Russian arms supplies to Syria:

GarryB wrote:In answer to your question, the S-300 is not a magic weapon... the use against the US or Israel would only lead to an escalation that they can't win.

Much more useful would be small arms and ammunition and other kit like protective vests and armour and Su-25 like aircraft and hopefully UCAVs.

It is obvious to me that the US and Israel are taking profit in the area from the fact that the opposed countries have not enough modern air defense. The development of the air defenses in the countries of the area would be bad for both countries and they would have little to do against it. Siria still is one of the coutries that have some air defense, if not the US and other countries would be using their air forces like they did in Libia and Irak.

JohninMK wrote:

George1 wrote:An-124 flying to Latakia

What does it transfer??

Pre-fabricated housing units for the marines seems to be the cover story.

T-72's fall into the prefabricated housing category. True story, that's one of the export certificates from Ukraine to Nigeria.

sepheronx wrote:More BMP's and add in technical engineers with older T-55/62 tanks and convert them to heavy IFV's to make them effective. Maybe helicopters too and Su-25's and 24's.  Syria needs what they can get.  I think it is high time too to build a wall, separating syrian army controlled areas from the rest. And any pockets of resistence inbetween, deal with them.

Russia needs to send more to help Syria.

I back what you say, Russia has abundance of T-62, T-64, and T-72 that they could send to Syria top this up with BMP-1, BMP-2, MT-LB, BTR 60,70,80, and other wheeled armour Tigr, Typhoon etc, and  theSyrian armed forces will be in a much better position. Russia also has loads of field artillery 122mm, 152mm, and 2S1, 2S3, and BM-21 that it could send, they also have a lot of older guns like T-12, BS-3, D-44, D-48, and M-46 that they could get rid of all of this stuff is just sitting around gathering dust, most of which the Syrian army would need little to no training on.

back all this up with AT-4, AT-5, AT-3, ZSU23-2, ZPU-2, various mortars, various RPG's and small arms (which yet again are gathering dust) and top it off with what you said SU-25, SU-24, plus Mi-24

and another thing to add to this TOS-1A would come in very handy.

KoTeMoRe wrote:

JohninMK wrote:

George1 wrote:An-124 flying to Latakia

What does it transfer??

Pre-fabricated housing units for the marines seems to be the cover story.

T-72's fall into the prefabricated housing category. True story, that's one of the export certificates from Ukraine to Nigeria.

It's just a sort of camper van... But with tracks, and y'know, a 125mm gun. Kind of like a tank.

In order to keep Syria strong enough to afford strong external attacks from some of its borders, is very likely that Russia and other allies of Syria in the continental platform of Asia assure that Syria keeps the pre-war military strength, and for it, these countries will likely help to keep the arsenals of Syria in the pre-war levels in the refered to the amounts of weapons, with some improvement in the refered to the most modern material and in the refered to the oldest models of weapons that are exhausted in the war.

LESS MODERN, LESS POWERFUL AND LESS CAPABLE HEAVY ARMAMENT FROM RUSSIA

From the Russian Armed Forces:

In recent years, maybe 12 years, a good number of heavy weapons totally dissappeared from the Russian Armed Forces, in the last decommission wave and little before. These weapons are likely to be totally out of the Russian Armed Forces by the begin of 2018 or little arfter. If some unit of these weapons remain still in Russia, South Ossetia, Novorussia and Abkhazia, is likely that go to Syria in the short term (only the T-64 seems more oriented to Novorussia). In this situation would be (in all the cases including engineering variants, bolded the weapons present in the Syrian Armed Forces in the war of Syria):

076mm M-1938
085mm 52-K KS-12 M-1938
122mm D-74
014.5mm ZPU-1/2/4
SA-3
SA-2
SA-5
ASU-57
BM-14
BM-16
PT-76
ASU-85
T-34
ZSU-57-2
SA-4

