Transcript: Webinar – Defending Israel Against the Iranian Missile Threat
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PANELISTS
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
JINSA Generals and Admirals Program Participant
Former Deputy Commander, U.S. Central Command; Former Commander, U.S. Air Force 1st Operations Group
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
JINSA Distinguished Fellow
Former Commander of the Israeli Air Force; Former Head of the IDF Planning Directorate
Ari Cicurel
JINSA Associate Director of Foreign Policy
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TRANSCRIPT
Ari Cicurel
Thank you for joining us today. I’m Ari Cicurel, JINSA’s Associate Director of Foreign Policy.
Today, we’ll be talking about the impressive U.S. and Israeli air defense operation during the war with Iran from June 13 to 24. I’m honored to be joined by two experts who have extensive experience on this topic within the U.S. and Israeli militaries.
Retired Lieutenant General Thomas Bergeson is the former Deputy Commander of U.S. Central Command. Retired IDF Major General Amikam Norkin is a JINSA Distinguished Fellow, and former Commander of the Israeli Air Force.
I welcome our viewers to ask any again they have to the panel by using the Q&A function in Zoom.
Before we get started with the panel, I would like to go over data that JINSA has released and that you can find on our website. I’ll emphasize that this is JINSA data, based on open-source information. I don’t speak for the panelists, or reflect any classified information, or speak for the IDF or for the U.S. military in any way. JINSA has tracked 574 ballistic missiles that Iran fired at Israel throughout the war with the United States and Israel destroying the vast majority of the threats against populated areas in Israel, resulting in around 57 hits, according to JINSA data. Air defense operations saved countless lives and prevented billions in property damage, leading to billions in net savings for Israel as well, topics we’ll certainly cover throughout the course of the conversation.
To achieve this impressive result, JINSA research shows a large use of interceptors during the war, in particular THAAD interceptors and involving potentially 14% of the U.S. THAAD stockpile throughout the war. A slow production rate for interceptors [and] possible performance issues of THAAD interceptors underscore the need to replenish, expand stockpiles, and continue to improve missile defenses. You can find all this research, the data, the cost estimates, on JINSA’s website.
And with that, I will turn to the panel.
General Norkin, my first question is for you. One of the features of the war that stands out is the fact that the Israeli Air Force was, for the first time, conducting offensive strikes in Iran. At the same time, it was also conducting air defense operations. What role did Israel’s early strikes play in helping Israel defend itself, and how did the interplay between the offense and the defense benefit one another? And I know you have some slides as well, so we [can] bring those up.
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Thank you very much, Ari. And thank you for the opportunity to speak here with this audience. Some of my friends are listening or watching us with a lot of experience in the American military, and I am honored to be here with General Thomas. Thank you very much for allowing me to speak together with you.
Before I’m going to answer your question, Ari, I would like to mention another parameter that we should all understand, and the parameter is the early warning. [In] 100 percent of the [cases in which] the Iranians launched ballistic missiles towards Israel, the Israeli population got [an] early warning, and this parameter saved lives, because the people [were able] to get into the shelters.
And that early warning is part of the American support, because we use some of the American assets that maybe General Thomas can speak about. And by being at the same net, and together—the Israeli Air Force and the American forces—we can use the data to provide the Israeli population [an] early warning. So, in some areas around the world, there are no warnings at all, and in some areas, there are no early warnings, So, we should always remember that the early warning saves lives.
And now to your question, and thank you for that. As the Israeli Defense Forces already published, we intercept[ed] more than 80 to 83 percent of the missiles that we want[ed] to intercept, and by that, we reduced the damage and the cost of life. And, unfortunately, we lost 30 citizens in those five days. But I think that it’s way above the goals, the strategic goals, that the government and the military planned before the campaign.
So, in Israel, the air defense capabilities, the air defense systems, they are part of the Air Force. Because of the size of Israel, all the capabilities are under one command, the Air Force. So, the Air Force headquarters [is responsible for coordinating] the plans and the activities between the defense activities and the offensive activities.
