Any publicity is good to take, said Andy Warhol. The Russian company Almaz-Antei, which manufactures the Pantsir S1 anti-aircraft close protection system, should hardly share this opinion in recent days. Indeed, according to the Turkish authorities, and videos conspicuously published on the internet, Turkish armed drones reportedly destroyed eight such systems around the city of Idleb, the focus of an armed confrontation between Syrian forces loyal to Bashar al Assad and pro-Turkish Islamist militias backed by Ankara's armed forces.
These videos, and the mediocre results they present for the Syrian Pantsir S1, are all the more damaging since the system is designed precisely to eliminate this type of threat, and its performance has been praised by many by the Russian forces, which use it in particular to protect the Russian air base of Hmeimim.
If several Pantsir S1 have, it seems, been destroyed while they were moving, some sequences show a stationary system, rotating radar, therefore visibly operational. Note that, on the Syrian side, the destruction of several Turkish drones is claimed, and the destruction of the Pantsir is denied.
So, does this mean that the Pantsir S1 is ineffective? It's unlikely. Indeed, it appears from videos published by Turkey, also showing Syrian S-125 and Tor M1 systems, that the problem is not in the equipment, but in the training of the servants of these materials, as well as tactics used by the Syrian army.
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