A YLC-6M radar on a 6-wheel truck. Source: radartutorial.eu
Syrian air defenses intercepted several cruise missiles and guided bombs while repelling the October 21 Israeli attack on the capital, Damascus, Colonel Andrei Boldyrev, deputy head of the Russian Reconciliation Center in Syria revealed a day after the attack.
The Russian officer said that the attack was launched by four F-16 fighter jets of the Israeli Air Force from the direction of the occupied Golan Heights. The fighter jets fired four cruise missiles and eight guided bombs in total.
“Syria’s air defense systems destroyed two cruise missiles and four guided bombs over the course of an air defense battle,” Col. Boldyrev said.
The Israeli attack didn’t result in any casualties. However, there were some material losses. Col. Boldyrev revealed that a YLC-6M radar of the Syrian military was destroyed. The runway of al-Dimas airport was also hit.
The YLC-6M is a medium and low-altitude surveillance radar made by China’s Nanjing Research Institute of Electronics Technology. The S-band, two-dimensional radar has a maximum range of more than 150 kilometers.
The Syrian military operates several types of Chinese-made radars. It was not known before that the YLC-6M was one of them.
Several Arab and Israeli news sources said that the attack on Damascus thwarted an attempt to smuggle Iranian weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon. However, the nature of the targets suggest that the goal of the attack was to weaken Syria’s own military capabilities.
The attack likely a part of Israel’s “War-Between-Wars” military campaign, which is meant to push Iran and its allies out of Syria as well as to prevent them from developing their offensive capabilities.
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