Syrian rockets ‘easy targets’

Press, 1 June 1985, Page 11

Syrian rockets ‘easy targets’

NZPA-Reuter Tel Aviv Israel’s air force commander said in an interview issued yesterday that Syrian surface-to-air missiles were an easy target for attack from the air. The unusually candid remark in the Israel Defence Forces Journal, an Englishlanguage publication of the Ministry of Defence, apparently served to put one of Israel’s chief foes on notice to improve protection of its anti-aircraft missile system. Major-General Amos Lapidot said that the Syrian Air Force had replaced all the losses it suffered in the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, when Israel downed about 80 Syrian planes and destroyed Soviet-built antiaircraft missile batteries in Lebanon. i... . “They have increased the number of surface-to-air missiles of all varieties: both the smaller, more agile types as well as the heavier ones,” General Lapidot said. “The major draw-back of the Syrian surface-to-air missile systems, however,

lies in the fact that these systems are relatively exposed. “They are not sufficiently fortified or dug in. They thus constitute an easy target for destruction by all types of combat aircraft.” General Lapidot also said that long-range SAMSs, which can hit targets over large areas of Israeli airspace, could severely limit the operations of the Air Force in wartime. Israel, he said, was well ahead of other countries in the operational use of re-mote-control pilotless planes, which can be used for reconnaissance and artillery spotting. The journal, a special edition for the Paris Air Show, also said that Israel’s new supersonic Tighter, the Lavi (Lion), would make its test flight in early 1986. It said that six Lavi prototypes were being developed as part of the estimated SUS 4 billion project. Test flights will probably continue until 1989-90; when the Lavi production line will be opened. 1