Metis-M & Kornet AT Missiles vs. Merkava Tanks

[Cross]

Interesting article in USA Today (page 10A Thur Sept. 14)

Quote:

Hezbollah laid ambushes throughout southern Lebanon's hilly terrain, hitting Israel's tanks with some of the world's most advanced anti-tank missiles.
The military had 400 tanks in Lebanon at the peak of the offensive. More than 50 were hit by Hezbollah-fired anti-tank missiles, killing 30 tank crewmen and disabling 22 tanks. Israel uses the Merkava tank. among the best protected armoured vehicles.
"We knew they had the best anti-tank missiles in the world," Rudoy said. "But we were surprised by the amounts, which at times seemed endless."
Militants were equipped with Kornet and Metis anti-tank missiles supplied by Iran and Syria. The weapons don't produce a large dust ball -or signature- when fired, making it hard for tank crews to see who is firing them.

End quote.

I can't check these stats and info. at this time; but am interested in any comments on how WinSPMBT may already reflect this sort of a result. I look forward to doing some testing myself in the near future.

Cross

[Sewter]

Yes...sadly the 'Battle of the Saluki' as it is called, refers to seemingly spontaneous 'tactical' orders...as confusing as they sound, to the IDF to move in and halt: then move in again, all the while, the advance's adversaries set up a strong defense. In real terms, the IDF got nailed. Still, out of the thousands of ATGMs fired, apparently, only less than two dozen actually penetrated armor. Great tank, bad orders. So...

Try this, create a scenario where the ATGMs are in the higher elevations, and the Merkavas advance from below. Do not forget the forward, side, rear, and especially top trajectories. Actually, add any modern tank into the action and see what happens. This game engine appears to be quite truthful in the results.

Many individuals are no longer due to conflicts depicted in steel panthers. This recent conflict is no different. Perhaps, try to refer to this while playing, and be truthful to your actions. I can not go further...the lose of life sits heavily upon my soul...as it should all of us.

[PlasmaKrab]

The whole story sounds strange in many aspects.
No one could confirm that the Hizballah had either Kornets or Metis or both; there have been some rumors about Kornet crates being found out in Lebanon with markings like "From: KBp Tula/ To: Syrian Ministry of Defence", but I have yet to see evidence of that.
The Russian government seems eager to crack down on anyone smuggling advanced weaponry into Lebanon (including Syria), but then again, try and check if they do.

On the other hand, one feather in the cap of the Hizballah PR planners (if I may use the term) is the relentless exploiting of the technico-military cluelessness of the average journalist.
When they say "tank" destroyed, you have to understand "armored vehicle of any kind", if not "truck". As far as I know, in the early weeks of the ground "offensive", the Hizballah claimed 4 Israeli tanks, and every journalist googled for Israeli tanks, hit Merkava 4 and merrily concluded to the vulnerability of the invincible Tsahal etc.
From Israeli sources, it turned out that of the four disabled vehicles, one was a Centurion-converted APC (hard to beat but still one generation too old), one was a T-62-retrofit Tiran (no comment), and only two were early, non-uparmored Merkava-2s. This version of the Merkava was about as much 'best tank of the world' back in 1988 than the M1A1 and Leopard2A4 were back then.

Also, on the final day, it turned out that a majority of the tanks that were disabled in the field could be fixed in under-division echelon workshops.

So, much bad planning on the IDF side, much clever boasting from the Hizballah, and you have unneeded deaths and the now-classical 'guerilla victory'.

The Hizballah made extensive use of their ATGMs, including Syrian Milans, Konkurs and Fagot, and apparently some TOWs (Iranian oldies?). They also used scores of old MCLOS AT-3 Sagger/Malutka as bunker-busters against occupied buildings.

For more detail here, there should be a couple of threads in the TOEs subforum about a possible Hizballah OOB.

