A Hizballah mission, which arrived in Moscow Tuesday, Oct. 28, was taken around Russian state of the art anti-tank missile factories, including KBP in the town of Tula southwest of Moscow, DEBKAfile’s exclusive military sources report. The Lebanese visitors were treated to a live fire demonstration of various types of missile. They then ordered 3,000 missiles of different types and returned home Saturday, Nov. 1.
Tehran is footing the bill.
Our sources disclose that the hardware inspected by the Hizballah officers included 9M133 (Nato-coded Spriggan AT-14) which can be launched by helicopter and Kliver, which is an upgraded Kornet-E mounted on vehicles. The Lebanese Shiite terrorist shoppers also placed a large order for RPG-32 rocket-propelled grenades made by Bazalt. In the 2006 Lebanon war, the older RPG-29 used by Hizballah was responsible for most of the hits suffered by Israeli tanks.
Last month, Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert traveled to Moscow to ask Russian leaders to refrain from selling arms to Syria and Iran, countries at war with Israel. Moscow only promised to reconsider weapons sales capable of upsetting the balance of strength in “sensitive regions” and then went right ahead to sign big arms deals with Damascus and Tehran – and now Hizballah.
Sunday, Nov. 2, defense minister Ehud Barak warned Syria that arming Hizballah with new anti-air weapons would force Israel to “consider its position.”
Several weeks ago, DEBKAfile reported that Syria had supplied the Shiite group with anti-air missiles supported by radar stations. They are already deployed on two Lebanese peaks, Mt. Sannine and Jebel Barukh, which Hizballah controls.
Our military sources stress that Barak’s “warning” will not deter Moscow, Damascus or Hizballah who will taken it to mean that Israel is not preparing to act for now.
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