February 26, 2021
The Islamic Republic has been busy boasting of new Navy vessels the last several weeks, but what it hasn’t told the public is that all three of its Russian-made Kilo-class submarines the largest ships it owns are currently out of the water and inoperable.
The 3,000-ton Kilos are the Iranian Navy’s largest and most potent warships, both surface and subsurface.
Having all three Tariq, Noor and Yunes out of the water at once is unusual and not normal naval practice. It suggests some major problem. Navies try to rotate maintenance periods to keep as many submarines in the water as possible. For a navy with three submarines, like Iran’s Kilos, this should mean that at least one, and preferably two, are in the water at any point in time.
The next largest sub own by Iran is the 600-ton, built-in-Iran Fateh, a one of a kind sub. While the three Kilo-class subs have been beached, the Fateh has been tied up to the submarine pier in Bandar Abbas a further indicator of major problems.
The Kilos were bought from Russia in the 1990s and occasionally sent back to Russia for upgrades and overhauls. But in recent years, they have been overhauled in Iranian yards. The US Naval Institute News, which reported on the beached Kilos, said these periods in drydock have been longer than expected and “may indicate supply or skills shortages.”
It said one of the subs has been in a dry dock in Bandar Abbas since 2019, according to satellite photos. Another has been at the Shahid Darvish yard west of the city for months. And in mid-December the third was also put in a dry dock in Bandar Abbas. As of January 31, all three were still high and dry, it said.