
Quds 1 missile - pinewurst
https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/1208062/meet-the-quds-1/
======
dmix
> Is Iran secretly designing, testing and producing missile systems for
> exclusive use by its proxies?

Designing a deniable missile sounds exactly like something an Iran Intel
agency would do. Especially with how effectively Russia worked in Ukraine, not
using directly attributable assets is very valuable and will be a tactic we'll
only see more of in the future.

Makes sense they'd simplify one of their existing proven systems and use more
drone-esque technology.

The Quds name is also interesting since it's the name of Iran's more elite
forces which have operated in their proxies like Syria, and what I thought
this article was going to be about
[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/09/30/the-shadow-
com...](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/09/30/the-shadow-commander)

~~~
sb057
(al-)Quds is just the Arabic name for Jerusalem.

~~~
dotancohen
Quds means "holy", the Arabic name for Jerusalem is "The holy". Other things
can be holy, and the name Quds applies to them as well.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Lovely. "The Holy Missile".

"The Holy Hand Grenade" was comedy in a movie. "The Holy Missile" in real
life? Not so funny.

~~~
dotancohen
Run away! Run away!

------
CapricornNoble
Very detailed article. The Czech TJ100 turbojet would be neat in a serial-
hybrid turbine power pack (for ground applications).

Physical fabrication of cruise missiles (which is basically what modern
"kamikaze drones" are) isn't the hard part IMO....I really wanna get a look at
their guidance/control software. Somebody get the Houthis on GitLab ASAP.

>>>The idea that impoverished war-torn Yemen would be able to develop a cruise
missile without any outside assistance seems far-fetched......Is Iran secretly
designing, testing and producing missile systems for exclusive use by its
proxies?

I think it's possible the Iranians are doing the design work, then sending the
CAD files to the Houthis and telling them "cobble together something like this
to the best of your ability." The results have been spectacularly successful,
and gets around the problems of the blockade if they aren't sending physical
hardware.

~~~
FuckButtons
Manufacturing is an awful lot more than “cobbling together” a cad file. Cruise
missiles need some pretty complex components to be made with specialized
tooling, none of which are going to last long with Saudi Arabia bombing the
fuck out of them on a regular basis.

~~~
CapricornNoble
The Houthis managed to retrofit an air-to-air missile into a truck-launched
surface-to-air missile in order to damage an F-15. [1] Their ability to hack
hardware might surprise you. I honestly dunno how they are pulling it off
either.

[1][https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/now-we-know-how-
houth...](https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/now-we-know-how-houthi-
rebels-yemen-used-modified-air-air-missiles-attack-planes-ground)

~~~
mr_overalls
The missile in question - the Vympel R-27 - is a Soviet design. Just
spitballing here, but how likely is it that the Houthis have covert Russian
technical help? Russia's political alignments in the ME (and domestic oil
production) certainly mean that it benefits from attacks on Saudi oil &
stability.

~~~
sangnoir
Why do you assume they need help?

~~~
mr_overalls
It's my own bias, but I don't readily think of Yemen as having the kind of
highly-skilled military/technical personnel needed to perform such a task.

------
_iyig
My first thought was, "why not a pulsejet? Didn't that crazy guy in NZ use one
to build a DIY cruise missile some years back?" Well, it turns out pulsejets
are horrendously inefficient [0]. If the missiles were fired from northern
Yemen per the article's map, there's no way a pulsejet could have even gotten
close to its target with the same load of fuel.

I'm led to wonder whether piston engines could've made the trip, and whether
Saudi air defense could've shot such a (slower) drone down. Giant-scale RC
plane engines exist... anyone know how big these have to get before export
controls kick in?

EDIT: forgot source link.

[0]
[https://aardvark.co.nz/pjet/jet_efficiency1.shtml](https://aardvark.co.nz/pjet/jet_efficiency1.shtml)

~~~
rdtsc
I think the idea is that it wasn't a complete clean room Yemeni design, but
rather an altered Iranian design, which in turn copied from a Soviet missile:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kh-55](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kh-55)

The engine was switched from a more efficient turbofan to a turbojet TJ100.
But switching to a piston and propeller engine might have been to much of a
change and would have require a complete redesign.

~~~
caf
The article is concluding that the Quds-1 is _not_ an altered Soumar (which is
the missile based on the KH-55) - the list of differences up to and including
the significantly smaller diameter and different engine make that unlikely.

