Recently a new Youtube channel has been created for a group calling themselves the Martyr Issam Saleh Air Defense Battalion, part of the Farouq Brigade, one of the major armed groups in Syria. What's very interesting about this channel is the amount of MANPADS (Man Portable Air Defense Systems) on display
Above we see two examples of what I believe are SA-16 MANPADS, and one SA-7. What we also have is a rare example of a MANPADS being fired in Syria, and while the quality of the video is too poor to be 100% certain I believe this is a SA-16 being fired
While it's unclear if the missile successfully reached it's target it does provide rare evidence of MANPADS being used by the Syrian opposition.
As regular visitors to the blog will know in recent weeks there's been a number of videos surfacing that showed partial SA-16 MANPADS in the possession of the Syrian opposition (see here, here, and here for examples). MANPADS (Man Portable Air Defense Systems) are shoulder mounted surface to air missile systems, with a number of examples of the more dated SA-7reportedly in use by the Syrian opposition in recent months.
Previous examples of SA-16 sightings in Syria have shown incomplete systems, missing the grip-stock component, which along with the missile tube and battery pack makes up the complete MANPADS system. Missile tubes come preloaded, and battery packs generally have enough charge for one use, with the grip-stock being the only reusable part. This means having a thousand missile tubes and battery packs without a grip-stock is worthless, but one grip-stock would make all of those missile tubes and battery packs usable.
As far as I am aware this is the first example of a complete SA-16 MANPADS system in the possession of the Syrian opposition, and would be a vast improvement on the SA-7 systems seen so far. The main question is how many missiles and battery packs do they have access to?
Update December 18th Peter Bouckaert of Human Rights Watch has just reminded me there was one sighting of a complete SA-16 system before.
As I noted in my recent article about the weapons and equipment captured from the 46th Regiment base outside of Aleppo it appears as at least 10 crates of the type used to store a variety of SA series surface to air missile systems were looted from the base by the Syrian opposition. The ten crates in question can be seen in this video
The only crate that has been opened has a SA-16 missile tube and battery, but no visible grip-stock, a type part of the system that's required for it to be fired. The best view of the crates they are stored in is here
And another example of this type of crate can be seen in this earlier video showing a number of SA-24 missile tubes, this specific examples showing a SA-24 Maket (mock-up) training model
Although the first picture isn't too clear you can see the have roughly the same sort of design, and this is the type of crate these surface to air missiles are transported in. In a later video from the 46th Regiment raid we also see a truck loaded with crates, and we briefly see the end of crates that match the ones seen above
At this point I'm sure at this point you are wondering why I'm going on about the shape and design of crates. What I want to establish is this design of crate is used to transport SA series missile system parts, as we now have this new video from the 313 Brigade featuring one of the same type of crates that contains a complete SA-7 missile system, which they claim was looted from the 46th Regiment
Here we get a good view of the contents of the crate, two missile tubes, two batteries, one on the bottom left corner and the 2nd in the middle of the bottom of the picture, and most importantly the grip-stock, absent in so many examples of these captured weapons
The Syrian opposition member in the video demonstrates how the system is put together, and shows the completed system ready to fire
Here we not only have a demonstration of how to put together a SA-7 MANPADS for other members of the Syrian opposition who might have looted SA-7s elsewhere, but evidence that at least one pair of SA-7 MANPADS that they cliam to have looted from the 46th Regiment base, and with 10 crates in those stacks, minus one containing the SA-16 system, that could mean up to 18 complete SA-7 MANPADS.
The most important thing here is the presence of the grip-stock. Usually shipped separately they are often the key missing component from looted surface to air missile systems, but unlike the batteries they can be reused, so only one is needed to make all the missiles and batteries usable.
Today we've seen a number of reports about the capture of the 46th Regiment base west of Aleppo, after two months of fighting around the base. EA Worldview has a summary of the events, which includes these claims
Rebel fighters took control of the 46th regiment in the western suburb of Aleppo, the last bastion of regime forces in the area and the biggest military base where its artillery and tanks used to bombard the surrounding towns and villages as well as the city of Aleppo. The base also was the main reinforcement’s source to regime forces fighting in Aleppo city. The rebels acquired more than ten military tanks and a number of rocket launchers, heavy artillery in addition to a big quantity of arms and ammunition.
Al Jazeera also had this report
Several Youtube channels have been posting footage from the battle, as well as footage of what was captured, including atareb mohrara, atarebintoheart, freenorthernsyria, and atarebsyfree2012, and from those channels we can see a great deal of equipment was looted.
For example, in the below video we see a captured T-55 tank driving away with a D-30 howitzer, with the howitzer's ammo pictured in this video
In this video we see multiple tanks, although from the quality of the video it's unclear if they are functional, or if they are all T-55s
In the below video we briefly see a BTR-60 in the background, along with what appears to be the T-55 shown towing D-30 in the first video, which can be seen clearly in this second video of the scene shot from behind the tank.
These videos show six Type-63 multiple rocket launchers, which I've written about in more detail here
There's also large amounts of crates containing a variety of ammo captured, and in these two videos we get a brief look at a SA-16 missile tube, along with it's battery
It appears that the stack of crates it's in, and the one behind it, are all the same kind of crate, matching the crates seen in the video of SA-24s and SA-16s captured in the Bala Air Defense Base in East Ghouta, outside of Damascus. It should be noted that as with many surface to air missile systems captured by the opposition it appears there are no gripstocks, which are required for the operation of the missile systems alongside the battery and missile tube.
Finally in this video we see trucks loaded up with crates, apparently looted from the ammo dumps, and even a brief glimpse of what looks like the ends of the SA-16 crates at 16s into the video, just on the right hand side
It appears that the Syrian opposition has managed to capture a large amount of heavy weapons with plenty of ammo in this attack, and we may see in coming days these weapons in action around Aleppo.
