IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps): News

hisutton.com wrote:
The vessel is named in honor of Nader Mahdavi. He was one of 7 IRGC personnel killed in an engagement against the U.S. Navy in October 1987.

According to defense analyst Aurora Intel, the ship is Savin (IMO 9209348). This Iranian flagged container ship was previously Dandle. She was built in 2000 and is 240.2 meters overall, and 32.2 meters across. Based on imagery analysis it appears that she had been outside the naval base at Bandar Abbas, in the civilian anchorage, since mid-2019. It had been in its final spot since March 2021. Based on analysis of satellite imagery, the ship was brought to the shipyard in late January 2022. Work likely commenced soon after.

The refit is being done at the same yard where the regular Iranian Navy's own forward base ship, I.R.I.N.S. Makran (441), was converted. At 240 meters long the new IRGC ship appears to be similar lenght but slightly smaller overall than the Makran, which was a tanker. But it will be by far the largest ship in IRGC service.

The IRGC already has three forward base ships. The I.R.I.S. Shahid-Roudaki is the smallest at 150m length. The other two are more covert, the Saviz and Behshad, and are used as base ships in the Red Sea. Behshad replaced Saviz there after the latter was mined in 2021.
http://www.hisutton.com/Iran-IRGC-Shahid-Mahdavi.html

This time, however, Iran should put an Aesa radar on it, TORM1 (Home Productions?) Systems and for the helicops also elevators to wait for it in the hangar. A refueling for the small destroyers as accompanying protection should also be included this time, hopefully!

Iran IRGCN Navy Catamaran Martyr Soleimani Frigate, VLS Navy system, long range Weapon system,With Helipad,

It has no radar and no real AD system. It will go to the bottom as fast as Iraqi missile boats when US invaded Iraq.

Wow whoever did this was wrong...

On the front deck the VLS systems marked 6 midsized VLS cells... they look as big as UKSK, but yes they appear to be each a block of three tube cells, but the outer set of "cells"  if I had to guess the size and shape of them I would guess they could be land based TOR sized VLS, so old model each "lid" is four TOR missiles from the 1980s, which is 8 lids for 32 missiles, but I would think in this day and age it could be the modern TOR sized missiles with 8 missiles under each lid and therefore 64 missiles ready to fire.

If the big tubes are UKSK sized that means the depth there is 8-10m so plenty of room for TOR sized missiles beside them that don't reach down so far freeing up internal space to move through the vessel at the lower decks.

Here is the current TOR... look at the shape of the VLS systems for two blocks of missiles ready to fire:



The two big missile launchers might carry large SAMs, (three tubes each for 6 missiles), but I would also guess to say that they might be 9M96 type missile cells which means each of those three hatches might have four missiles each... so 24 medium range SAMs,  but those smaller VLS systems will be short range air defence systems like TOR or something similar... that is the sort of thing I would love to see on new Russian ships.

(Obviously I am using 9M96 and TOR missiles as examples, they will have Iranian missiles I would expect...)

The ship is of course a quantum leap for Iran. Is the regular navy or paramilitar?

It could be a TOR, which also makes sense. But I don't see any radar for it.

Iran Building 4th Missile Catamaran, And New Stealth Version Launched

Flag Iran Double OSINT (open source intelligence) news on the IRGC's (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp). Analysis of satellite imagery of the Qeshm Madkandaloo Shipbuilding Cooperative Co. shipyard, on the island of Qeshm, suggests that a new Shahid Soleimani class missile corvette is under construction there. This should be the 4th hull of the class. At the same time, the first of another new class seen there appears to have been launched. This analysis is based on the relative sizes of the two types.



The Shahid Soleimani class will be by far the most potent and modern of the IRGC's warships. As well as a mix of short and long range anti-ship missiles, it can carry three fast boats in a hangar under the helicopter deck. These can include interceptor boats and torpedo-armed RIBs (rigid inflatable boats). It may also include crewed or uncrewed explosive boats.

The design also has two types of VLS (vertical launch system) behind the bridge. The six larger cells likely carry medium range air defense missiles. The 4x4 smaller ones short range air-defense missiles derived from the Russian SA-15 Tor (GAUNTLET) system. Once the radar is fitted to allow these to be used, it will be the best defended warship in Iranian service, including the regular navy.

It seems to lack radars. There can't be AD with no real AD radars...

Pretty weak ship that will be an easy target for the US.

For a TOR based missile to be effective you need very good tracking radar for very high precision tracking of the target and the outgoing missile... which is essentially command guided and therefore very effective but also relatively cheap.

A cat like that would move rather quickly through the warm waters of the Persian Gulf and one carrying a helicopter and the other carrying speed boats would be very useful for the Iranian Navy... they make a lot of sense for them, but not really something to get hugely excited about.

A bit like saying a Russian icebreaker patrol boat is amazing and everyone should have them... well the shape needed to cut through surface ice means in open water they are not very fast and not very energy efficient either, so they belong in the far north or far south, while these cats would be best in the Persian Gulf or off the coast of Africa or in Indonesia hunting pirates.

