Because the outbreak of open hostilities between Iranian forces, and the USA and Israel, in April 2024, adopted by a number of subsequent clashes over the next years, the Iranian ballistic missile arsenal has performed an indisputably central position in permitting the nation to maintain its defences and restrict its adversaries’ escalation by way of deterrence. The arsenal has been excellent each for its sheer scale, in addition to for the sophistication of lots of the missile sorts in use, together with multi-warhead missiles, and missiles with manoeuvring reentry autos and hypersonic glide autos. The superior state of the nation’s missile forces has contrasted sharply with the state of the big majority of the Iranian Armed Forces, together with its armoured models, artillery, fighters fleet, and floor navy, reflecting a robust prioritisation of funding. Commander of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Aerospace Forces Amir Ali Hajizadeh, who was killed in motion by Israeli forces on June 13, 2025, supplied perception into the choice in a just lately circulated interview which seems to have been given shortly earlier than his demise.
Elaborating on the origins of the Iranian missile buildup within the Eighties, Brigadier Common Hajizadeh noticed: “Within the discipline of armaments, in the course of the years after the [Iran-Iraq] warfare, Hazrat Agha [Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei]inspired self-sufficiency, indigenisation, and standing on our personal toes, however this is only one subject. However the query of which path to take, which weapons to indigenise, and the way to take action, is a vital matter…. we wanted to decide on the suitable path effectively. For instance, over the previous thirty years – maybe ranging from 1984 – particularly within the missile discipline, we see this emphasis constantly throughout completely different years.” Iran had first procured ballistic missiles from North Korea in the course of the Iran-Iraq Warfare, specifically the Hwasong-5 and Hwasong-6, and would go on to cooperate intently with the East Asian state, procuring missiles ‘off the shelf,’ license producing them domestically, and when growing designs indigenously, buying a variety of Korean applied sciences, elements and subsystems. A number of thousand North Korean missile specialists resided in Iran over a number of many years to help a variety of missile applications, in addition to to work on different applications together with fortifying missile and nuclear services deeply underground. Such fortifications have been key to permitting Iran to maintain its missile capabilities regardless of the U.S. and its strategic companions’ sustained efforts to destroy its arsenals on the bottom.
Brigadier Common Hajizadeh famous that the funding in ballistic missile capabilities had yielded much more optimistic outcomes for the nation’s safety state of affairs than an funding in fighter plane would have, observing:
“If we had adopted the trail taken by the [rest of the] world – the place each the East and West primarily pursued offensive weaponry by way of plane growth. If we adopted the trail of the world, who’ve now reached, for instance, fifth technology [fighter aircraft], we might possible nonetheless have been struggling at across the third technology. What does that imply? It signifies that no matter we did, we might all the time be behind them; with a lag of fifty years. However as an alternative of falling behind the enemy and by no means with the ability to catch up, we selected a path that has now positioned us nose to nose with them. Which means, whereas we did pursue a threat-based strategy in response to the hazard we confronted, we additionally developed capabilities that might successfully counter these threats.”
It’s notable that solely the USA, China and Russia have developed fifth technology fighters, whereas solely the U.S. F-35 and Chinese language J-20 and J-35 are thought-about really prime tier opponents. Iran’s a lot smaller financial system, tech sector, and industrial base would have been removed from effectively positioned to develop a peer stage fighter sort even to Russia’s Su-57, a lot much less to prime tier U.S. and Chinese language designs.
Iran’s procurement choices characterize the outcomes of an uneven funding technique, and mirrors related choices taken by a number of potential targets for U.S. and Western Bloc assaults after the tip of the Chilly Warfare. North Korea and Syria’s lack of ability to obtain trendy fight plane from Russia after the Soviet Union disintegrated, resulting from constant Western Bloc stress on Moscow, led each to take a position closely in growing missile deterrents, in addition to weapons of mass destruction together with in Syria’s case superior nerve gasses. Russia equally prioritised funding in its nuclear forces and its tactical ballistic missile arsenal, though it was restricted by the Intermediate Vary Nuclear Forces Treaty which prevented it from growing comparable tactical arsenals to these of Iran or North Korea till the late 2010s. The U.S.-led assault on Iran in June 2025, and second assault launch from February 2026, have supplied the primary giant scale check of such asymmetrically oriented forces in opposition to main NATO standard forces.
