Post #5507

🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩 In his briefing, Hegseth said that Iranian retaliatory missile attacks against its neighbors had decreased by 90 percent since the beginning of the war on Feb. 28. Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has acknowledged that Iran still retains missile capabilities. Israel claimed on March 21 that for the first time, Iran fired intermediate-range ballistic missiles at the joint U.K.-U.S. Diego Garcia military base in the Indian Ocean, almost 2,000 miles away. Four of the most important sites, which make fuel for the ballistic missiles, the experts said, have suffered severe damage in attacks by the U.S. and Israel that is greater than what was inflicted during the 12-day war with Israel last June and in October 2024, when Israel attacked Iran. The sites — Khojir, Parchin, Hakimiyeh and Shahroud military complexes — house the production of critical missile propellants and assemble the weapons for use. Satellite imagery shows four main areas at the Khojir missile complex, just east of Tehran, were hit by the U.S. or Israel. The strikes targeted complex production systems that make solid and liquid fuel necessary to power the ballistic missiles, according to Sam Lair, a research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies. Ballistic missiles are fired miles into the air before returning to the ground at extremely high speeds. Those in the Iranian arsenal are fueled by either solid or liquid propellants, according to experts. Solid fuel is the most common, typically used for shorter range munitions and more efficient during war. Liquid propellants typically power the longest-range missiles, but have more time consuming fuel-loading processes, which makes them more vulnerable to attack. In total, at least 88 structures were destroyed at Khojir, according to satellite imagery taken on March 24. The IRGC’S Shahroud production complex in northeast Iran houses the research, development and mass production of solid fuel. It was heavily attacked by the U.S. or Israel, satellite imagery shows, leaving at least 28 damaged or destroyed structures. At least 29 missile launch bases have been hit by airstrikes, according to imagery, severely undermining Iran’s ability to fire ballistic missiles. Experts said the exact number of ballistic missile launch sites in Iran is not known but estimated there to be about 30. Most of these bases include underground missile storage facilities that are accessed through tunnels cut into mountainsides, according to experts. U.S. and Israeli strikes have hit many of these tunnel entrances, blocking access to where the missiles are kept, satellite imagery shows. Bases in central and western Iran are mobilized for medium-range strikes on Israel, while those along the Persian Gulf have been used to fire short range missiles at the Gulf states, Lamson said. #iran#ballistic#missile#israel#strikes 📱American Оbserver - Stay up to date on all important events 🇺🇸