And it’s a key issue, especially in the first two or three days, because the Iranians, as we all know, they planned to launch hundreds of missiles the first night or the second night. And as we all saw in the slide that Ari presented to us, they launched less than 100 the first night. And this is something that we planned to do, to attack a lot of Iranian launchers and underground assets, and by [doing] that, we reduced the amount of missiles that they launched the first night. And by that, [we were able] to support the air defense systems and to support the defense plan, to be more efficient and to achieve a higher percentage of intercepts. What we can see here in the slide … [crosstalk] …
So, part of the airplanes, their mission was to take out the air defense systems. And [another] part of the airplanes, their mission was to attack the ballistic missiles, bases, launchers, and headquarters all over Iran, and we reduced the amount of missiles that they [could] launch the first night. And we can see here, this was PowerPoint, and now we can see a real picture, and a real video clip of one of the launchers that the Air Force attacked. This is the second one that was attacked by a UAV. So, all those activities were coordinated by the Air Force, of course, together with AFCENT [U.S. Air Force Central Command]. And you can see here in this picture. from the UAV sensor, a ballistic launcher. It can move by [a] truck and the Air Force designated it and attacked it before the launcher launched this specific missile, and you can see it here it is being attacked by the UAV ammunition, and because of the IR sensor. You can see that the frame is fully black.
All those launchers, they’ve been attacked one by one, and the combat fleet attacked other areas, as we saw in the presentation. We reduced the amount of missiles the Iranians [could] launch in the first few days. And the mission to hunt those launchers and those units that are responsible for the ballistic missiles of the Iranian military, it’s a mission that the Air Force did all over the 12 days, but specifically in the first few days. It’s [what] allowed the defense systems to be able to intercept most of the targets.
Ari Cicurel
Thank you. And those videos are fascinating to watch and there is a lot to be learned just from studying those. I noticed a lot of mobile launchers that were struck. Was Iran also launching from its underground missile cities as well?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Yes. The answer is yes. They can launch from underground, from a silo and a launcher, and they can launch from [a] moving launcher, as we saw by [the] trucks. So, we need to have the intelligence capabilities to designate the launchers in real time and to be able to send those targets to our combat fleet and UAV fleet. And by [doing that] once they are moving out of the tunnels that they built below the mountains, we immediately detect them and destroy them.
Ari Cicurel
General Bergeson, when you were Deputy CENTCOM Commander, I imagine you had to prepare for a possible war, either with the U.S. and Iran or between Israel and Iran, and how that would affect the U.S. Did the war proceed as you would have anticipated? Were you surprised at all by the speed of Israeli air superiority [inside Iran] or the strikes on Iran, or how the defense played out?
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
Yeah, we’ve been talking about this particular plan for literally decades and have updated it regularly as it looked more and more likely that this could be something that could happen. And I think the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs did a great job at his press conference, which probably most of the attendees here have seen, kind of describing all the efforts that went on from DTRA [The Defense Threat Reduction Agency], et cetera, to the engineering and building of the MOP [Massive Ordnance Penetrator]. But a lot of things had to come together for this plan to be executed.
You know, when we built the plan, we didn’t imagine, necessarily having the freedom of action over [Iran] that we had, as a result of the IDF strikes and taking out the [S-300s] and really creating the opening and gaining the air superiority sort of autonomously which was pretty marvelous.
Always, the risk associated with the B-2 strikes had been concern about the retaliation. We thought we’d be able to get in and hit the targets, although we were concerned with the [S-300s], that the B2s, you know, could have some vulnerabilities there. But we thought, we had pretty good confidence, that we could execute the strikes. But it was always a retaliation [which] was most concerning, starting with concerns about Lebanese Hezbollah, Hamas, and Khataib Hezbollah, and the vulnerability of both Israel and U.S. forces in the region—as well as our other regional partners—to Iranian retaliation.
But masterfully, the IDF had largely neutered both Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah, which took that off the table a little bit. [They] had opened up the corridors for freedom of air navigation over Iran, which made the strikes easier, if you will, to be able to execute [and] less risky. And so that left us then with the ballistic missile retaliation, primarily, which is what played out.