Rather it is mentioned that TJ100-alike engines are used in Iran's drone
program (as distinct from cruise missiles), and this raises the possibility
that the Quds-1 is a derivative of one of those.

~~~
rdtsc
But the general design class is the same, it even confused the Saudis it was
the same rocket. I guess I was trying to say is if it was designed from
scratch with a piston engine it would look very different. But because there
were already similar designs and models they had access to, it made sense to
stick with that same general class of rockets.

------
credit_guy
Great article.

So, it appears that this "drone" attack was actually an attack by an ultra-
advanced cruise missile. A missile with higher range than the limits of the
INF treaty (from which the US has pulled recently).

According to this article, the distance between northern Yemen and the
attacked facility is more than 1250 km. For comparison this is roughly the
distance between New York and Chicago, or between Paris and Rome.

~~~
caf
There doesn't seem to be a case for "ultra-advanced", it's more a
demonstration on how well you can do _without_ needing "ultra-advanced"
technology.

Note that the INF treaty was bilateral (it only bound its two signatories,
Russia and the US).

~~~
credit_guy
This paragraph is somewhere in the middle of the article so maybe it's easy to
miss:

"The TJ100 however not only has much lower thrust than the original KH-55
engine but also is just your regular old turbojet. This leads to some
questions about range. Both the missile’s smaller size and its more fuel-
hungry engine make it seem __unlikely it’s range would be anywhere close to
the the Soumar’s /Hoveyzeh’s range of 1350km __ "

So no, the attacks did not happen with the Quds-1 missile, but rather with a
much more advanced one. A missile in the same class as the Tomahawk, or the
KH-55. These missiles are not garage-level technology.

~~~
caf
...or it wasn't launched from Northern Yemen.

------
sverige
It is very interesting that Yemen may have developed their own missile, or
possibly a variation on an Iranian missile which was reverse engineered from a
Soviet missle.

What would be even more interesting (to me at least) is to see the United
States withdraw all our combat personnel from the region and let the players
in the region figure it out for themselves. The U.S. has now been at war
continuously for 18 years, which is the longest stretch ever. I'm starting to
feel like my generation may be the last American generation to remember a time
when we weren't at war.

I felt a small surge of hope when Bolton was canned (or resigned, what does it
matter really as long as he's gone), but then Trump tweeted that he was
waiting to see what the Saudis want us to do, which is frankly ass backwards.

Here's hoping for the end of American soldiers dying in other people's wars in
my lifetime, which would make the subject of this article seem like something
less than a provocation for yet more strikes by the U.S.

~~~
wahern
> What would be even more interesting (to me at least) is to see the United
> States withdraw all our combat personnel from the region and let the players
> in the region figure it out for themselves.

Well, that's partly what the Iran nuclear deal was about. While not
necessarily intentional, the fact that Iran was free to go about building
their conventional weaponry was a _feature_ \--it prevented a power vacuum
from opening up. You _want_ a detente between the Iranian and Saudi Arabian
spheres of power. Power imbalances create instability. Not just because the
more powerful will try to grab more resources, but because (as here) the
weaker are politically incentivized to antagonize the stronger powers.

~~~
solatic
> Power imbalances create instability

Citation needed.

Generally accepted wisdom is that power balances create instability (albeit
one in which rational players can manage the instability to provide the
illusion of stability, if so incentivized), and imbalances create stability
(albeit one that is fragile and under threat from asymmetric players). This is
a separate issue from the values of fairness, equality, and justice, which are
far more concordant, on the surface level, with a balance of power between
players, even as they are only secured through the institution of an
unbalanced, central power.

On a domestic level, a strong federal government provides political stability.
Legacy rights, specifically the Second Amendment, which attempt to create a
"balance" of power between citizens, result in violence.

On an international level, Pax Romana and Pax Americana. Global stability has
been worsening with the decline of American power.

~~~
wahern
Great power imbalances can permit one power to conquer another. But that's not
necessarily stability; at best it's a guarantee that you get to write the
history. Ask the Uighurs how stable and secure things are for them. Or
Ukrainians. Or the lands that Rome conquered as they were being conquered.

Do you think the Middle East would be more stable if Saudi Arabia were
powerful enough to conquer Iran?

Power imbalances are almost by definition how violence arises as it means that
forces are out of equilibrium. If you want to avoid all violence, even at the
outset, you have to constructively arrange for a balance of powers. It's odd
you single out the U.S. because the tripartite (4-part if you include
Federalism) structure of American government is renowned for having the
foresight to vest powers in distinct branches in a manner designed to maintain
a balance through tension. The structure of American government wasn't
particularly novel; what was truly novel was the recognition of the utility of
constructively leveraging opposing domains of power to build something as
sophisticated as a national government.

