Israel’s armed forces managed to destroy Russian state-of-art Pantsir-S air defence systems in Syria. According to the chief designer of the Shipunov Design Bureau of Instrument Engineering – Valery Slugin – the reason why Israel was able to hit the Russian advanced system was because the launch vehicle failed to move to a different position after firing the set of ammunition, reports the Tass.
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On May 10, 2018, one of the Pantsir missile systems of Syrian forces was destroyed by an Israeli guided missile, probably launched by the anti-missile system Spike. A video of the attack was made public later.
Slugin said the Pantsir-S had hit eight targets, for which it spent all ammunition. The crew left the vehicle and were waiting for the transport and loader vehicle.
“It should not have been done by all means. The combat vehicle should have been removed from the firing position as soon as the set of ammunition had been spent. At once. Had that been done, everything would’ve been fine,” Slugin claimed.
The Pantsir-S is meant for close-range air defence of civilian and military facilities against aircraft, helicopters, precision munitions, cruise missiles and UAVs; and to provide additional protection to air defence units against enemy air attacks employing precision munitions, especially at low to extremely low ranges. Pantsir consists of twelve air defence guided missiles (six missiles in two transportation and launch containers).