

And that is very true. For example, on land we have Long, Medium and Short Range Air Defense.

For Long Range, we use THAAD.

For Medium Range, we use PATRIOT.

For Short Range, we use AVENGER, STINGER and C-RAM.

Iron Dome fits in between the Short and Medium Range systems of the US Army. It reaches farther out then any of our current Short Range systems, but not as far as PATRIOT. It also is a lot less expensive, between $35-50k per round fired.

http://www.defpro.com/daily/details/277/

That is pretty good, compared to the almost $1 million per round of the PATRIOT missile ($2-3 million for a PAC-3 round). So this would fill in a critical gap, while not needed would be a huge benefit to protecting those assets we are assigned to protect.

Part of the advantage of Iron Dome is that it is a very recent creation. Where the US adapted a system that was already in service to fulfill the anti-missile role, Israel decided to create an entirely new system from the ground up. And they were able to look at PATRIOT, and decide what they needed (Phased Array RADAR, mobile, modular components, quick to reolad) and scale them to what their real threat was (short range rockets, able to fire many more missiles, targets that are low altitude and speed). And for this role, they did a great job.

This is a great system for taking out a Qassam Rocket. But I doubt it would be anywhere near as effective against a Shahab-3.

Exactly. The Qassam normally only reaches an altitude of .5-.7km. And PATRIOT can't engage anything below an altitude of 1km.

Well, yes and no, yes and no. One advantage of PATRIOT is that we have a great many missiles that we can fire from them. Some are completely self-guided, most use the feedback of the RADAR on the ground for long-range targeting, then switch to an active system when they fully acquire their target. Others operate almost completely on command from the ground. It all depends on the missile being fired and the target. And there are a great many different missiles loaded onto the launchers (most batteries use 3-5 different missiles, GEM+, GEM/T, CEM/C, PAC-2, PAC-3). They just load most of the launchers with the missiles they most expect to need at that location, but often have some others loaded with other missiles, in case something unexpected happens. And even more new missiles are in development, the only one I could find from public sources is the MSE, or "Missile Segment Enhancement", the first major upgrade to the newest missile, the PAC-3.

http://www.lockheedmartin.com/us/products/PAC3MissileSegmentEnhancement.html

 

The danger of quoting from fox news ... is that it is opinion and editorializing which is not "news".

Apparently the "Iron Dome" did not perform nearly as well as all the hype would suggest.


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...e-defensive-shield-questioned/article5830196/