Now, the way that AFCENT [U.S. Air Forces Central Command] or CENTCOM [U.S. Central Command] organizes, if anybody is interested, is the CFAC—the Air Component Commander—Lieutenant General [Derek] France, his headquarter’s in Qatar, just outside of Doha at Al Udeid Air Base. But importantly, there’s also a fully operational Air Operations Center that was stood up at Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina a few years ago. And we did that intentionally, because of the vulnerability [of how close] that very close AOC [Air Operations Center] was, across the [Persian] Gulf, to Iran. And [we] wanted to be able to retrograde the forces to maintain a continuity of command even when we were under attack.
And so while I haven’t confirmed personally, I highly suspect that that’s where most of the Air Force operations were occurring from, from the Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina, a long ways away. Additionally, you know, we have a CENTCOM Forward Command in Doha, but I suspect that was fairly quiet, and most of the operations from the CENTCOM level were occurring in Tampa, Florida. So we had the benefit of great distance from the enemy for retaliation perspective.
So the CFAC is designated the area air defense commander, and in that role, has authority and responsibility for doing the Integrated Air and Missile Defense of that particular region in coordination with partners. Importantly, and something we’ve been working on, but importantly there is not a single air and missile defense operations center that is multilateral that looks at the entire region. So, we still have sort of independent national centers that coordinate with liaison officers, but we don’t necessarily do the real time handoffs between weapons systems like we would like to be able to do.
I do believe that Israel and the United States have integrated more fulsomely than we did back a few years ago, so that’s very important. But other nations that could participate, such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and others, simply aren’t technically connected together like we would like them to be.
So fast forward into the actual strikes and the response from that. As General Norkin laid out, we have [a] really good constellation of satellites that are responsible for that early warning, SBIRS [Space-Based Infrared System] or OPIR [Overhead Persistent Infrared] different names associated with the constellation, but they’re the unblinking eye and usually the first detection of a missile launch. From just the initial detection, [they] can usually categorize the type of weapon that it is, and usually get a pretty good indication of the trajectory, and therefore where the impact is going to be. And so that’s very important for early warning, for safety of the general population, but also for directing weapons to intercept those things.
And then we tried to set up a multi-level layer of defense, a tiered defense. But the tiered defense actually starts, if you can, with the interdiction. If you can kill the arrow while it’s on the ground, that’s the best form of defense. And so, to General Norkin’s point, that ability to do that dynamic targeting where you have air superiority. You have F-35s and other aircraft over the head of Iran, and now you have sensors that are looking to find these ballistic missiles that are moving. It’s hard to do, we did it during Desert Storm, and did it very unsuccessfully, but we’ve gotten much better at it.
So, there’s now different sensors to be able to detect the moving target. Importantly, some of the weapons, or the ballistic missiles that Iran shoots are liquid-fuel powered, as opposed to solid-fuel powered. That’s an important distinction, because the liquid fuel normally has to be refueled out in the open, and that leaves it somewhat vulnerable. Also, there’s not a one-to-one ratio of launchers to ballistic missiles, so if you can kill the launchers, you really get more bang for your buck.
So, lots of different ways of being able to detect and then hopefully get an airplane overhead to find it and finish it. So, find, fix, and finish is the coin of the realm for interdiction, and they did that masterfully. That’s really made the problem less [serious].
It starts there, and then once a missile is launched, your layered defense starts with your highest tier weapon, like a THAAD, that can intercept the longer range ballistic missiles. And then you get into a Patriot and David’s Sling, all the way on down to an Iron Dome. So, the different missiles have different capabilities based on the type of target that they’re going after. Importantly, also, there needs to be an air defense layer, because were were a lot of cruise missiles launched, as well as just UAS [uncrewed aerial system] that could attack targets, [generally] those are most normally handled best by aircraft. And so, there’s a lot of, as we’ve seen throughout the last couple of years, of intercepts by manned aircrafts on those types of weapons that were coming after Israel.