The vertical launch tubes appear to take up quite a bit of internal space too so those big structures are likely not too big on the inside.

Interesting looking boats though.

You can't move like cat with a boat. Fighter bombers are way faster. Iran doesn't have AD on its navy ships neither does it have a capable air force that can protect them. Those outdated f-14 are a joke for arab f-15, Typhoons and rafales or US f-35.

This ships is less useful than iranian coastal missiles systems.

When I said cat I didn't mean . I meant catamaran.

Don't think their F14s have remained the same. Phoenix and air launched Hawk and Standard missiles would be interesting, not to mention Su35s!

Patarames
@Pataramesh
Originally a fire control radar, the AESA architecture ( MTBF) of the new radar, allows it to be also used in continuously rotating volume-search mode

The air-defense umbrella created, with simultaneous launches, is more than many destroyers
Just at lower quantity per ship


There is high confidence now, that the new radar is the naval variant of 3rd Khordad's X-band AESA

- We can see the small LPI missile up-link antennas

- 3rd Khordad was tested for sea condition beam stabilization (photo)

- IRIN's S-band AESA is the larger Eagle-Eye radar

It is well known that the Iran likes to use ex-tankers for his IRGC Navy somewhere near the Red Sea or currently in the Pacific. For small conflicts like Yemen, this should be more than capable. Especially when lifting charters, smaller drones, quick messenger and radar are used.

But what the Iran now builds is two levels higher. Iran could therefore achieve skills that have very few armed forces from other countries. Especially when such a ship is protected by furrows Torm and Buk copies or their new small frigates with air defense.
http://www.hisutton.com/Iran-IRGC-Drone-Carrier-Update.html

@Pataramesh
That sound better not be one of Shahed-136's bigger brothers Shahed-181
Recently revealed to have 13 hours endurance for persistent "on station" capability @ 1150km strike radius
Its a low-observable drone with 2-4 PGM's which could be survivable inside Ukrainian airspace

Very nice, but propeller driven... isn't this just a very slow S-70 with external weapons?

Probably due to the slowness coupled with the camouflage a very difficult target for e.g. Shorad systems. The systems will take it for birds and calculate out of it.

With external bombs it wont be a bird on any radar.

For a country like Iran where most of its enemies have western based air defences then it will be fine... they will get shot down of course but equally they will also do some damage too... I would guess the key will be their accuracy of bombing and as we know from the experience of WWI and WWII most bombing has shit accuracy without assistance, so unless it is dropping rather large bombs its effectiveness will be poor... except if it uses some sort of computer assisted bombing system like the Russians fit to their upgraded and new aircraft...

Being able to fly this at 5,000m altitude means it will be out of range of most ground fire... MANPADS wont get an IR lock on something so far away... as I mentioned the Russians would destroy it easy... OSA, TOR, SA-9, SA-13, Tunguska and Pantsir would all eat it for breakfast and would not be overly expensive for the job... even Kornet-EM in the HE model would be excellent, but for most of the rest of the world it is too high for small arms and most MANPADS require an IR lock and at 5km distance with such a small motor they are unlikely to get a lock, so this thing could fly back and forth over an area lining up targets for bombing runs as it pleases and its relatively low speed will be making it even more effective... they will hear it and see it and there will be very little they can do about it... except hide like cockroaches.

The thing is that the Russian S-70 is the same sort of thing but much faster and can probably operate at 10-12km altitude which will be even safer at 800km/h and with a bombing accuracy and flight range and weapon capacity to make it effectively as dangerous and as powerful as an unmanned F-117... but cheaper.

Russia does have quite a few medium sized drones that are armed and could do the sort of job this drone will be for, so I don't see them adopting it... the Geran filled a niche... they had Lancets... but they didn't really have any very long range.... 800km+ suicide drones with decent warheads (30-50kgs).

I guess that is why they built a factory to make them and have them in licence production and use.

The bigger drone rapidly get more expensive and so it is worth adding even more expensive stuff so they last longer and are more effective... but the reality is that there are only very specific situations where it makes sense to use a big drone and sometimes collecting information with camera and a radar and other electronics systems is more useful than carrying weapons.

For Iran however this is a very interesting drone which would be very dangerous on any Middle East battlefield... ISIS should be afraid.

@IranDefense
Newly released photos of a SU-22 at the IRGC-ASF aerospace exhibition
A new air launched ballistic missile (ALBM) was seen for the first time, dubbed Arman. Looks quite similar to ground launched Ababil SRBM
Sadid-342s were also seen as part of it's armament for the first time

Ok , if they have to have surface ships more than submarines . Still they can improve on this model easily : ( 1 ) Make all antennae and Radar retractable inside the hull , like F35 in stealth mode , for approaching the target and escaping .  . ( 2 ) Radar absorbing  covers needed for window areas to improve low RCS , in escape mode after fire and forget discharged . Looks cool ! ( 3 ) All weapons on deck to be housed internally or be retractable inside hull or have Radar absorbing covers while in transit at least .

Nawab Sam = a better TorM1 Naval Version?