Well, taking common sense into account, the S-300 battery has to protect whatever it is protecting, not to destroy every aproaching aircraft. Thus, it could just switch off its radar once it believes that someone is attacking the battery and not the actual target, move a few kilometers, switch on again and so on. A mobile battery is not a battleship – it could just melt away in a forest and reappear an hour later, not just sit in the water so that anyone could see it. The fact that the battery is still alive will probably be enough to keep large strike groups away or force them to go lower, thus making short range SAMs effective. Also, the Russians have developed extensive electronic decoys, which could make detecting the real battery quite hard.
Another best selling tactic in the August War between Georgia and Russia was to position the batteries (the shorter ranged Buks though) not in the open field or on top of a mountain, but at the bottom of a small valley. Thus, enemy jammers and ELINT aircraft could not see them, while aircraft passing overhead were fired at from point blank range. Granted, such ambushes may not be able to protect the real target completely and limit the field of view of the battery, but could get you some high-profile shootdowns.
I think that in the end no single munition is going to be that effective against a complex air defence network. Multiple attack vectors, different munitions and as heavy electronic warfare as possible is the best solution. At least in my opinion the destruction of air defense assets in not the most important task in a war – there are usually much more meaningful targets and the air defenses just have to be suppressed long enough for a strike group to get in, bomb the target, get out. Going after every S-300 battery the enemy has could quickly turn into a neverending nightmare.
Sign In