So anyhow, that’s a brief, broad brush on how we’re organized and how we were executed. My wish for a theaterwide here at missile defense center and connectivity, that’s the dream. But right now, we’ve done a very good job of coordinating and deconflicting, if nothing else, between our forces.
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Thank you very much, General, and if I may, Ari.
The Iranian launched more than 600 Shaheds. [It is] a suicide drone. And you know, it’s like a cruise missile, but it flies 100 knots. And from those 650 Shaheds, only one penetrated the Israeli border, and this one penetrated by mistake. Half of them were intercepted by the American forces and the other nations [that] are part of a coalition that we built as [part of the] original defense plan.
So, this is, let’s say, the second or the third reason to appreciate the American support, by reducing the amount of Shaheds that the Israeli Air Force [had] to intercept near the Israeli border. And we did it with Iron Dome, we did it with our Apache helicopters, and, of course, with our F-16, F-15, and F-35 [fighter jets]. And you can compare how many Shaheds have penetrated [into] Israel since October 7, to what [has] happened in Ukraine, in Kiev.
So, to defend your nation, especially when we are speaking about a small nation like Israel, it’s a major, major mission for us, for the Air Force, and I think that [as of] now, the results are very good.
Ari Cicurel
You’ve both mentioned this Integrated Air and Missile Defense that has developed over the years. And just days before Israel started Operation Rising Lion, JINSA had released a report about the IAMD efforts in the April and October attacks. One of the takeaways that we had was that this coalition had remarkable success, but that it was still largely ad hoc, informal, and had to come together in the days and hours beforehand. So, General Norkin is that still the case? Is it still [an] informal coalition, and has it improved at all, as it’s had to repeatedly defend against Iranian attacks?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, I think that we started to build this coalition around six years ago. Of course, we did it under the AFCENT umbrella, because the Israeli Air Force cannot do it by [itself]. At that time, “Cobra,” General Harrigian, was the AFCENT commander, and then [General Greg Guillot] was the second one that organized all the actors around the table to build the regional air defense plan, and against the cruise missiles and the drone. And at that time, we put into the ground the seeds. And after six years, we can see the fruits. But it can always be much better.
And, as General Thomas talked about Jordan and Saudi Arabia, I think that if we are going to see a better strategic situation in the Middle East, and maybe more nations [deciding to] come and join [the] Abraham Accords, we can build a regional plan, not just against droned. We can build regional plans against missiles and ballistic missiles, by connecting more radars, and by having a better situational awareness, and of course, by having more air defense systems that can protect not just the Israeli airspace [but] can protect also our neighborhood partners’ airspace. So, the potential [is there] to move forward with better plans for regional plans. I think that the defense plans might be the first priority for the militaries to build.
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
If I may just add on to General Norkin, because I completely agree with you, sir. I want to also give an acknowledgement to General Gus Guastella, who was CFAC, he may be listening right now. So, Gus, we love you too.
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Gus, I love you my friend!
Ari Cicurel
I’ll just add, General Guastella also was one of our task force members.
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
I’m going to meet him in Israel in a month, because he’s a part of the JINSA delegation that’s supposed to be here.
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
But the point is, the strategic situation has shifted the Middle East so dramatically, where now Iran is seen as a principal threat in the region by all the relevant parties in that area. I think building on and continuing to develop this sort of air missile defense capability is a real confidence-building measure that can facilitate things like the Abraham Accords, you know, more regionally. You know, I think the Saudis would be ready to do that. They don’t like a Houthi ballistic missile flying over Riyadh on its way to Israel any more than the Israelis do.
So, there’s definitely alignment there on the threats and needs for this kind of defense. And this is the time, when Iran is down, that we should be able to do it. I think that overall, it’s been breathtaking in both its complexity as well as success, over the last couple of years, just extraordinary. People will write books about this, I’m convinced. However, we should never, you know, high five and rest on our laurels because the enemy has a vote, and they’re going to continue to look for ways to penetrate these kinds of systems. So, we have to be leaning into this. And I think the next step of building a regionwide air and missile defense is the right way to go.
