The Iron Dome - 90% Accuracy BS

[KKLoco]

So I came across this video of tons of bombs raining down on Tel Aviv tonight. Why do they say the iron dome is 90% accurate? In this video, it looks like it has about 10% accuracy, as bombs are reaching their targets. Please help this dummy understand. Make sure and watch the entire 4 minute video. It escalates as it progresses.

[UltraBudgie]

No idea. Though I suppose there might be two factors: 1) Saturation. Anti-missile batteries are a limited resource and a large enough fusilade can overwhelm capacity, and 2) ECM. Electronic counter measures can throw off targeting locks.  Remember how Iran launched dozens of different missile varieties in the past, and was mocked for it?  "They're sending the dregs of their arsenal!"  Well perhaps they were testing to see what worked and what didn't.

[KKLoco]

No idea. Though I suppose there might be two factors: 1) Saturation. Anti-missile batteries are a limited resource and a large enough fusilade can overwhelm capacity, and 2) ECM. Electronic counter measures can throw off targeting locks.  Remember how Iran launched dozens of different missile varieties in the past, and was mocked for it?  "They're sending the dregs of their arsenal!"  Well perhaps they were testing to see what worked and what didn't.

Interesting, and thank you for the reply. I’m an idiot when it comes to military projects. I just saw that video and thought ‘wait a minute, isn’t it supposed to be super accurate?’ Then I went and searched it, and just about every site says 90%. It really looked like maybe 10% were exploding mid-air. Especially, as you get more towards the middle of the video. It really looks like Iran has learned to expose its weaknesses.

[Maxmars]

I always felt that such claims as 90% were MIC "marketing."  In my mind I always apply a +/- 30-40% to any such claims... it's what they can 'get away with" given 'explanations' for every deficit in outcomes.  In the very beginning, weapons of war, are all simple "products;" meaning they exist simply to be sold for war.  Commerce compels 'selling' which always 'compliments' the product. The Iron Dome is a "product" (system) for sale.

In its' use I would applaud anything that saves lives. Even if it were only 20-30% effective that would mean many innocents were ultimately saved from indiscriminate bombing... it seems that it would be worth using, given that.

But this is one of those things that's ironic.  You see they entire notion of "throwing rocks to hurt people" seems indiscriminate... the justification for killing "whoever is around" should always be always 'suspect.' 

We live in a world where too many leaders of states are willing to "pay a bunch of money" to be able to slaughter their targets... with many seeming not just willing, but eager to do... the rest is just ideological, political, racist, or other bullshit leaders leverage against the compliance of their subject citizens. 

Leaders make war, and we are all told (usually by them,) that "we" just accept (and even love) that the victimization of innocents is somehow "regrettably unavoidable, and thus, tolerable."

Where the real red flag soars above all others is the commonly promulgated notion that "There are no innocents" (while never adding "... among our leaders' targets.")

Oops, sorry went all deep and shit. 

I hate war as an 'option.'  When it is a defensive necessity it is not a problem... until your own 'offense' proves you to be no different then those who attacked you.

It is true:

War is hell,
War never changes,
War is about killing.

War leads to "becoming" exactly like your enemy.

[xpert11]

The following is my hot take, but any glaring errors or omissions are mine.


The issue with Air defence capabilities is what gets through them and finds their intended targets. Reporting the success rate of the Iron Dome might offer the Israeli public reassurance, but it doesn't provide anything useful from an analytical standpoint. 

Consider the United States Navy dealing with the kamikazes for a moment. The kamikaze aircraft and other craft didn't breach American defences, failed to find their targets, and never inflicted any damage. But the kamikazes that scored successful hits sunk or inflicted severe damage on vessels.

Similarly, the Royal Navy's experiences with the Argentinian Air Force during the Falklands War are also a valuable case study for historians and military planners. The Argentinian Air Force's conventional attacks against the Royal Navy and other ships involved in retaking the Falklands didn't change the war's outcome. However, the Royal Navy expeditionary force suffered losses from Argentinian aircraft scoring bomb hits on their vessels.

To stay on topic, I will skip the role of damage control at sea and other matters that come into play.

However, one other point worth briefly making is that the kamikazes sunk more United States Navy vessels than occurred in previous WW2 sea and air battles. Moreover, the United States Navy's submarine campaign, not its capital ships, destroyed Japan's merchant fleet. The loss of irreplaceable shipping partly sealed Japan's strategic doom.

I invite the reader to apply the above historical lessons to Irasel's air defences, the Houthis's targeting of shipping in the Red Sea, and future conflicts. If China converts its manufacturing base from exporting low-quality consumer goods to producing war materials, brace for trouble. The output from China's drone and missile factories would not only provide a massive threat but likely tip the balance of the war in their favour.