082mm Vasilek
130mm KS-30
037mm 61-K
100mm KS-19
FROG-7

152mm D-1 (TMB2004-2005 700 units; TMB2018 700 units)
100mm BS-3
085mm D-44
122mm M-30 (TMB2004-2005 3750 units; TMB2018 3750 units)
160mm M-160 (TMB2004-2005 300 units; TMB2018 300 units)
203mm B-4(M) (TMB2004-2005 40 units; TMB2018 40 units)
152mm ML-20 (TMB2004-2005 100 units; TMB2018 100 units)
057mm S-60 (TMB2004-2005 >0 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
130mm M-46 (TMB2004-2005 650 units; TMB2018 650 units)
152mm D-20 (TMB2004-2005 1115 units; TMB2018 1075 units)
023mm ZU-23(-2) (TMB2004-2005 >0 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
BM-13 (TMB2004-2005 <50 units; TMB2018 100 units)
BTR-50 (TMB2004-2005 1000 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
SA-9 (TMB2004-2005 >0 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
Be-6/12 (TMB2004-2005 20 units; TMB2018 4 units)
GT-MU
BTR-60 (TMB2004-2005 >0 units; TMB2018 >800 units)
AT-T (TMB2004-2005 0 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
T-54 (TMB2004-2005 0 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
T-55 (TMB2004-2005 <1360 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
T-62 (TMB2004-2005 3000 units; TMB2018 >0 units)
T-64 (TMB2004-2005 4350 units; TMB 2018 >0 units )

Red because they would be finnished in Russia (or will be very soon). Despite it, the supplies to Syria of these weapons and some others of Sovietic origin, can continue from other countries of the continental platform  of Asia.

The previous box includes some weapons that deficiently updated sources like The Military Balance still count as present in the Russian Armed Forces. Like we can see in the box, comparing the data offered by the 2004-2005 and the 2018 editions of the numbers of The Military Balance, the numbers for these weapons in Russia have been very erratic, with some cases when the numbers even increased for weapons out of production.

This would be the model used to repair:

https://www.russiadefence.net/t4461p50-syrian-arab-army-saa#196708
http://bmpd.livejournal.com/2665826.html

A second group of weapons would be formed by weapons that are still present in the Russian arsenals, but are likely to disappear in the following years in Russia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. In this situation would be (bolded the weapons present in Sirian Armed Forces in the war of Syria):

100mm 2A19/2A29 (M)T-12
122mm 2A18 D-30
120mm 2B16 Nona-K
BMD-1
BMP-1
BRDM-2

In adition to this, limited number of units of more modern and powerful armament have been supplied to Syria. Just the weapons habitually in the news.

From the Russian Security Forces:

The Russian Security Forces had some units of heavy armament, that have been and can be transfered without impact in the Russian Armed Forces (including the reserve). It includes material that follows the same scheme than the commented for the Russian Armed forces (bolded the weapons present in the Syrian Armed Forces in the war of Syria):

BTR-60

122mm 2A18 D-30
BMP-1
BRDM-2

In adition to this, limited number of units of more modern and powerful armament have been supplied to Syria.

NON COMBAT VEHICLES FROM RUSSIA

From the Russian Armed Forces:

In the side of the non-combat vehicles, there is also a number of sea, land and air non-combat auxiliary vehicles that have been totally decommissioned in the recent years, but in this case I have not completed the recount. Like in the case of the heavy weapons, if some unit remains still in Russia, will go inmediately to Syria. In the reports of 2017 I saw only some reference to presence of the Kraz-214, Kraz-255, Kraz-260 and ZIL-130 in some non-combat engineering variants, and the presence of the MAZ-543. In this situation would be (bolded the weapons present in the Syrian Armed Forces in the war of Syria):

A good number of types

Red because they would be finnished today.

The second goup would be again the group of vehicles that are present today, but are likely to be finnished in the following years in the Russian Armed Forces. It is likely that Russia will want to finnish the foreign vehicles in the Russian Armed Forces by two ways. By transfer to other non military gouvernmental agencies (including Russian Security Forces) or by export/donation to other friend countries. Of this group, it is much more likely to see a supply to Syria of land and air vehicles than of sea vehicles. In the most likely cases to go to Syria (L-39, Type IC16MII and Iveco LMV), while for Russia they would be for non combat roles like training or light utility, it would be likely to see them used for comtat roles in Syria. In this situation would be (bolded the vehicles present in the Syrian Armed Forces in the war of Syria):

A good number of projects of auxiliary ships
An-22
Mi-6/10/22
L-39
An-2/4/6
An-140
Iveco LMV
An-148/158/178
L-410

In addition to this, limited number of units of more modern and powerful auxiliary vehicles have been supplied to Syria.