Following my earlier post examining evidence of SA-24 and SA-16 surface to air missile captured by Syrian opposition groups a video has been posted on Youtube which appears to show the same missiles captured, along with a large number of other weapons
Here are some key frames from the video that provides more details on what has been captured.
Thanks to Steve Zaloga and Matt Schroeder for additional information.
At the start of the video we see two crates, one holding a cutaway demonstration model of a missile, and a yellow demonstration model of the SA-24, both totally useless.
The two crates above those crates hold a pair of live SA-24 missile tubes each.
As the camera pans over we catch a glimpse of two more live SA-24 missile tubes on the right side of the screen.
The camera than shows a AT-3 anti-tank missile.
Before quickly panning over a pair of training SA-24s, again not much use to the Syrian opposition.
The camera pans up to show two crates containing a pair of training SA-24s each, along with the grip stock, and just in the top left corner we spot another pair of live SA-24 missile tubes.
The camera than quickly pans across, and for a brief moment on the right hand side of the screen we see what appears to be the edge of a live SA-16 missile tube, and more importantly what appears to be two spare SA-16 batteries. This means the only missing component for a complete SA-16 missile system is the grip-stock.
Finally we have another pair of training SA-24s, followed by a massive amount of guns and other items.
So in total we appear to have
- 10 training or demonstration SA-24s.
- 8 live SA-24 missile tubes.
- 1-2 live SA-16 missile tubes
- 2 SA-16 batteries.
It's still unclear if live SA-16 or SA-24 grip-stocks have been captured, and training grip-stocks will not work with the live missile tubes. However, there were reports of a helicopter shot down in the area today, as well as video of a downed Hip Mi-8, although it's impossible to know if these events were related at this stage.
Update November 16th Video footage has now been posted showing the SA-24 missiles described in this post, a detailed analysis of which can be found here. During the conflict in Syria a great deal of attention has been paid to
SA-7 shoulder mounted surface to air missiles, but these are not the
only type of shoulder mounted surface to air missiles in the hands of
the Syrian military. Until now there's been no evidence of these systems being captured
by the opposition, but this picture shows one system, an SA-16, that was reportedly
captured by Ansar al-Islam from an air defence in East Ghouta, near Damascus
Currently
there's very little other information about the equipment captured,
with no indication of the number of systems captured, and while it
appears the battery is present it's unclear if the grip stock is also
present. Update November 13th Another new type of surface to air missile has been spotted, apparently looted from Babla Base air defence base by Ansar al-Islam, and interestingly this appears to be an SA-24 system, the latest generation of Russian surface to air missiles
It's also been pointed out to me it appears to be the same man holding both missile systems.
Update November 14th Thanks to @penym2 who has noted that the word on the gripstock of the SA-24 might be "MAKET", the Russian word for mock-up, although it's not possible to be 100% sure due to the quality of the photograph.
AFter some research I found out that they
were captured from Bala Air Defense Base near Mleiha town of Damascus
Suburbs in Eastern Ghouta (Not Babla) by Ansar al-Islam as they said in a statement they issued on their Facebook page.
Update November 14th Thanks to Steve Zaloga, editor of Teal Group’s “World Missiles and UAV Briefing”, who emailed me some very interesting information on the SA-24 pictured
When a country buys a MANPADS system, they get a
standard package which includes several different types of training
missiles. One type is a simple, non-functional cut-away dummy which is
used to train operators on the basic construction of the weapon. They
also get some non-functional models which are used for very simple
training (pointing, etc.) The most elaborate type is a functional
trainer which operates like the real thing and has a functioning seeker
(but not a warhead or rocket motor) so that the trainee can understand
what happens when they operate the real thing. The most elaborate type
is a trainer that hooks into a desk-top computer simulator where the
computer can be used to generate targets that are viewed on a small
video device attached to the gripstock.
I
can’t tell from your photo, but it would seem to be one of the
functional trainers, and not a simple dummy. On these MANPADS, the
gripstock (the lower section with the trigger, thermal battery and
electronic package) is reusable, while the missile in its launch
tube/transport tube, and the thermal battery are replaced for each
launch.
BTW,
the Russian word Maket is borrowed from the French (maquette) and means
“Model” rather than mock-up. Maket is painted on Russian training
weapons so that troops don’t confuse them with the real thing.
Likewise, they are often painted in a different color (such as silver)
for the same reason.
I
have no specific details on what Syria has purchased in recent years.
The Russians do not usually list their sales on the UN Arms Register, or
if they do, it is limited to some very generic data (160 missiles, vs.
160 Igla-S, etc). The fact that the Syrians have the gripstock trainer
strongly suggests that they got it as part of a package with the
functional weapons.
Update November 15th This photo has been posted showing the missile tubes for at least 12 MANPADS, possibly SA-24s. Hugely significant if they have complete systems
This page claims that they were captured by the Jesus son of Mary Battalion at the above mentioned Bala Air Defense Base. It should be noted without gripstocks and batteries these missiles are useless, and neither of them are pictured.
Update November 15th Another photograph has been posted online, which appears to again show the training model of the SA-24, as well as an unrelated anti-tank rocket. It's rather interesting no pictures of batteries or grip-stocks have been posted, which may suggest the systems are incomplete
Update November 15th A number of videos have been posted on this channel filmed at the Bala air defence base featuring the previously mentioned "Jesus son of Mary Battalion". The description for the videos claim that they fought alongside Ansar al-Islam and the Nasser Saladin Battalion, capturing 23mm weapons (likely ZU-23-2s), SA-16s, and "Malocka" anti-armour missiles, which I believe are AT-3 missiles
