after the US-led strike in Syria in mid-april Russia announced that they were considering moving much more capable surface-to-air missile systems to Syria a lot of Syria's air defense consists of older soviet-era systems like the S-75 the S-125 and the S-200 most of these systems have been in service for over half a century while still capable they are much more susceptible to radar jamming and their weaknesses are well known enabling modern air forces to mitigate much of the threat that they pose
the system in consideration is the S-300 specifically the S-300 P.MU2 one of the latest variants of the 300 family the system is a long-range SAM designed to shoot down aircraft it is the next evolution of the S-200 the launchers each carry four missiles and each battery will have anywhere between four to twelve launchers giving them many more missiles than the rail launched S-200 they can also be relatively quickly reloaded in about 45 minutes depending of course on many factors such as number of missiles and trans loaders nearby and the combat situation at the time
Russia already has advanced the S-400 systems in Syria but they are under Russian control these S-300s will be directly under Syrian control there hasn't been any word yet on exactly where the systems would be deployed but likely sites include Damascus and major air bases, just a few of these systems would have the ability to cover most of the populated regions of the country.
the new systems would pose a threat to the US and their allies operating in the region but the country that will be most impacted by these new systems would be Israel, Israel's conducted numerous Airstrikes inside of Syria hitting targets it says our weapons convoys headed to groups like Hezbollah along with Iranian sites inside the country, Israel typically uses terrain masking to stay hidden from Syrian radar and the mountainous region of western Syria gives plenty of cover but for deeper and more aggressive strikes the S-300 will pose a significant problem for Israel much more so than the older S-200 which managed to shoot down an Israeli F-16 back in February.
along with the S-300 system there has been talk about Russia also delivering several more Pantsir S-1 systems Syria already has received some three and pants ears from Russia a few years back but several of which may have been lost in the ongoing conflict Pantsir S-1 for those who don't know is a short-range surface-to-air missile system it is very new only recently deployed in 2012 it is designed as a point defense system and excels at shooting down low-flying cruise missiles and drones it's proved its value back in January of 2018 when it shot down several drones that had attacked the Russian air base in Syria.
Israel has voiced concerns about these reports of Syrian operated S-300s but claims they have the ability to destroy them it is true that Israel does have the ability to take them out but doing so would be much more difficult than the older air defenses and could come at a much higher cost so if the S-300 is deployed to Syria Israel will have to make a decision either scaling back their attacks in Syria or attempt to destroy them
