Iran’s Air Defense Force Displays Indigenous Radar System Capable to Detect Stealth Aircraft

September 22, 2013 Iran, Troubled Areas
David Cenciotti

On Sunday Sept. 22, 2013, during the annual military parade in Tehran that marks the anniversary of the outbreak of the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, Iran displayed a new indigenous passive phased array radar system for detecting stealth targets and cruise missiles.

According to Iran’s FARS News Agency, the radar systems was developed by the experts of Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base in order to detect fast moving targes at any altitude and speed.

The tactical radar system has been dubbed “Silent Radar System” because it acts passively: it does not emit any radar wave and can’t be detected by the enemy systems.

Furthermore, it can be moved quite easily and can be installed in a short time.

Commander of Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base Brigadier General Farzad Esmayeeli said “The radar is capable of detecting stealth (radar-evading) targets and cruise missiles and enjoys a high movement and mobility capabilities and acts in different ranges,” FARS reported.

Actually, this is not the first time Iran announces a new radar system capable to detect radar-evading planes, cruise and ballistic missiles: in May 2012, the IRGC (Islamic Revolution Guards Corps) Aerospace Commander Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh announced a 1,100 km range radar system, called Gahdir, designed and built to identify aerial targets, stealth planes and low-altitude satellites.

Still, at least according to what the U.S. Air Force has recently disclosed, in March 2013, Iranian radars were unable to detect F-22 Raptors flying a few miles off their coastline: one the U.S. stealth fighters intercepted two F-4 Phantoms without them noticing it until the American fighter jock radioed: “you really ought to go home!”

In December 2011, Tehran announced that the country had installed advanced radars capable of detecting Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): according to what Iran claimed, they could detect, track and shoot down any drone violating their airspace.

Anyway, in December 2011, Iran somehow managed to capture an RQ-170 Sentinel and later they proved to have put their hands on some smaller ScanEagle UAVs.

Top Image: Photo File of Iranian Radar Unit (credit PressTV)

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About David Cenciotti
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David Cenciotti is a journalist based in Rome, Italy. He is the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of the world’s most famous and read military aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for major worldwide magazines, including Air Forces Monthly, Combat Aircraft, and many others, covering aviation, defense, war, industry, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown several combat planes with different air forces. He is a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Force, a private pilot and a graduate in Computer Engineering. He has written five books and contributed to many more ones.

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9 Comments

  1. Yeah, and if you believe this Iranian radar can detect U.S. stealth aircraft, I have some swampland I can sell you in Florida! But they do have a very dangerous air force. Check out one of their top fighter jocks:

    • oh, that looks like one hell of an interceptor
      but i bet that’s not an iranian jet pilot
      1- as you should have learned from this blog iran can’t design anything,
      they just copy their things from US and Russians (which is a very
      intresting point) and since non of them have designed such flying thing
      iran can’t make a copy of it !!
      2- and look at the way he’s dressed

      That’s surely an SAF jet pilot and that’s how they use their Typhoons

  2. A passive system by definition is something else than a radar, isn’t it?

    If the image is supposed to be this new system it should detect radio emissions from the aircraft, thus it can not detect a Raptor flying with its radar turned off. Considering how the Raptor’s radar is constructed I doubt it would be able to triangulate it even if it is turned on.

    And while a passive system can not be detected it can most definitely be fooled by false emissions…

    This seem to be a morale booster for internal consumption, nothing else.

  3. To me it looks like a 3D model made in SketchUp, and how on earth can it detect an object without transmitting? Then it would have to relie on emission from the target, in which case it is not a radar but a passive ELINT interception system.
    bregds
    Michaël SES Svejgaard

    • See REAL picture of SKYGUARD LR below. Seems the Iranians did a little bit of photo-shopping on this, their latest joke – one of many they keep on throwing out to the world to try and convince us of their “invincibility”. But the radar dish section does have the same number of “T” receivers. 8! A coincidence???

      On a side-note, at least they finally admitted that they are indeed deep into a nuclear weapons development program. This is kind’a breaking news, so if you haven’t seen it yet take a look at the interview conducted with what looks like one of their clerics and recently aired on Iranian television. I posted the Youtube link below. FYI:

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