Russian arms for Hizballah cross Israel’s red line

President Vladimir Putin turns aside all Israel’s complaints about Russian arms supplies to Iran’s Lebanese proxy, Hizballah, whenever he talks to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu – roughly every week-to-ten days. The issue is also raised without results by Israeli officials on trips to Moscow, including the visit by Yossi Cohen, Director of the Mossad, to the Russian capital on July 1.

Nonetheless, Netanyahu persisted in complaining again about the Russian arms reaching the Lebanese terrorist group in his latest phone conversation with Putin on Saturday, July 23. He made the call, debkafile military sources say, primarily to raise another topic at issue, the UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) flights from Syria into Israeli airspace on July 17.

The Syria War Is Showcasing Russian Arms, Promoting Sales

Companies in the Russian defense industry are beginning 2016 with optimism: The contracts in their portfolio exceed $50 billion, and the military campaign in Syria has been excellent advertising for Russian armaments.

In an article published last week in Kommersant–Dengi magazine, writer Ivan Safronov analyzed the internal (economic) and external factors which will impact armament exports in the new year. He also predicted which countries will buy arms from Russia in 2016, and in which quantities.

Following are excerpts from Safronov’s article:[1]

Adopting To The New Economic And Political Realities

“…According to the Federal Authority on Military Technical Cooperation (MTC),[2] the export of Russian weapons has increased dramatically during the last 11 years, from $5 billion to $11.3 billion. However, even though Russia has arms contracts with some 60 countries, most of the revenue comes from five or six major players. Although the sales figures for 2015 has not been officially announced, we know that as of December 1, $11.6 billion worth of military equipment was exported. Existing contracts for future military sales total $57 billion. 

Exclusive: Moscow has no S-300 air defense missiles available for Iran. Replacements under discussion

Although Tehran celebrated President Vladimir Putin’s decision to release the S-300 missiles withheld from Iran for five years by an arms embargo, debkafile reports exclusively that Iran can’t hope to take delivery of the advanced air defense systems in the foreseeable future. The Russian military industry is already way behind meeting demands for more S-300 missiles and their radar systems for the Russian army, which has none to spare for Iran. Its own needs have soared since Russia fell out with US and Europe over the Ukraine conflict.

The Russian army lately moved S-300 batteries, which are capable of downing fighter jets and missiles, to the country’s southern border with Ukraine, as air cover for the pro-Russian separatists against Ukrainian air bombardment, which has since petered out.