Ari Cicurel
Just as a point of clarity, General Norkin, there were reports that Jordan and Saudi Arabia had shot down drones, and I think France as well. To what extent were they involved in this effort, and were they just focused on drones, or were they also intercepting ballistic missiles at all?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, unfortunately, our neighbors [have] no technology capabilities or operational capabilities to intercept ballistic missiles. So, all the ballistic missiles were intercepted by the American forces and the Israeli forces. Our partners at the regional defense plan, they intercepted some of those Shaheds.
Ari Cicurel
General Bergerson, the United States deployed THAAD and Aegis destroyers in the region. You laid out a great explanation of how that coordination happens. But could you elaborate on how the determination is made of whether a US or an Israeli system is going to intercept a particular missile? Is that an automated system now, or is that something that has to be communicated in real time between two people?
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
Yeah, so I can’t talk expertly about that, because I just haven’t been there to see how they’ve stitched together those operations centers. I’ve got to believe they probably are doing the data sharing so that the computers can pick the right weapon. Otherwise, what they might have done is just based on the type of weapon and the altitude, they sort of assign first rights to SM-6, for example, or THAAD because of its longer range, and it has a very specific altitude and ranges that it’s looking for things to intercept. So they may have done that, built in a deconfliction plan, or they may have actually stitched it together electronically. I just don’t know the answer to that. Maybe General Norkin can elaborate.
Ari Cicurel
General Norkin, is that something that you’re able to discuss?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, you know, the THAAD is an American system, so I am not the expert.
Ari Cicurel
General Bergeson, I’ll ask, maybe, a similar question. The United States used a lot of interceptors in its defensive operations. How many interceptors the United States [is] able to, or going to, use, is that something that’s fully in the purview of CENTCOM, once those forces are deployed, or is that something that the Pentagon or civilian leadership are going to weigh in on how much the U.S. can really be involved?
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
No, [that’s] the area of defense commander and his subordinate units that are supporting him. So that’s all your Patriot units, even your Aegis, and other systems, are chopped to the CFAC for air and missile defense. And, no, they’re not given a bogey about how many missiles they can shoot. They’re going to shoot as required in order to win the war.
Now, as a practical matter, you can run the salvos out, and then you’re in trouble. So, there are times we might change the shoot doctrine, for example. At some point you may, if you definitely have to hit a target, you may do a shoot, look, shoot. Or shoot two, to make sure you get it, although the quality of these weapons now—especially the hit-to-kill interceptors—are so good that, you know, they don’t miss very often. But sometimes you do shoot two. Once you start getting low on your numbers, you may go to one per target, and then you may default to, ‘we’re only going to go after that missile if it looks like it’s going at an area of interest.’ And you may let the other ones go through if they’re not going to hit something that’s of a big concern.
So there are definitely different things you can do in your decision-making process to try to preserve the missiles you do have. But that’s the purview and the responsibility of the area of defense commander, and, of course, the CENTCOM commander—who’s going to be watching this as well—and their logisticians.
Ari Cicurel
You mentioned earlier, the base at Al-Udeid, in Qatar, and its proximity to Iran. The U.S. reportedly evacuated its military personnel from the base, except for 44 American troops who were manning two Patriot batteries when Iran attacked the base, shooting down 13 of the 14 missiles that were fired.
Could you outline what the vulnerabilities are for U.S. partners and troops in the Gulf?
And that close proximity to Iran, how does that play into U.S. operational planning and decision-making, not just for force protection, but also just as you’re considering whether to conduct offensive operations?
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
Yeah, I mean, I think it’s self-evident that we’re really close. So, if I’m our naval forces in Bahrain, there’s a lot of types of surface-to-surface missiles that are just a few miles away. And so that’s a very vulnerable location. So, retrograding a lot of these forces has always been in the plan for survivability. But there’s some forces you just can’t pull away.