~~~
solatic
> But that's not necessarily stability

Yes, it is - it's an unjust stability, which is why I pointed out that the
question of justice is separate from the question of stability. Do not confuse
justice with stability. China and Russia are stable powers and Rome was a
stable power, but none of them are democratically just.

> Do you think the Middle East would be more stable if Saudi Arabia were
> powerful enough to conquer Iran?

No, because that's a more complicated question than you think. Like I pointed
out, large stable powers are threatened by asymmetric players. The US invaded
Afghanistan and Iraq and defeated their incumbent governments extremely
quickly, only to discover that American rule was unstable because of
asymmetric threats in both countries. A theoretically (really, only
theoretically) sufficiently powerful House of Saud could govern Iran, but
there would be enough of a threat from asymmetric players to undermine the
stability of Saudi rule in Iran. Being able to quantify the potential for
asymmetric threat and accounting for it in a risk profile to try to present
the case for or against invasion is, to my knowledge, an open research
question in military science, conflict studies, game theory.

> If you want to avoid all violence, even at the outset, you have to
> constructively arrange for a balance of powers

Literally _the_ explanation for why all of human history is so bloody is
because for most of human history, the difference in military power between
players was slim to none. Europe was a patchwork of warring fiefdoms with no
clear central power (aside from Pax Romana) resulting in two world wars. Latin
America was unstable for most of the twentieth century for the same reason
(see above). Warlords continue to be a source of much instability across the
African continent as much of the continent is run by governments which are too
weak to effectively control the sum of their territories from the threats of
warlords etc. I have absolutely no idea where you came up with this idea.

> structure of American government is renowned for having the foresight to
> vest powers in distinct branches in a manner designed to maintain a balance
> through tension

And the result is quite unstable. Each branch, internal to its own context,
yes is quite stable - but the sum total is so unstable that 46 years after Roe
v. Wade, there is still no consensus on abortion policy; 52 years after the
adoption of the 25th Amendment, there is still no consensus on whether it
permits the Cabinet to remove a sitting President who does not want to be
removed; 151 years after the adoption of the 14th Amendment, there is still no
consensus on the true meaning of "equal protection of the laws" across racial
and class divides.

Rather, American governance is a case study in how projecting stability
_externally_ \- both to the general American public, and to the world, each in
its own context - can help to mask a deep _internal_ instability, and how that
internal instability paradoxically feeds the external projections of
stability, for better (Pax Americana) or for worse (industry holding off on
investment while it's unclear as to the extent of the trade war with China).

------
forget1t
Interesting article just on the missile evidence from prior attacks. Probably
the most detailed out there. However, other conclusions here seem rather out
of place.

If this is a crime, then any crime investigation should examine motive, timing
and means.

Few recent geopolitical details to keep in mind:

1 - Trump administration just fired the #1 anti-Iran hawk (Bolton) and
signaled interest in talking with "no conditions" with the Iranian regime.
This would entirely change the Iranian position in the region [1]. It suggest
lunacy from an otherwise calculating regime to jeopardize this potential new
chapter.

2 - Iran just signed a $280 billion investment deal with China. Which includes
presence of 5000 Chinese "security" forces. Essentially creating a Chinese
military base across the waters from the US military base [2]. Iran would not
want to escalate into a war before it has chance to land the Chinese forces on
the ground and use them as a deterrent.

Do keep in mind, aside from the impact of the $280B investment in Iranian
infrastructure and oil sector, it essentially makes Chinese currency the
second currency of oil trade.

The oil trade in $USD is one of the most important and financial power that
America has. This is something started during the Nixon era as a way to deal
with the budget deficits needs of paying for the Vietnam war and it has
continued ever since ensuing stability of $USD as we print money [3]

Just looking at these, you can make an argument there are multiple entities
interested in either breaking any possibility of meeting between US and Iran,
as clearly Trump has already walked backwards about "no condition" talk
statements [4].

