Jeffrey and I recently had a story with Aaron Mehta in Breaking Defense on Iran’s air defenses around Natanz:
Aaron Mehta, “Iran’s air defenses around nuclear site more ‘brittle’ than expected: Exclusive analysis,” Breaking Defense, May 15, 2025, https://breakingdefense.com/2025/05/irans-air-defenses-around-nuclear-site-more-brittle-than-expected-exclusive-analysis/
Since this might have provoked the IRGC to release this video insisting their air defense radars work very well indeed, we decided to put up the full write up of our analysis.
Did Iran show us an air defense command center around the Natanz enrichment site?
If Israel or the United States were to launch an attack on Iran’s nuclear sites, one of the primary targets would be the large underground enrichment facilities near Natanz. And the first stage of any strike would be targeting the air defenses stations around Natanz.
Israel has, in the past, targeted air defense sites in Iran to demonstrate that it has the ability to conduct larger attacks. As part of the cycle of tit-for-tat violence in April 2024, Israel targeted an air defense site located near a facility outside Natanz where Iran had manufactured drones that were involved in an early attack.
Now, for the anniversary of the attack, Iran has released new footage showing a large number of drones and missiles being launched in the April strike. (See this post for a higher resolution version of parts of the video)
The video contains a short – 1.8 second – clip of an air defense command center.
Inside the command center, there are three screens showing the locations of four radars.
One of the screens shows two radar locations. The screen also shows the “coverage fan” of one of the radars. It is possible to use the terrain visible on the map to locate the two radars to air defense sites near Natanz. The screen also shows one of the radars’s “coverage fan.” Based on the size of the fan, the radar appears to have a range of about 120 km, which is consistent with the tracking range of the Iranian Najm 804 radar.
The Najm 804 radar is often deployed as part of the Khordad-15 air defense system which has been reported to use the Sayyad-3 SAM. However, during the announcement of the Khordad-15, it was shown along with both Sayyad-3 and Sayyad-2 SAMs, suggesting it is capable of using both interceptors.
Satellite images show a Najm 804 radar at an air defense site to the south of Natanz Nuclear Facility, along with the rest of a Khordad-15 battery. The battery and radar were present in April 2024, suggesting it is the white square with the radar fan seen on the screen in the video.
The other site may be a Tor SAM battery located just to the west of Natanz, but since there is no associated radar fan, it is more difficult to be sure. However, satellite imagery shows there were Tor launchers operational in early April, near the time of filming.
The two other screens are more interesting. The location of those radars can be identified by comparing the polygons on the screen with a map of Iran’s air traffic zones.
Each screen shows one radar. One is located north of Kashan (34.204909°, 51.430194°) , the other to the east of Natanz Nuclear Facility (33.757269°, 51.826422°).
We geolocated the radars by identifying where they were in relation to defined zones that appeared both on the radar screen and in the map of air traffic zones. The air traffic zone map provided rough coordinates to search, which then yielded Iranian early warning radars.
Based on satellite imagery, they appear to be similar to Spoon Rest radars from the Soviet Union. Measuring the range circle on the display, it appears the range of the radar is approximately 200-210 km. This suggests the radar is derived from the P-12 Spoon Rest A, which has a 200 km range, rather than the longer range P-18 Spoon Rest D.
The Iranians held an exercise in January and February 2025 called Great Prophet 19, which included air defense exercises near Natanz and other nuclear facilities. A video released by Iranian PressTV of the exercise showed a Spoon Rest-derived radar, geolocated to the site east of Natanz. More precisely, the radar appeared to be a Matla-ul-fajr-3. However, the reported range for that system is 500 km. This discrepancy from the ranges displayed on the air traffic zone screens might suggest those radars are more limited than the Iranians claim. The Khordad-15 battery was not shown in the video from Great Prophet 19, though some reporting indicated the system participated in the exercise.
Interestingly, the S-300 radars struck by the Israelis in retaliation for the April missile attack which are also part of the layered air defense system for Natanz are not depicted in this command center.
This absence, along with the separation between the three different radar displays in the command center, suggest that if there is some networking of air defense radars in Iran, it is somewhat limited. The lack of fusion in the data may reflect the age and varied origin of the hardware involved, it may also reflect the more fragmented nature of Iranian air defenses.
Nevertheless, this short section of video has provided fascinating insight into the air defenses at one of Iran’s most important nuclear facilities.
However, even if the air defense network defending Natanz is more brittle than previously thought, what does that mean? As the Israelis demonstrated in their strike on the Isfahan S-400 battery in April, Iranian air defenses are vulnerable to attacks by Israel and the U.S. Even if the U.S. or Israel were to destroy the air defenses surrounding Natanz, what would follow? Air strikes on the buried enrichment halls at the site would be a likely next step, but the Iranians have taken recent steps to undermine the effectiveness of such attacks. Excavations for an underground expansion to Natanz have been underway for years, deep enough under nearby mountains to likely render it safe from conventional U.S. bunker buster munitions and harder to destroy than the existing underground Fordow uranium enrichment plant. The Iranians say the underground facility is for centrifuge manufacture, but it is also possible the space could also be filled with additional cascades of centrifuges.
This again begs the question of what the next steps would be after destroying air defenses? Israeli President Netanyahu reportedly floated commando raids on Iranian underground nuclear sites to President Trump, who shot down the idea. However, such a boots-on-the-ground escalation, or a prolonged campaign of air strikes to seal the underground facility and prevent it from being reopened, would be necessary to destroy Natanz at this point. Ultimately, despite the less sophisticated nature of Iranian air defenses in the area, Natanz may still be relatively secure, by virtue of its deeply buried facilities and location deep in Iranian territory.
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