[FlyingClayDisk]

So I came across this video of tons of bombs raining down on Tel Aviv tonight. Why do they say the iron dome is 90% accurate? In this video, it looks like it has about 10% accuracy, as bombs are reaching their targets. Please help this dummy understand. Make sure and watch the entire 4 minute video. It escalates as it progresses.

The 90% claims are likely a lot of bravado and propaganda for the most part (as others have noted as well).  However, remember that missile defense includes a variety of different technologies and tactics, so you're not going to see patriot batteries go up and directly take out 9/10 incoming missiles directly (as many people expect to see).  Countermeasures include things like electronic jamming systems, optical jamming systems, fragmentation systems, decoys, close-in weapons systems, anti-projectile artillery and various other systems are also employed.  When you combine all these systems you can create a fairly effective defense over a selected area against certain types of offensive weapons.  You don't have to impact and detonate an incoming missile directly; many times you can use kinetic and/or fragmentation weapons to disrupt, disable or destroy an incoming missile just by detonating something near it.  In the case of the close-in systems; these work by simply sending a wall of explosive rounds in the general vicinity of the incoming missile trajectory.  The tactics are to disrupt or destroy incoming missiles before they can arm and detonate.  There can still be an issue of dealing with unexploded ordnance after the fact, but at least you don't have missiles detonating in population centers.

So, when you add all these things together you might get defensive averages up over 50% somewhere, but I would say 90% is pretty overly optimistic.

The more important strategic point in this discussion is how long you can sustain such a defense.  You might get high percentages early in an attack, but as successive waves of attacks come in those percentages drop rapidly simply because you run out of defensive munitions.

Lastly just some data points for reference.  People commonly hear about "Patriot" missile batteries, but it's important to understand these aren't like 1-2 missiles on a truck which can just travel anywhere.  A Patriot "battery" is a whole system which includes (3-4) platoons of personnel along with officers to operate, command and control vehicles, multiple radars, and upwards of (6) missile batteries each capable of firing up to (16) missiles.  It sounds like a lot, but you don't just fire one missile at a time, and once you fire all the missiles on a given launcher it takes a couple whole platoons of personnel a couple hours to re-arm the system (assuming you have the munitions and service vehicles there to do it).  A single battery costs on the order of $2 billion (yes, 'billion') dollars, and requires (60-100) personnel to operate.  So, you can see how this is not something you could sustain for long duration / multiple wave attacks...over a vast area.  Now, this is only one type of defense, and there are other less expensive and more numerous systems, but they're also not as effective.  This is just one example (which is frequently bantered about in the media).  So, there's quite a bit of strategy in how you deploy and utilize these systems.  And, it's not like you have (50) of these systems just laying around (the cost alone would be stratospheric)

[KrustyKrab]

So I came across this video of tons of bombs raining down on Tel Aviv tonight. Why do they say the iron dome is 90% accurate? In this video, it looks like it has about 10% accuracy, as bombs are reaching their targets. Please help this dummy understand. Make sure and watch the entire 4 minute video. It escalates as it progresses.

Looked more like 90% hit than not.

[FlyersFan]

Were those missiles coming down to the ground or were they debris from after being hit by the iron dome?  I can't tell.

[KKLoco]

Were those missiles coming down to the ground or were they debris from after being hit by the iron dome?  I can't tell.

They were hitting their targets on the ground. The media is downplaying the destruction and just how many misses were fired. Trying to keep the facade that the iron dome is just that effective.

Thanks everyone for the replies. Especially, thank FCD for the detailed explanation. I think I’ve got my head wrapped around it now. Short version, it takes a lot of man power and bandwidth to reload the damn things.  Seems kind of counterproductive to have such advanced technology, only to have it be so labor intensive to operate.

[KrustyKrab]

Lastly just some data points for reference.  People commonly hear about "Patriot" missile batteries, but it's important to understand these aren't like 1-2 missiles on a truck which can just travel anywhere.  A Patriot "battery" is a whole system which includes (3-4) platoons of personnel along with officers to operate, command and control vehicles, multiple radars, and upwards of (6) missile batteries each capable of firing up to (16) missiles.  It sounds like a lot, but you don't just fire one missile at a time, and once you fire all the missiles on a given launcher it takes a couple whole platoons of personnel a couple hours to re-arm the system (assuming you have the munitions and service vehicles there to do it).  A single battery costs on the order of $2 billion (yes, 'billion') dollars, and requires (60-100) personnel to operate.  So, you can see how this is not something you could sustain for long duration / multiple wave attacks...over a vast area.  Now, this is only one type of defense, and there are other less expensive and more numerous systems, but they're also not as effective.  This is just one example (which is frequently bantered about in the media).  So, there's quite a bit of strategy in how you deploy and utilize these systems.  And, it's not like you have (50) of these systems just laying around (the cost alone would be stratospheric)

WOW, That’s crazy, I had no idea it was that involved and required that much manpower.