Russia Gave Iran Radar Intelligence and Anti-Jam Hardware That Defeated US Electronic Warfare

Ask why Iranian drone and missile strikes have grown more precise over five months of war — and the answer is not strategy. It is hardware. Embedded in the wreckage of a Shahed drone that struck RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus on March 2, 2026, investigators recovered what analysts immediately recognized: a Kometa-M satellite navigation module, a Russian-designed Controlled Reception Pattern Antenna array that is standard on Russian Geran drones deployed against Ukraine. The same hardware, now confirmed in Iranian weapons, mathematically nullifies GPS jamming — and its presence in Iranian drones, paired with Russian signals intelligence providing the radar-signal and radio-wavelength data US systems emit, explains what US electronic warfare tools alone cannot.

Russia is providing electronic intelligence to Iran that is likely helping it pinpoint American forces in aerial attacks or jam American-made weapons, according to a US official and a European official with direct knowledge of the matter. Russian satellite surveillance and signals intelligence are likely allowing Iran to better defend itself against US airstrikes and refine its own aerial assaults, the officials said. The scope of the intelligence is specific: Russia is probably sharing electronic intelligence — radar signals, radio wavelengths — and what one expert describes as “live-time dynamic targeting information,” specific data allowing the launch of drones and missiles on short notice.

The arrangement amounts to something Western security officials have been reluctant to name plainly: Russia acting as a materially enabling partner in attacks on American forces. If confirmed, intelligence sharing that specifically improves Iranian targeting of US personnel would amount to Moscow acting as a co-belligerent, argued one analyst. And the technical architecture Russia has supplied makes that characterization precise rather than rhetorical.

Kometa-M: What Russia Delivered and Why GPS Jamming No Longer Works

The Kometa-M is not a navigation receiver — it is an anti-jamming shield for one. Technically classified as a Controlled Reception Pattern Antenna (CRPA) array, the Kometa-M4 variant is a 12-channel multi-element antenna system in which each element samples incoming satellite navigation signals simultaneously. A digital signal processor computes the direction of any interference — a jamming transmitter broadcasting noise across GPS frequencies — and applies a null: mathematically canceling that signal in the antenna’s reception pattern while maintaining gain toward the legitimate satellite above.

“Russia widely uses these CRPA devices, which are mostly assembled in Russia, but critical electronics are from China,” said Robert Tollast, a defense analyst at the Royal United Services Institute. “Russia has really taken Iranian drone technology to another level.” The practical consequence is direct: when a US or coalition electronic warfare system transmits a GPS-band jamming signal to degrade Iranian drone navigation, the Kometa-M module detects the interference direction and nullifies it, maintaining satellite lock.

“CRPA allows drones and missiles to filter out jamming signals and lock onto genuine satellite data,” a Western official told The National. “That means they can stay on target even in heavily defended airspace. It’s a capability that, until recently, was largely confined to more advanced military powers.”

CRPA alone would be a significant upgrade. But Iran’s drones and missiles have also acquired a second layer of EW resistance that compounds the problem for US defenders: multi-constellation satellite navigation using the American GPS network alongside China’s BeiDou-3 and Russia’s GLONASS simultaneously. Each constellation operates on different radio frequency bands — GPS L1/L2, GLONASS L1/L2/L3, BeiDou B1/B2/B3. A single US jamming system that targets GPS frequencies does not address the GLONASS or BeiDou receivers operating simultaneously in the same guidance unit. Defeating multi-constellation navigation requires three coordinated jamming operations across different frequency bands simultaneously — a task that exceeds the design specifications of most deployed US ground-based EW systems.

In ballistic missiles, the problem extends further. Iranian Zolfaghar ballistic missiles now incorporate terminal-phase thermal and optical sensor guidance in the final descent phase, after the satellite navigation phase is complete. Infrared seekers and cameras are entirely immune to radio frequency jamming — you cannot blind a thermal sensor with electromagnetic noise. What begins as a satellite-guided weapon becomes, in its final meters, a sensor-guided one.

What Russia’s ELINT Sharing Actually Enables

The NBC News report specifies a distinction that matters operationally: Russia is not only sharing imagery (the satellite photographs of US bases that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy documented in his July 25 disclosure). It is also sharing electronic intelligence — ELINT — the data derived from monitoring electromagnetic emissions of specific radar systems, communications equipment, and weapons systems.