Like you said, the Army soldiers had to be on the ground because that’s a responsibility to do that intercept. And there were other forces there, arrayed around the theater in Iraq and other locations, that were vulnerable. But there’s a plan to have them hunker down if they’re not actively participating in the strikes and do other defensive measures to try to protect them to the extent we can, because you can’t retrograde the entire theater. You have to be able to continue to fight back. So, I’m confident we gave them the right command decisions and defensive measures to try to be as protective as we can. And then you ask them to do their job as a military member.
Ari Cicurel
General Norkin, when Israel was targeting Iranian launchers or missile arsenals, was it just focusing on medium-range ballistic missiles, or was it also going after the short-range ballistic missiles that really put the Gulf countries at risk?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, first of all, I think, from the previous answer [it’s clear] that the American military should replan its deployment in the Middle East. And you know that we, in JINSA, are working on those issues. And this is the right time to strengthen Israel by having more assets and by supporting the American Air Force to have bases that can support the F-35 or ammunition for the American forces. So, I think it’s a relevant time frame to replan that deployment.
For your question about the short range and the medium range [missiles], for our priorities, we look [at] the long-range missiles. So, once we achieve and destroy more than 60 percent [of] the launchers, and we understood that the Iranian forces are going to [target] the American bases and American soldiers, we share[d] some of those targets, and we act against them, and it was part of the cooperation between those militaries.
Ari Cicurel
General Norkin, did Iran adapt how or where it was targeting in Israel, or any other adaptations that you think are noteworthy, and was there changes in Israel’s defensive adaptations throughout the war?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, you know, it’s like a competition, and now, after this war, both sides got a lot of lessons to learn and to improve. So I’m sure that the Iranians got a lot of lessons, and they are going to develop different systems and better missiles or drones and air defense systems.
So, we need to prepare ourselves for the next round as part of the competition between ourselves and the enemies.
Ari Cicurel
On a similar note, of course, Israel and the United States, were overwhelmingly successful with the air defense. But any air defense is going to have some percentage that will come through, and you need to continue to advance air defense programs. I’ve seen reports that Arrow 4 and Arrow 5 are coming online soon. Can you speak to what capabilities and what advancements those systems might have, and any other ways Israel is looking to kind of expand its air defense arsenal, either through lasers or other new technologies?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Of course, first of all, we might have a better early warning system. So, this is the first part of the new technology that we are looking for. And once you can intercept the missiles in a higher altitude, you might have a second chance. So, Arrow 4 and Arrow 5, they’re supposed to intercept in space, like Arrow 3. And the third one is the missiles that might maneuver, the ballistic missile can do some maneuvering, and then it might be a challenge to intercept them. So, this is a third challenge. So, there are many challenges that we already understand, and we need to bring those capabilities to the battlefield.
Ari Cicurel
General Norkin, Israel has numerous air defense assets, not just the ground-based interceptors, but aircraft and helicopters.
Can you discuss, were certain air defense capabilities used more for ballistic missiles versus drones, in particular, were aircraft and helicopters prioritizing the drones while ground-based [defenses] were handling ballistic missiles?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, I think that for the ballistic missile, we understand what the system [is] that we need, and there is no other option. Once we are talking about the short-range rockets or missiles or drones, there are other options, like all the soft-kill capabilities that both nations [have] developed, and Israel is focusing on the laser capabilities. And the laser capabilities might be able to deal with the rockets and the medium-range missiles, and also with the cruise missiles and drones, and by that, [it will] reduce the amount of Iron Dome and David’s Sling interceptors. It is supposed to be, of course, much cheaper.
The combat fleet [decided] to use the AMRAAM [advanced medium range air-to-air missiles] against those Shahed [drones]. I’m not sure that this is the right way. From time to time, we prefer to intercept the targets before they are getting into the Israeli airspace, so we cannot do it by the ground system like Iron Dome, and we prefer to do it above the Syrian airspace. And we should have missiles that are much cheaper, low-cost, and not [use] the best AMRAAMs that we have.