These entities with most to lose from a Trump/Iran meeting are:

Saudi Arabia Israel

Looking at the imagery and precision of these hits, you almost wonder if the
attacks might have come from something else. Not to mention we've already had
attacks on ships in the Persian Gulf with the original narrative disputed [5]
and following a precision attack from a "flying objects" possibly a missile.

Given that the only evidence to Quds is a destroyed missile image from Saudi
Arabia (a rather partial entity) from past and there are no actual evidence
yet from the attack sites itself, you can as easily look at who has most to
gain from a military confrontation with Iran or the very least stopping any
diplomatic rapprochement between US and the Iranian regime. A case can be made
for both Saudi Arabia and Israel.

Then there is the questions of the means.

On Israel there are multiple options.

1, Israel has some of the most stealth submarines in the world that they got
from Germany. It is equipped with a cruise missile [6]

2, Israel can also strike from the air from a distance. Israel recently hit
Iraq [7] and it has stealth ability to fly close to the Kuwait border to fire
their cruise missiles [8]

The point I'm making, while you can make a case for Iran, you can as easily
make the case for Israel. Given the biggest beneficiary of this latest
escalation are probably the Israelis (please do not hate me for saying this)
we should equally look at this possibility.

Lastly, these missile might have come for the "rebels" in Yemen. It's hard to
imagine how an impoverished country could make something like this. Import the
parts and everything else and then manufacture and test it. Obviously you
could look at Iran as the source, however, there is one more regional player
who benefits from the Saudi-Yemen war quagmire which is Qatar.

Saudi Arabia (or rather MBS) began a siege of Qatar and gave an ultimatum of
invasion and overthrow of the country's rulers. Despite numerous back channel
efforts there is no easing on the tension between Qatar and Saudi Arabia [9] A
case can be made that Qatar would want to support the "rebels" and prolong the
Saudi-Yemen conflict as long as possible to get leverage over the Saudis.

[1] [https://theintercept.com/2019/09/15/threatening-war-oil-
dona...](https://theintercept.com/2019/09/15/threatening-war-oil-donald-trump-
rails-media-not-forgetting-offered-iran-talks/)

[2] [https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20190907-a-blow-to-
washing...](https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20190907-a-blow-to-washington-
china-to-invest-280-billion-in-iranian-sectors-targeted-by-sanctions/)

[3] [https://www.investopedia.com/articles/forex/072915/how-
petro...](https://www.investopedia.com/articles/forex/072915/how-petrodollars-
affect-us-dollar.asp),
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-05-30/the-
untol...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-05-30/the-untold-story-
behind-saudi-arabia-s-41-year-u-s-debt-secret)

[4] [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-aramco-attacks-
trum...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-aramco-attacks-trump-
meeting/trump-says-incorrect-he-is-willing-to-meet-iran-with-no-conditions-
idUSKBN1W00VV)

[5] [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-tanker-japan-
dama...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-tanker-japan-
damage/flying-objects-damaged-japanese-tanker-during-attack-in-gulf-of-oman-
idUSKCN1TF0M9)

[6] [https://www.nti.org/analysis/articles/israel-submarine-
capab...](https://www.nti.org/analysis/articles/israel-submarine-
capabilities/)

[7] [https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/officials-confirm-
isr...](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/08/officials-confirm-israel-air-
raid-iraq-190823094346731.html)

[8]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delilah_(missile)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delilah_\(missile\))

[9] [https://www.trtworld.com/middle-east/saudi-qatar-hopes-
for-m...](https://www.trtworld.com/middle-east/saudi-qatar-hopes-for-
mediation-go-up-in-smoke-29669)

~~~
zyxzevn
Saudi Arabia also has a lot to win by inciting a war with Iran. And their
government is certainly not afraid of killing off some civilians.

So this needs to investigated from all angles. Every party could be guilty.

And the solution should find a way towards peace instead of towards war. That
is the only way to build a stable society for the people.

~~~
zyxzevn
Update by Former Pentagon Official: No evidence Iran attacked Saudi oil fields
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iM7lcTL2Rs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iM7lcTL2Rs)

The drones/cruise-missiles came from north / north-west. Not straight from
Iran, but from a source in Iraq. ..If this information is correct.

~~~
jabl
A cursory web search suggests "RT America" (Russia Today?) is funded by the
Kreml. Do you think it's trustworthy?

------
SergeAx
Loved the reference to xkcd)

