Iran builds a 'Waze' to navigate the sea for its submarines
The current Iranian naval technology is designed to help it map and communicate at sea. It showcased various concepts that it claims it is employing.
By SETH J. FRANTZMANIranian Navy ships on a training exercise(photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)Iran’s coastal navy took a step forward as it claimed to have created a network of to identify undersea terrain and map the sea for its submarines. Called “Wasa,” the network of underwater wireless sensors was designed and built by Iran’s navy to collect subsurface information, Iran’s Fars News claims.Iran usually boasts of new military technologies so its claims should be taken with skepticism. However the article asserts that this network of “science designed underwater wireless sensors” is one of the most innovating in the world. Only advanced countries and superpowers have such systems, Tehran claims.Iran knows that its ground forces are no match for its main enemy, the United States, and its navy is similarly just a shadow of America’s Fifth Fleet based in the Gulf. However Iran wants to present a threat nevertheless and show that its submarines, of which is has several dozen of varying classes, are relevant. Most of Iran’s submarines are mini-submarines, but it has several built by Russia decades ago and several other diesel submarines that cannot venture far from the coast. It sought to add mines and torpedoes to them and constructed homing torpedoes in the early 2000s. It also fired a cruise missile from its Ghadir-class mini-subs.Iran says that its new technology and naval weapons will help to reveal the “concealed terrorist forces under the command off the great powers” that lurk off Iran’s waters. This nonsensical sentence likely refers to Iran’s recent actions at mining ships in the Gulf of Oman and claims it will cut off the Persian Gulf if threatened. Iran downed a US Global Hawk drone that was flying off its coast in June 2019. It also claims one of its oil tankers was attacked in the Red Sea. In 2011 Iran sent to ships from its navy to the Mediterranean. Iran has sought to send submarines to the Mediterranean as recently as 2017. Iranian ships last made a major show of docking in Sudan in 2012. In 2016 Iran carried out a giant naval drill dubbed Velayat 94 where it tested a new cruise missile called Nour. One of its Kilo-class submarines was last tracked and photographed being towed in the Mediterranean back in 1996.Iran carried out a naval drill with China and Russia last year. This was a major step forward for Iran’s navy. Iran is trying to make strides with use of cruise missiles torpedoes and naval drones. It constructed a small surveillance drone, the Pelican-2 that it has recently showcases. Iran also uses civilian-style dhows to smuggle weapons, including missiles and drones, to the Houthis in Yemen. Several of them have been intercepted by the US.The current Iranian naval technology is designed to help it map and communicate at sea. It showcased various concepts that it claims it is employing. This appears to be a way to show its navy is still relevant amid the coronavirus pandemic.
