Belarus to sell Russian Iskander to Iran and Syria?

Deploying missile launchers Iskander in Belarus could be just an intermediate stage for selling armaments to Middle East, believes the military expert of Novaya Gazeta Pavel Feldengauer.

Colonel-General Vladimir Zaritsky, the chief of artillery and rocket forces for the Russian Ground Troops stated on Wednesday that the supply of the new Iskander tactical missile system to Belarus would be an asymmetrical response by Russia to the deployment of a U.S. anti-missile system in the Czech Republic and in Poland.

Earlier Belarusian chief of artillery and rocket forces General Mikhail Puzikau also told about planned delivered of Iskander systems. Having in fact reach withdrawing from a treaty which is profitable for Russia (but not for the military commandment), Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE), our generals are now trying to destroy the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF). Zaritsky has stated that in case Russia will pull out of the INF, Iskander will be modernized, and its range will be extended to 500 and more kilometers.

Bad news is that Russia is a member of the MTCR missile technology control regime, so it doesn’t have a right to supply to Belarus either ballistic missiles, or cruise missiles with a range more than 300 km and with a warhead heavier than 500 kg.

A simplified, so-called “export” variant, Iskander-E, could be legally deployed in Belarus. Its range is 280 km and has a warhead of up to 480 kg. The deployment of Iskander missiles in Belarus, which borders Poland, would likely put planned U.S. missile defenses there within range; a site in the Czech Republic would likely be out of reach.

Iskander's current version has a range of 190 miles; a new version equipped with cruise missiles capable of striking targets at a distance of 310 miles has been tested earlier this year, ITAR-Tass said. Zaritsky said the upgraded version would become operational in 2009.

Russian news reports also quoted Zaritsky as saying that Iskander's range could be extended beyond 310 miles if Moscow decides to opt out of a Cold War-era treaty that banned intermediate-range missiles.

It is clear that objectively increased enmity with the West and the renewal of a kind of arms race is profitable to some of our generals. For a long time they have been hoping to get a great part of oil and gas profits to the military budget. If there will be new programs of military construction and weaponization, there will be huge kick-backs.

There are other possibilities of illicit gains. In 2004 Syria advanced for a party of Iskander-E rockets. With their range of 280 km they cover most of Israel territory. But Putin under the pressure of Israel and the US personally liquidated the contract. Just before his tragic and mysterious death a military correspondent of Kommersant Ivan Safronov investigated and received a confirmation from the sources in the military-industrial complex concerning the plans of modern Russian armaments deliveries via Belarus, Iskander-E being among the armaments.

If the planned Iskander deployment in Belarus does not have any connection to the U.S. missile defense sites in Europe, it could be just an intermediate stage for selling armaments to Middle East, when Moscow has officially nothing to do with that, and Russian chiefs have their take.