[Pyros]

Hi,

copy/paste from Military Procurement International Vol. 16, No. 17, September 1, 2006

Hezbollah’s arsenal


During the 33 days of fighting that ended – at least temporarily – in South Lebanon on August 14, the Shi’ite Hezbollah fired more than 500 anti-tank missiles against Israel Defence Force Merkava 2, 3 and 4 Main Battle Tanks, all mounting Explosive Reactive Armour (ERA). Of these missiles, at least 40 scored hits and 14 penetrated, mostly from the sides or rear, destroying the tanks and killing a significant number IDF tank crewmen.

None of the Merkavas were fitted with Rafael Trophy or Israel Military Industries Iron Fist armour protection systems, both of which remain in development (page 23, this issue).



Anti-tank weapons

Hezbollah’s most lethal anti-tank missiles were the Syrian-supplied Russian KBP laser beam-riding Kornet-E (AT-14) and wire-guided Metis-M (AT-13), both with tandem warheads designed to defeat both ERA and the steel armour beneath.

They also included older Konkurs (AT-5) and Fagot (AT-4) missiles supplied by Syria , as well as smaller numbers of Iranian-supplied Towsan-1 (a version of the AT-5) and Raad (a version of the Malyutka, or AT-3b) missiles, plus a few Euromissile Milans.

In addition to older versions of the shoulder-launched Rocket Propelled Grenade (RPG), Hezbollah also used some of the latest Syrian-supplied Russian tandem-warhead Vampyr RPG-29s.

The Israeli Air Force (IAF) is still trying to determine what missile type was used by Hezbollah to shoot down an Israeli CH-53 helicopter on the evening of August 12, killing all five crewmen just after they had off-loaded troops deep in southern Lebanon. It may have been an anti-tank missile or, possibly, a Syrian-supplied SA-16 or SA-18 shoulder-fired Surface-to-Air Missile (SAM), manufactured in Russia .



Anti-ship missiles and UCAVs

Hezbollah also fired at least two Iranian-supplied Chinese C-802 (CSS-C-8 Saccade) shore-based anti-ship missiles, designated Noor in Iran , at the Israeli Navy Saar 5 class missile corvette Hanit. One of these damaged the Hanit amidships and at the front of the helicopter deck, killing one sailor and wounding four more. The other sank a nearby Egyptian merchant ship. The truck-launcher for the Noor carries three missiles.

Furthermore, Hezbollah has received up to eight canard-wing Ababil-3 (Swallow) Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles (UCAVs), produced by Iran Aircraft Manufacturing Industries. The Ababil-3 carries an explosive payload of up to 40kg. Three were shot down at night by the IAF, with parts of one of them subsequently recovered.



Surface-to-surface rockets

In addition, Iran has supplied Hezbollah with a very large number of short-range 107mm Grad and 122mm Katyusha artillery rockets, with ranges of up to 20km. Iran has also supplied its 45km-range Fajr-3 and 75km-range Fajr-5, while Syria has provided its 100km-range Khaibar-1 rockets.

In all, some 3,970 of these rockets were fired into northern Israel during the five weeks of fighting. 126 of their launchers were destroyed, mostly by the IAF.

The most worrying surface-to-surface rocket in Hezbollah’s arsenal, however, has not yet been fired. This is the Zelzal-2, which Iran has admitted supplying. It has a range of at least 210km, putting Tel Aviv at risk. Although the IAF destroyed some launchers, Hezbollah is believed to still have at least one battery of Zelzal-2s.

cheers,
Pyros

[Sewter]

Here are some interesting figures, my friends.