From the Russian Security Forces:

If needed Russia can also supply non-combat vehicles (including light semiarmoured vehicles) to Syria, from the Russian Security Forces. These vehicles can have sometimes lower standards than the current of the Russian Armed Forces, but can be useful for Syria. Following the previous scheme:

A good number of types

To see how the exhaustion of the previous warfare marked in red and fuchsia in the previous post above:

https://www.russiadefence.net/t1321p125-russian-arms-supplies-to-syria#186218

is not critical for the extintion of this material in Syria, and is not critical to force to Russia to provide more modern material to Syria, is necessary to see the stock of the same (or very close) material in other countries of the continental platform of Asia.

LESS MODERN, LESS POWERFUL AND LESS CAPABLE SOVIETIC HEAVY ARMAMENT AVAILABLE FOR SYRIA IN THE REST OF COUNTRIES OF THE CONTINENTAL PLATFORM OF ASIA

According to recently updated sources like The Military Balance 2018, these countries would have still the following material of Sovietic origin (not included foreign produced variants with different designation):

>0000   152mm M-10 M-1938
>0000   076mm ZIS-3
>0035   152mm D-1
>0000   160mm M-43
>0018   100mm BS-3
>0000   085mm D-44
>0035   122mm M-30
>0000   160mm M-160

>0000   037mm 61-K M-1939
>0300   085mm 52-K KS-12 M-1939
>0000   122mm A-19 M-1931/37
>0000   152mm ML-20
>0000   100mm KS-19
>0000   085mm D-48
>0246   057mm S-60
>0000   122mm D-74
>0000   014.5mm ZPU-1/2/4
>2153   130mm M-46
>0160   152mm D-20
>0620   023mm ZU-23-2
>0133   SA-3 (note the recent mobile weapon is receiving the designation of SA-26 and would not be included)
>0224   SA-2
>0048   SA-5

>0000   122mm SU-122
>0000   100mm SU-100
>0000   BM-13
>0055   T-34
>0000   BMD-20
>0000   BM-24
=0004   MiG-15
>0000   BTR-40
>0020   BTR-152
>0000   BRDM-1
>0020   BM-14
>0870   PT-76
>0000   BTR-50
=0200   SA-9
>/<1753   BTR-60

=0080   057mm ZSU-57-2
=0024   FROG-7
>0000   SA-4
>0003   T-54
>/<3818 T-55
>1122   T-62
>0204   MiG-21
=0100   T-64

Like in the previous related comments, bolded the weapons present in the Syrian Civil War. Red because it would be material finnished in Russia (or very soon like explained in the previous comments).

The presence of this material in the continental platform of Asia (even until Belarus and Novorussia), has an impact in the transference of warfare from Russia to Syria. All it can reach Syria in the short/mid term, because the countries that own this warfare have an interest in to replace this material by newer weapons and in to avoid costs of scrapping. They only need to put the material in the queue of the repair plants in Syria.

The presence of this material in Russia, Belarus and the continental platform of Asia is the explanation of how Syria has been fighting all the war with the same type of material since the begin, without changes, despite very important loses.

Also this is the explanation of how Russia has not been still in the need to supply to Syria with more modern material except in symbolic amounts that have more a goal of deterrence of powerful neighbors of Syria than for real use in combat every day.



PS: For non combat vehicles, it is more difficult to show the picture with the same precision, but it is the same situation.

Interesting regarding a lot of speculation on this thread about S-300 deliveries to Syria that we now know the reason they didn't greatly improve Syrian air defences was because of an agreement with Israel that Israel eventually broke leading to S-300 and IADS support for Syrian air defences...