Ari Cicurel
During the June war, as we started off, Israel was on the offense and the defense in comparison to April and October, where it was on offense at one point and defense on another. How did that affect how Israel was employing its aircraft, in terms of choosing priorities and organizing operations?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, it’s a very good question, because we changed the way that we planned the war against Iran once we took out Hezbollah. And there is no threat from Lebanon, which was a major parameter at the planning procedure a year ago. And the second parameter is that we destroyed the Syrian military. So, as General Thomas mentioned, we opened a corridor between Israel and Iran, so even F-16 Block 30 [jets] that we are still flying with [were] attacking Iran. So, by that, more platforms can be part of the campaign which helps the Israeli Air Force to do more sorties and to attack more targets per day.
So, as you know, the average flight time for each sortie is around five hours. We plan to fly one sortie per day. And in June, we did two sorties per day from Israel to Iran. So, we doubled the number of sorties, and [the] number of the targets that we can attack [on] the same day. It’s a huge difference from [the] previous plan because [there is] no other threat on the northern border.
Ari Cicurel
Would aircraft be doing both offensive and defensive missions in the same sortie?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Not just offensive and defensive. Some of them came back from Iran with one or two bombs and we used [the bombs] in Gaza. Because, you know, in Israel, there are multi-mission squadrons, so we need to be more efficient. If there is a target in Gaza, and we have the F-16 with JDAMs or other ammunition that are available, [we use them] and we [did it] a few times.
Ari Cicurel
That’s remarkable. Not just playing offensive/defensive with Iran, but really scoping the fight out to the full three threat theater.
General Bergeson, we’ve talked a lot about the interceptors that were used, and the U.S. used a lot of them. Israel used a lot. We have major production issues with the number of interceptors that we can produce every year. And THAAD interceptors are very costly, I think around $12 million compared to Arrows that are $2 [million] to $3 million. How can we both increase production speed as well as potentially cost when we’re producing interceptors?
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
Well, money talks, haha. No, I don’t want to be flippant. But yeah, there [are] limitations on the industrial base. They’re well-documented, right? And these exquisite weapons are very expensive and take a long time to produce, to your point, so you have to build up a stockpile, if you will, in advance for any anticipated use because of their necessity when it comes to combat.
And then, as General Norkin alluded to, there’s any number of operational tests and developmental testing going on with a cheaper bullet than a multi-million-dollar interceptor to shoot down a relatively inexpensive missile or UAS. So, things like, any electrical, magnetic interference capability, be it microwave, laser, EMP [electromagnetic pulse], whatever, that can screw up the guidance system or the propulsion of that particular system is something that could be cheaper.
So, there’s a lot of efforts. And I think that’s probably the right answer: to develop those types of technology where you can have literally hundreds, if not thousands of rounds and one interceptor at very low cost. We’re seeing some of that. If you scale this down right to the lowest part of the tiered layer, it looks a lot like Ukraine and Russia in trench warfare. And they have any number of quadcopters and pocket rockets going back and forth at each other, which is kind of the modern-day artillery over there. But the things that seem to be most effective in defending against those are types of electronic countermeasures that are shooting them down.
And then, while I’m on that theme, where we should never rest on our laurels: if you look at what I think was a brilliant operation on the part of Ukraine that didn’t have a ballistic missile capability to reach back and strike Russian bombers deep in its territory, so it put a bunch of these quadcopters on a truck and shipped them all the way in. So offenses and defenses when warfare continues, those ideas and those things. And, so, now you’ve got to be able to defend your highest priority sites from those kinds of attacks that are really ingenious.
Ari Cicurel
I’ll keep the questions kind of at the global stage. General Bergeson, what impact do you think the U.S. support for not just Israel’s defense, but its decision to launch strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, will have in terms of deterrence outside the region with adversaries like Russia or China?
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
I would add North Korea into that. Let’s talk about North Korea.
