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Israel and Iran have both been preparing for this confrontation for decades. So, how do they stack up? Well, on paper, Iran far outnumbers Israel in terms of active and reserve personnel. Iran is a much bigger country than Israel; 86 million people to Israel's 10 million people. So, the Iranians have got 960,000 personnel. Israel has got 634,000.
But this war, of course, won't be about who has the more manpower. It's really about who has the best technology, particularly in the air war. And on that score, there is a clear and obvious winner. So, let's look at the attack capabilities.
Now, first, Israel's weapon of choice. Of course, there are its fighter jets, the F-15, the F-16, and the F-35. Very stealthy. The F-35 can get through radar defenses undetected. Very, very useful weapon system for the Israelis to operate. The Iranians, they operate much older Russian jets, and they've lost some of them. They don't work as well. And so instead they've built up a huge stockpile of missiles and drones, and they include the Shahid 136 that we've seen much of in Ukraine. The IMAD, the Kuron Shar big missile, but this one, the Fatter, there's a whole family of Fatter missiles. They work. The most modern versions of them are thought to be hypersonic, which are really very difficult to defend against.
In total, it's estimated that the Iranians may have 3,000 of these ballistic missiles. Most estimates would say it's probably nearer 2,000, but undoubtedly they have a lot of them and they could keep throwing them at Israel over the coming days and weeks if they chose to do that. And Israel claims that Iran was building up the capacity to manufacture 300 ballistic missiles a month. And that with their ranges would put Israel and hundreds of US bases in the crosshairs around the region. So if you look at a range map, undoubtedly the Iranians have a big capacity building in terms of their ballistic missiles and their drones.
Now over the years, Israel has the most advanced defense system in the world, and it's built it up and it's getting support from United States assets in the region. And that system, most people call it the Iron Dome, but Iron Dome is only one type of missile. So there's the Iron Dome missile itself. There's David's Sling, which is a high-altitude short-range very fast missile. And there's the A3. Probably the best of the whole bit is the AR3 that probably works the best of all. But between them, as well as with some Patriot missiles, they create this sense of a dome, a multi-layered dome that sits on top of their population centers that can cover the whole country because it's a small country and give them close to 100% protection. But of course, no system will ever give you 100% protection.
Now, you can see here action over Tel Aviv. A few missiles did get through, but the vast majority were intercepted. But no system, no system is ever 100% because any system can be overwhelmed with sheer numbers. And in that respect, we know that Iran does have the numbers. But in contrast, Iran's air defenses are older. They're weaker, and they've been badly hurt by Israel already.
Now, the IDF have actually looked at some of these systems. The S300, an old Russian system, doesn't work that well these days if you know where it is. The Corad 15 and the Tactile Hunter. They're okay, but they're quite old. And the IDF has released these images of them attacking Iranian surface-to-air missiles near Tehran. And there they are. If they can spot them, they can destroy them. They've got enough intelligence to know where they are. Even those which are mobile like the S300. Once they've spotted them, then effectively they're dead. If the Israelis decide to go for them, finally, Israel has the one thing that they don't want Iran to have, nuclear weapons; the Jericho 2, which is a nuclear weapon-tipped missile. The Israelis will never confirm or deny whether they have nuclear weapons, and they deny that they are running a nuclear program in this way, but we all know that they are. They have the Jericho 2. It is nuclear. The Iranians would love to have what the Israelis have had for years.
And in response to these attacks, the Iranians talk a very good game. They talk big, and they can certainly hurt Israel. But in a war of the skies, which this is going to be for some time yet, Tel Aviv certainly has the upper hand.