Air strikes on the Gaza Strip: what arsenal of cruise and ballistic missiles does Israel have for this purpose?
What are the interesting features of the Israeli missile arsenal and what you should know about it?
The Israeli Armed Forces have launched an air strike campaign against the Gaza Strip, using both AH-64 attack helicopters and tactical aircraft with guided weapons. Against this background, the question naturally arises as to what Israel’s arsenal of ballistic and cruise missiles is, and how powerful it is.
If we summarize all the known data, the picture looks like this – Israel has a rather wide and interesting range of air- and sea-launched cruise missiles (some of which may even be nuclear warheads), even its own medium-range ballistic missiles, the quantitative characteristics of which are unknown.
To begin with, Israel has its own family of Popeye 1 and Popeye 2 cruise missiles. The first type of CR was adopted in 1986 and can only be used with the F-15, while the second type was adopted in 1995 and can be used with the F-16.
Popeye 1 has a launch weight of 1360 kg, of which 360 kg is the warhead. The launch range is 80 km, the guidance system is a combined one, with an inertial navigation system at the main flight stage and an infrared GNSS at the terminal flight stage, with a declared probable deviation of up to 3 meters. The peculiarity of this CR is that for its use on the carrier aircraft, it is also necessary to suspend the AN/ASW-55 equipment unit weighing 865 kg.
The Popeye 2 has a slightly lower launch weight than its predecessor – 1135 kg, while the weight of the booster remains the same, 350 kg. Another important difference is that this missile uses a combination of an inertial navigation system and GPS navigation.
In turn, a logical development of the Popeye 1 and Popeye 2 missile families was the Popeye Turbo cruise missile, which has an airborne version (launch range of approximately 200-350 km) and a naval version (for submarine-based deployment, declared range – up to 1500 km, allegedly with a nuclear warhead option).
The most powerful elements of Israel’s missile arsenal are still considered to be intermediate-range ballistic missiles of the Jericho 2 and Jericho 3 types. More or less accurate data is available only for Jericho 2 – approximately 24 missiles, launch range up to 1500 km, and for Jericho 3 – a complete “veil of secrecy”.
At this point, the question may naturally arise – what about the Israeli Lora TV stations? To begin with, The Military Balance 2023 says nothing about the presence of such missiles in the IDF.
And experts of the same CSIS in their report Missile Technology: Accelerating Challenges state the following: “The Israeli Defense Forces are also believed to be using LORA ballistic missiles, which were previously exported to Azerbaijan, but inter-agency competition within the IDF may have slowed down plans to acquire (such TOWs – ed.).”
