Russia's air defenses can't stop Israel from stomping on Iran in Syria with airstrikes
- Russia has some of its best air defenses in Syria, and has boasted they can shoot down US stealth fighters, but Israel routinely defeats these systems with non-stealthy F-16s.
- Syria managed to shoot down one Israeli F-16, but also shot down a surveillance plane that belonged to its ally, Russia, on accident.
- There's good evidence to suggest that Israel's air force is really good at defeating Syria's air defenses and that Syria hasn't figured out how to defend itself yet.
- Russia has taken to making excuses for their Syrian allies as their systems, which they hope to export, are routinely defeated by Israeli jets.
Russia deployed some of its best air defenses to Syria to keep US missiles and jets at bay as the US military's immense air and naval power fought ISIS in close proximity - but the supposedly airtight defenses are routinely defeated by Israel.
In February 2017, a Syrian-manned Russian-made S-200 missile defense system shot down an Israel F-16 returning from a massive raid targeting Iranian forces in Syria.
In response, Israel launched another raid that it claimed took out half of Syria's air defenses, of which older Russian systems comprised the majority.
Read more: Israel's F-35s reportedly saw combat in a raging Syrian air war that smashed Russian defenses
In April, Syria got rocked by a missile attack that appeared to ignite a munitions depot hard enough to register as a 2.6 magnitude earthquake and is believed to have killed dozens of Iranians.
In May, Israel released video of one of its bombs destroying a Russian air defense system, Russian media offered excuses as to why it failed to stop the incoming missile.
Israel rarely confirms individual airstrikes, and either confirmed or didn't deny these attacks.
In September, another Israeli raid on Iranian weapons stockpiles in Syria saw a Russian Il-20 surveillance and control plane downed by Russian-made air defenses fired off in error by Syrian air defense units, killing 15.
Read more: Russia's new missile defenses in Syria look likely to set off a shooting war against Israel
Russia accused Israel of purposefully flying under the Il-20 to confuse the Syrian air defenses into shooting down a friendly plane and quickly shipped the more advanced S-300 missile defenses to Syrian hands.
Russia thinks highly of its S-300 and other missile defenses, and has publicly mocked the US over its stealth jets, implying it could shoot them down. At the time, Russia said it would shut down satellite navigation in the region and that it expected its new defenses would preclude further Israeli attacks. So far, they were wrong.
Somehow Israel has continued to hit targets in Syria at will with F-16s, non-stealthy fourth-generation fighter-bombers.
On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged that his country's air force had carried out hundreds of raids in Syria, with a recent one hitting Iranian weapons near Damascus International Airport.
Russia initially deployed air defenses to Syria to keep powerful countries like the US from attacking Syrian President Bashar Assad, and later to protect its own air force fighters stationed there.
The US has long opposed Assad, as he violently shut down peaceful protesters in 2011 and has stood accused of torture, war crimes, and using chemical weapons against civilians during the country's maddening 7-year-long civil war.
But the US has attacked Syria twice with cruise missiles, and Syria has never proven a single missile intercept.
According to experts, there's two likely reasons why Syria's Russian-made air defenses can't get the job done: 1. Israel is good at beating Syrian air defenses. 2. Syria is bad at beating Israeli jets.
Israel is good at this
"One of the Israeli hallmarks when they do these sort of fairly bold strikes within the coverage of the Syrian air defenses is heavy electronic warfare and jamming," Justin Bronk, an aerial combat expert at the Royal United Services Institute told Business Insider.
Bronk said that Israel, a close US ally that takes part in major training events in the US, has become adept at knocking over Syrian air defenses.
Israel sees Iranian arms shipments through Syria as an existential threat. Although Israel has relationships to maintain with the US and Russia - both key players in the Syrian quagmire - Netanyahu has said resolutely that Israel will stop at nothing to beat back Iran.
In more than 100 raids admitted by Netanyahu, Israel has only lost a single aircraft. Bronk attributes this to "many, many tricks developed over decades" for the suppression of enemy air defenses developed by Israel.
Retired US Marine Corps Lt. Col. David Berke, a former F-35, F-22, and F-18 pilot, told Business Insider that Israel finds "innovative, creative, and aggressive ways to maximize the capability of every weapons systems they've ever used."
Syria is bad at this
Syria has demonstrably failed on many occasions to stop air attacks on its territory. While Russia's air defenses do give US military planners serious pause, Syria's have yet to prove themselves.
With US Tomahawk cruise missile strikes in consecutive Aprils in 2017 and 2018, Syria claimed both times to have blocked a significant portion of the attack, but never provided any evidence of an intercept.
Additionally, photos from the second US Tomahawk strike on Syria show Syrian air defenses firing interceptor missiles on ballistic trajectories.
This strongly indicates that the Syrians simply fired blindly into the night sky, unable to detect a thing as US missiles rocked targets across the countryside.
Finally, Syria shooting down a friendly Russian plane evidences a lack of coordination or situational awareness, whether due to old hardware, Israeli electronic warfare, or simply poor execution.
Israel's most recent attacks in Syria took place smack in the middle of Damascus, Russian and Syrian air defenses make for some of the world's most challenging airspace.
That Israel can still fight in Syria among top Russian air defenses shows either that their force has its tactics down pat, that Syria can't field decent air defense regimes, or that Russia has turned a blind eye to Israel pounding on Iranian advances in the region.