The role of Iran in Russia's war against Ukraine is growing: the analysis of Molfar experts

Last time, the OSINT-community Molfar made an expert review of Russia's use of Iranian weapons for the war against Ukraine. We don't want to repeat what has already been said, so we'll just leave a link to the first post. If necessary, you will be able to follow the changes in numbers and estimates that have occurred since the first publication (estimate as of 17.10) until the moment of the second calculation according to the updated data (estimate as of 07.11).

👉 Start of the analysis in the previous publication

🟢 Full text of the research with updated data 

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Last time, we said that the Armed Forces successfully shoot down drones, and that the average rating of effectiveness reaches almost 80%. And now we firmly say that yes – the Armed Forces of Ukraine successfully shoot down Iranian drones, and the overall efficiency of shooting down drones is more than 82%.

In general, according to Reznikov's statement about 300 ammunition remaining on 14.10 and our calculations based on open sources 460-479 Shahed-136 were delivered from Iran to Russia414 of them have already been used against Ukraine!

With this slide, we want to formally declare that the Ukrainian army has immense potential for improvement! In less than a month, the Ukrainian military not only continued to heroically defend the Ukrainian sky, but also achieved greater efficiency in shooting down Iranian kamikaze drones – more than 82%.

However, the assessment of the cost of combating drones continues to be confusing: shooting down drones costs 6.7 times more expensive for Ukraine than launching them for Russia. However, this is currently the only way to deal with drones. Restoration of infrastructure facilities is much more expensive, human lives cannot be estimated. 

We are convinced that hard-working Ukrainians will find a way to minimize the costs of shooting down drones, and also increase the effectiveness of protection – both Ukraine and Ukraine's partner countries are interested in this.

This time, we can say firmly and confidently: Ukraine needs more air defense systems! Air defense systems are the most effective in the fight against drones: 

  • a large radius of target coverage;
  • the average cost of a shot compared to MANPADS and aircraft;
  • the ability to shoot down targets without their direct visual identification.

Ukrainian soldiers will continue to use all available weapons to fight Russian-Iranian terror, but from an economic point of view, the emphasis should be on using surface-to-air missiles for air defense systems: S-300, Iris-T, NASAMS.

On this slide, you can see the cost of a shot from individual air defense systems. The cheapest is a shot from the Soviet S-300 system, the average cost is the Iris-T. And the rockets for the NASAMS complex cost the most. However, the effectiveness of these systems fully justifies their cost!

According to the total order for 2,400 drones, Russia has a little less than 2,000 drones left

The rest of the drones have not yet been delivered to Russia, the supply is carried out in batches of 300 pieces, which are immediately put into use.

It is impossible to achieve one hundred percent efficiency in shooting down drones, but it is definitely worth trying. So, for example, according to our investigation: at the beginning of November, considered possibility of ordering interceptor drones to fight against the "Shaheds". The brand and model have not been disclosed, but the most likely guess is the Anvil interceptor

According to the Molfar OSINT community, any strengthening of Ukraine's air defense will only be beneficial!

We also emphasize that the role of Iran in Russia's war against Ukraine is growing. There is official confirmation of launches from Belarus (less than 50 drones) and information that Iranian instructors have been spotted on the territory of Belarus not far from the launch site. Previously, similar information about instructors was received in Crimea and Kherson – representatives of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps were also spotted and even partially destroyed there.

We did not consider information about the launch of drones from the territory of the Russian Federation and the placement of Iranian instructors on the territory of the Russian Federation due to the difficulty of obtaining information about the movement of equipment and weapons on the territory of the terrorist state. 

🟢 Full text of the research with updated data 

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