* 33 days of fighting
* Israeli casualties: 119 servicemen, 41 civilians
* Lebanese casualties: At least 900 civilians and 500 Hizbullah fighters
* Rockets fired on Israel: 3,970
* Israel Air Force sorties: 15,500
* Targets struck in Lebanon: 7,000
* Hizbullah rocket launchers destroyed: 126
* Israeli MBTs destroyed: 20 (6 to mines and 14 to ATGMs - they were all Merkava Mk 2,3 or 4s)
* IAF aircraft shot down: 1
* IAF aircraft lost in accidents: 4
* Israel Navy operational hours: 8,000
* IDF Artillery shells fired: more than 100,000

"The anti-tank threat emerged as the most serious challenge to the IDF. Operating Kornet-E and Metis-M anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs), Hizbullah successfully destroyed 14 Israeli Merkava Mk 2, 3 and 4 main battle tanks (MBTs). In response, the Israeli MoD has ordered Rafael Armament Development Authority to accelerate preparations for production of its Trophy active protection system (APS) for future IDF procurement. Israel Military Industries (IMI) has also been asked to complete development of its APS, dubbed Iron Fist, for IDF evaluation."

info:
'JANE'S DEFENCE WEEKLY - AUGUST 23, 2006'

These are somber statistics. We shall be met with more information as the time passes. Hizbullah has been using what are often called 'tank-sniper' units for sometime with lethal success. The United States has been met with such tactics in Iraq, often with late model coldwar era RPG.s. Remember, it was a 1.6lb he warhead (bazooka/M6) that brought down the venerable Tiger tank. War is burning hot and freezing cold...and all suffer...tragically.

[serg3d]

PlasmaKrab said:

The Hizballah made extensive use of their ATGMs, including Syrian Milans, Konkurs and Fagot, and apparently some TOWs (Iranian oldies?). They also used scores of old MCLOS AT-3 Sagger/Malutka as bunker-busters against occupied buildings.

TOW they got from the Lebanon Army, which cooperated a lot with Hizbollah - army radar acquierd taget for C802 which hit Israel corvette.
The quiestion about RPG-29 remain open. There were some tandem-warhead RPG captured, but whether they were RPG-29 or not is not clear. The myth about captured boxes of Kornet may originate form marginal silmilarity of the names "Kornet" and "Konkurs" - I have seen some people confusing them.

[Djuice]

RPG-27/29/illegal clone is most definitely confirmed, there are various images available on the internet, of captured ones, showne by israeli officals.

Regarding ATGMs, they used 9M111, 9M111-2, 9M113, 9M113-1, TOW, 9M14, 9M14M, 9M151, RaaD, RaaD-T, Milan, and possibly Toophan supplied by Iran. Regarding 9M131M Metis-M and 9M133 Kornet-E which Israel claims that Hezbollah used, they didnt provide any photographic evidence to the public.

[PlasmaKrab]

Illegal copies of RPG-29s??

Doesn't sound too surprising from the Hezbollah, at least in principle, but that one is a bit of a high-tech weapon.
Have I missed something or were the latest scratch-made weapons they used Qassam and Katiuscha rockets? Sounds like a big leap forward.

Possibly Syria could arrange production of retroengineered Vampirs, and Iran most certainly could (an would like to!) if only they had got their hands on some. Did they?

[Marek_Tucan]

Illegal copy doesn't neccessarily mean home made Quassams Don't know Syrian retroengineering capabilities but Iran has the experience needed, even with RPG style weapons, so if they managed to lay their hands on some RPG-29 (say from Syria) they'd be most likely able to put up some copy...
Also IIRC Jordany was thinking of building their version of 29.

[Marcello]

Possibly Syria could arrange production of retroengineered Vampirs, and Iran most certainly could (an would like to!) if only they had got their hands on some. Did they?

If Iran wanted some RPG-29s, the russians will be glad to sell them.
But reverse engineering them probably is not that simple.
From what I have managed to learn so far about shaped charges manufacturing (not a lot but still) high end ones, and the RPG-29 definitively is, can be rather complex to make.Making them might require expensive and technically challanging retooling of the production lines.
Casting rocket motors for battlefield artillery rockets is a relatively simple task in comparison.
The current tandem warhead round for the Saghegh was probably deedemed a more practical and cost effective solution, even if less powerful than the RPG-29.