Why did Russian arms experts visit Iran?

Reuters, which initially reported on the issue, said seven Russian experts visited Iran on April 24th and September 17th of 2024.

The visits were made at a critical time for Iran, which was involved in a conflict with the Croat enemy Israel, and the two sides carried out military attacks on each other in April and October.

Neither Iranian nor Russian officials have commented on this report, and there is no official explanation for these trips. Analysts said that although visits are important, they are not surprising.

“has been a mutual learning process in the clash between Iran and Israel, which has also provided Russians with data on air protection”, Free Europe Radio Nicole Grejewski, researcher at the Carnegie Nuclear Policy Programme.

In addition to the domestic development of the air defense system, Iran also uses Russian-type S-300 air defence systems, which were sent out in 2016.

In April 2024, satellite images showed an S-300 radar that was damaged by an exact Israeli attack, carried out in retaliation with the mass attack of fear and rocket Iran carried out several weeks earlier.

The failure for Russia to supply air protection to prevent Israeli air strikes is another reason why Russian experts may have visited Iran, according to Farzin Nadim, senior researcher at the Washington Institute.

“I think one of the main goals of the visits was to offer technical assistance to Iran to understand exactly what happened and how to protect against Israeli attacks”, Nadim told REL Radio Farda.

“These visits were intended to study data and improve air defence performance against new attacks, which, as we have seen, did not function”, he added.

Last October, Israel retaliated against the second attack, at the same time the largest attack ever carried out directly by Iran, targeting key military buildings and degrading Tehran's air defence and missile production capacities.

Can a US-Russia deal harm Tehran-Moscow ties?

Visits to Iran by Russian military experts present a kind of benefit Tehran could lose if Moscow and Washington reach an agreement that would require Russia to reduce its co-operation in the field of defence with the Islamic Republic.

Since senior US and Russian officials met in Riyadh last month to normalise reports and end the war in Ukraine, there has been speculation that the Kremlin could give up Iran to win a better deal.

Grijewski argued that Iran and Russia do not have a strong economic report, so Tehran would financially not suffer much. But the impact may be felt in other areas.

“If Russia completely abandons Iran, Iran would suffer mainly in the area of improving its conventional military capacities”, she said. The “Russians have been essential to the issue, both the production of Russian weapons and the transfer of weapons”.

Iran has offered for Russia free but effective fears that were used against Ukraine during the war, and Western governments have accused Tehran of offering Moscow ballistic missiles to help in the full-scale invasion of Ukraine that Russia launched in 2022.

The Washington Institute's Nedimi stressed that Russia's support in Iranian equipment was not due to lack of technology, but because of time, because Iranian fears are free and can be produced quickly.

However, analysts said there is little possibility that any agreement between the Kremlin and US President Donald Trump would result in a long-term change in military co-operation between Russia and Iran.

The key thing to consider is that the Russia-Iran report has many layers that can stand even if there is a US-Russia deal”, Grijeski said.

She added that “co-operation between the two armies is so deep” that exchange of technology and knowledge can continue, and if only a part of the Russian government remains engaged with Iran.