Air Strikes by VKS & SyAAF, 18 June 2017

Once again, it was the Russians that opened the day by launching their fighter-bombers from Hmemmem AB, at 00.03, 00.07, and 00.15. All of…

Once again, it was the Russians that opened the day by launching their fighter-bombers from Hmemmem AB, at 00.03, 00.07, and 00.15. All of these at least passed over Houla in the RTP (if they didn’t bomb the place, too, like two days ago), though seem to have continued further in south-western direction.

At 01.24, Tiyas launched one L-39, and this disappeared in northern direction.

The Russians continued taking-off from Hmemmem — at 02.42, then at 02.55, at 03.48 (one helicopter), two around 04.00hrs, and one around 06.00hrs. Nearly all of these passed high above Houla in south-eastern direction, minutes later. It was thus almost certainly the Russians that bombed the SCD Centre in Dera’a, knocking it out of action, and also bombed Jobar several times during the morning.

Assadists went into action at 09.24, by launching one Su-22 from Tiyas. A MiG-21 and MiG-23 were then reportedly airborne over southern Damascus around 09.24–09.47: most likely, at least one of them came from Nassiriyah AB, which launched another MiG-23 at 10.10, and then one more, at 10.20. Dmeyr then added two Su-22s: one at 10.20 and another at 10.21: both of these went in eastern direction. Some of aircraft in question have targeted an unknown object within the Daesh-controlled area east of Salamiyah.

Nassiriyah continued launching MiG-23s, including one at 10.54, one at 11.10, one at 11.34, and one at 12.23: all of these went in north-western direction, indicating operations against the Daesh.

Interestingly, the VKS was rather quiet throughout this period: just one fighter-bomber took-off from Hmemmem around 10.00hrs, and a helicopter from Tiyas at 10.32 (this went in south-western direction, though).

Following a break of nearly two hours, Tiyas and Shayrat each launched a single Su-22 at 15.30, and Tiyas then got another Su-22 airborne at 16.19. All of these went in north-eastern direction. At 17.09, another Su-22 launched from Shayrat, and then another from Tiyas around 18.30.

Around 18.45, one of the last two Su-22s (most likely the one launched from Tiyas), was then shot down by an F/A-18E from VFA-31 (CVW-8, on board USS George W Bush, CVN-77, which is underway south-west of Cyprus). At least according to US sources, this should have happened shortly after the Sukhoi in question attacked the PKK/PYD/YPG/SDF-positions in or near Jaadeen (or Ja’Dan), south-east of Tabqa AB.

Nearly all of available reports indicate the Sukhoi crashed east of Rassafeh, which is still held by the Daesh — and thus well away from PKK/PYD/YPG/SDF-positions.

Three hours later, the MOD in Damascus confirmed the loss, declared the pilot for KIA, and accused the USA of blatant aggression.

Almost immediately afterwards — and, at least officially, ‘in retaliation for terrorist attacks in Tehran’, last week — the Iranians fired several ballistic missiles from their bases inside Iran. Here a video showing the launch of some of missiles in question:

One of Iranian missiles reportedly hit al-Mayadeen, south of Dayr az-Zawr (city).

Given the lack of activity by Assadist Su-24s, my guess is that the death of three civilians due to an ‘air strike’ on Hatla, outside Dayr az-Zawr, was caused by another.

Otherwise, and as observed elsewhere already yesterday, except early in the morning, Russian activity was actually minimal for most of the day, and this didn’t change much after the Sukhoi was shot down by USN fighters. Two Russian fighter-bomber were reportedly airborne over western Idlib between 18.30 and 19.00hrs, and two others around 19.30 — but that was about all. Correspondingly, Assadist reports like Russian Air Force is highly active now, or suggestions about ‘tensions between USA and Russia’ from yesterday late afternoon, are within realms of science fiction.

What did change is that the SyAAF’s flying stopped: there were no further take-offs before 20.31, when an L-39 launched from Kweres AB, and a VKS aircraft from Hmemmem AB. These two were also the last recorded flights for yesterday.

Totals

VKS

fighter-bombers: 14

helicopters: 2

UAVs: 4

recce: 0

SyAAF

L-39s: 2

helicopters: 3 (over the Dera’a area)

MiG-21s: 1

MiG-23s: 7

Su-22s: 8

Su-24s: 0