North Korea’s arsenal and military capability is largely ballistic missiles. It looks a lot like Iran’s. That’s how they’ve been able to kind of puff their chest and do some provocations on the Korean Peninsula, which I served as the CFAC on for a couple of years. And they’re going to look at the ability to both interdict and intercept, all those capabilities that the U.S. and Israelis have done. And they’re going to feel deterred right now. So, they’re clearly looking at other ways and means of being able to continue to develop offensive capability. But I think it had a profound effect on North Korea.
And I would say similarly with China and Russia, because again, this gets at the heart of a lot of their offensive capabilities [with] the use of these ballistic missiles. Now China has some improved ballistic missiles that General Norkin alluded to, the ones that can move while they’re flying. They’re not on a static profile. Those are much harder to intercept. The Chinese have done some tests and demonstrated the capability of what they call the carrier killer, for example. That’s a much harder type of weapon to intercept. And so it continues, back and forth.
But I do think it was a powerful message to any of those potential aggressors out there that we have a lot of capability.
Ari Cicurel
I’ll remind our audience, if you have any questions, feel free to ask them through the Q & A function on Zoom. General Norkin, on a previous JINSA webinar, you noted Israel had achieved air superiority faster than you would have anticipated, and this was in the very early days. Were there any other things that surprised you as the war proceeded, in particular, how the air defense operation occurred?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, I think that the Iranian Air Force activities [which] surprised [us were] that they didn’t try to defend their nation. So they took off, and they [flew] over the Iranian bases, [but] once the Israel Air Force got into the Iranian airspace they turned around and they didn’t engage with us. And I was surprised from that. All the other Iranian activities were part of our plan.
Ari Cicurel
One of the differences, at least in scale, in this war was how often Iran was targeting Israeli population centers, Israeli cities, whereas in previous strikes, it had targeted a lot of Israeli military bases where Israeli attacks had originated—the air bases. How did that change how Israel defended?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
Well, of course, we [had to] change our priorities to defend our population, citizens, cities and all [our] assets. And there is a lesson that we should take, because the Israeli [military] headquarters is at the center of Tel Aviv. And I think that at the national level, we should take a decision to take it down from the center of our biggest city.
Ari Cicurel
Well, we’re coming up on the end of our time. I’ll just turn to our panelists for any final remarks that they have.
General Bergeson, I’ll start with you.
Lt Gen Thomas Bergeson, USAF (ret.)
Well, thanks for the opportunity. And again, I just think this has been an astounding display of strategy, operational design, and execution by the Israeli Defense Forces and U.S. forces and others in the region, just remarkable. But we have to make sure we don’t rest on our laurels. So, this is not the time to stop. It’s a time to continue to push, to continue to get better, and think about how the enemy may be creative and come back at us in ways we didn’t anticipate. And my last push again for the hope and the dream of a theater wide air missile defense architecture, which I think is in everyone’s best interest, and now’s the time to push forward. Thank you very much.
Ari Cicurel
Thank you, General. General Norkin?
IDF MG (ret.) Amikam Norkin
I completely agree. And thank you for that, Thomas. And as you all know and understand, the next time might be different. So we need to prepare ourselves to think about, let’s say, the new cards that we should put [on the] table to be able to defend our nations, to have a short campaign, because the time of the campaign is a major parameter. And I think that the 12-day campaign was the right time, especially for Israel.
So, if you would like to have a short campaign, you need to have very good capabilities and to achieve air superiority in 24 hours, and then to achieve all the achievements, the commanders that we took out, and all the other targets that we attacked in a very short time. And by that, Israel [faced] less time under threat. And this is out of the Israeli strategy. We need to keep it like that. And again, thank you very much, Ari, for the opportunity.
Ari Cicurel
Thank you. Thank you to our audience and panelists for joining us.
You can find all of JINSA’s work on our website, JINSA.org, including the data I mentioned at the beginning, our work on integrated air and missile defense, as well as I’ll put a plug in for a project that General Norkin mentioned, General Frank McKenzie, former CENTCOM commander, has a report on the need for rethinking U.S. basing in the Middle East that you can find on our website as well. Please check your inboxes for our next webinar and future publications.
I hope everyone enjoys the rest of their day.