[The disclosure of the
delivery comes as Russia and the United States are planning to convene an
international conference that is aimed at ending the brutal conflict in Syria,
which has killed more than 70,000. That conference is expected to be held in
early June and to include representatives of the Assad government and the
Syrian opposition.]
By Michael R. Gordon and Eric Schmitt
WASHINGTON — Russia has
sent advanced antiship cruise missiles to Syria, a move that
illustrates the depth of its support for the Syrian government led by President Bashar al-Assad, American
officials said Thursday.
Russia has previously
provided a version of the missiles, called Yakhonts, to Syria. But those
delivered recently are outfitted with an advanced radar that makes them more
effective, according to American officials who are familiar with classified
intelligence reports and would only discuss the shipment on the basis of
anonymity.
Unlike Scud and other
longer-range surface-to-surface missiles that the Assad government has used
against opposition forces, the Yakhont antiship missile system provides the
Syrian military a formidable weapon to counter any effort by international
forces to reinforce Syrian opposition fighters by imposing a naval embargo,
establishing a no-fly zone or carrying out limited airstrikes.
“It enables the regime
to deter foreign forces looking to supply the opposition from the sea, or from
undertaking a more active role if a no-fly zone or shipping embargo were to be
declared at some point,” said Nick Brown, editor in chief of IHS Jane’s
International Defense Review. “It’s a real ship killer.”
Jeffrey White, a fellow
at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a former senior American
intelligence official, said Syria’s strengthened arsenal would “tend to push
Western or allied naval activity further off the coast” and was also “a signal
of the Russian commitment to the Syrian government.”
The disclosure of the
delivery comes as Russia and the United States are planning to convene an
international conference that is aimed at ending the brutal conflict in Syria,
which has killed more than 70,000. That conference is expected to be held in
early June and to include representatives of the Assad government and the
Syrian opposition.
Secretary of State John
Kerry has repeatedly said that it is the United States’ hope to change Mr.
Assad’s “calculations” about his ability to hold on to power so that he will
allow negotiations for a political solution to the conflict. Mr. Kerry
indicated that he had raised the issue of Russian arms deliveries to Syria
during his recent visit to Moscow, but declined to provide details.
“I think we’ve made it
crystal clear we would prefer that Russia was not supplying assistance,” he
said. “That hasn’t changed.”
American officials have
been concerned that the flow of Russian and Iranian arms to Syria will buttress
Mr. Assad’s apparent belief that he can prevail militarily.
“This weapons transfer
is obviously disappointing and will set back efforts to promote the political
transition that is in the best interests of the Syrian people and the region,”
Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, the senior Republican on the Foreign Relations
Committee, said in a statement on Thursday night. “There is now greater urgency
for the U.S. to step up assistance to the moderate opposition forces who can
lead Syria after Assad.”
Senator Robert Menendez,
Democrat of New Jersey and the committee chairman, added in a statement,
“Russia is offering cover to a despotic ruler and defending a bankrupt regime.”
Syria ordered the
coastal defense version of the Yakhont system from Russia in 2007 and received
the first batteries in early 2011, according to Jane’s. The initial order
covered 72 missiles, 36 launcher vehicles, and support equipment, and the
systems have been displayed in the country.
The batteries are
mobile, which makes them more difficult to attack. Each consists of missiles, a
three-missile launcher and a command-and-control vehicle.
The missiles are about
22 feet long, carry either a high-explosive or armor-piercing warhead, and have
a range of about 180 miles, according to Jane’s.
They can be steered to a
target’s general location by longer-range radars, but each missile has its own
radar to help evade a ship’s defenses and home in as it approaches its target.
Two senior American
officials said that the most recent shipment contained missiles with a more
advanced guidance system than earlier shipments.
Russia has longstanding
interests in Syria, including a naval base at the Mediterranean port of Tartus.
As the Syria crisis has
escalated, Russia has gradually augmented its naval presence in the region. In
January, more than two dozen Russian warships sailed to the Black and
Mediterranean Seas to take part in what the Defense Ministry said was to be the
country’s largest naval exercise in decades, testing the ships’ ability to
deploy outside Russian waters.
A month later, after the
Black Sea exercises ended, the Russian Defense Ministry news agency said that
four large landing vessels were on their way to operations off the coast of
Syria.
“Based on the results of
the navy exercises in the Black and Mediterranean seas,” the ministry said at
the time, “the ministry leadership has taken a decision to continue combat duty
by Russian warships in the Mediterranean.”
Russia’s diplomatic
support of Syria has also bolstered the Assad government.
At the United Nations,
the Russians recently blocked proposals that the Security Council mount a
fact-finding trip to Jordan, Turkey and Lebanon to investigate the burgeoning
flood of refugees, according to Western diplomats.
Jordan had sought the
United Nations visit to make the point that the refugee situation was a threat
to stability in the region, but Russia said that the trip was beyond the
mandate of the Security Council, diplomats said.
When allegations that
the Assad government had used chemical weapons surfaced, Russia also backed the
Syrian government’s refusal to allow the United Nations to carry out a wide-ranging
investigation inside Syria — which Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov,
said was an attempt to “politicize the issue” and impose the “Iraqi scenario”
on Syria.
Russian officials have
repeatedly said that in selling arms to Syria, they are merely fulfilling old
contracts. But some American officials worry that the deliveries are intended
to limit the United States’ options should it choose to intervene to help the
rebels.
Russia, for example,
previously shipped SA-17 surface-to-air missiles to Syria. Israel carried out
an airstrike against trucks that were transporting the weapons near Damascus in
January. Israel has not officially acknowledged the raid but has said it is
prepared to intervene militarily to prevent any “game changing” weapons from
being shipped to Hezbollah, the Lebanese militant group.
More recently, Israeli
and American officials have urged Russia not to proceed with the sale of
advanced S-300 air defense weapons. The Kremlin has yielded to American
entreaties not to provide S-300s to Iran. But the denial of that sale, analysts
say, has increased the pressure within Russia’s military establishment to
proceed with the delivery to Syria.