ELINT is a different category of intelligence from satellite imagery, and its military value is different in kind, not merely degree. When Russia provides Iran with the radar signal characteristics — frequency, pulse width, polarization, scan rate — of a specific US radar or communications system operating in the Gulf theater, it gives Iranian EW operators the technical fingerprint needed to build a jammer targeted against that exact system. It also tells Iranian operators where the coverage gaps are: the angles, altitudes, or frequencies where a specific radar has reduced sensitivity. This is not general battlefield awareness. It is the engineering data needed to attack specific US systems electronically.

Russia has accumulated decades of ELINT on Western military systems — collected during NATO exercises, Cold War surveillance operations, and observation of US equipment in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. Much of that collection is directly relevant to the systems US forces are now operating in the Gulf. Iran, which has a small military satellite constellation and limited ELINT collection infrastructure, could not assemble that database independently.

Nicole Grajewski, an assistant professor at Sciences Po’s Centre de recherches internationales and author of Russia and Iran: Partners in Defiance (Oxford University Press/Hurst, 2026), described the intelligence sharing as filling a specific capability gap: “Iran has a small number of military satellites but Russia can draw on a large network of satellites and other data to provide the Tehran regime with information about U.S. forces faster and with more precision, as well as more accurate battle damage assessments from Iranian aerial strikes.” She noted that the types of targets Iran appears to be aiming for — radar sites and communication posts — reflect knowledge of where those systems are that Iran could not have acquired without specific intelligence support.

Western security sources told The National that there is a “high probability” that Iranian targeting experts are based at Russian satellite ground stations receiving precise location information.

Russia Also Transferred the Hardware That Makes ELINT Actionable

Signals intelligence without delivery hardware is incomplete. Russia has not merely provided data — it has provided the electronic warfare system needed to exploit that data offensively.

The Krasukha-4 (1RL257E) is Russia’s premier mobile ground-based electronic warfare platform: a two-vehicle set mounted on KamAZ-6350 8×8 trucks, designed to jam airborne radars, airborne early warning and control (AWACS) systems, satellite downlinks, and high-altitude surveillance aircraft across X/Ku/Ka-band frequencies at ranges of up to 300 kilometers (186 miles). Confirmed sightings of Krasukha systems in Iran, including the advanced Krasukha-4 variant, were documented as of September 2025. The same system Russia uses to disrupt US surveillance satellites and AWACS aircraft over Ukraine is now operational in Iran, pointed at US aircraft operating in the Gulf theater.

Russia has also provided Iran with guidance related to electronic warfare and drone employment, as well as components to improve Iranian one-way attack drones. In late March 2026, officials said Moscow was supplying Tehran with entire drones, apparently including upgraded versions of Iran’s Shahed-136 — specifically the Geran-2 variant Russia has been manufacturing at scale at its Alabuga facility in Tatarstan.

“Russia and Iran have thoroughly analyzed Western defenses in the Middle East,” said Anatoliy Khrapchynskyi, development director at EW firm Fly Group, which has studied the drone modification program. “They understood there’s no total EW saturation like there currently is in Ukraine, and so they deliberately equipped drones to break through the relaxed air defenses.”

The result has been a measurable shift in Iranian strike effectiveness. The Iranian aerial attacks, Grajewski noted, appear more precise than in the twelve-day Iran-Israel exchange in June 2025, and are now more focused on radar sites and communication posts — the kind of sensitive targets that experts say Iran could not have identified without specific intelligence support.

Cosmos-2550, a Russian radar and electronic signature reconnaissance satellite that recently passed over the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea, was identified by George Barros, a Russia expert at the Institute for the Study of War, as consistent with the type of support described in intelligence reporting. “They’re specialized for naval reconnaissance and detecting ships, because the radar signature off the water really pings it quite well,” Barros said. “These are known capabilities of the Russians.”

US Officials Contradict Intelligence Community

The gap between official messaging and intelligence assessments is now documented at the congressional level.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters that Russian assistance is not meaningfully affecting US operations. A White House spokesperson described Iranian attacks as decreasing by 90% and attributed the result to US military strikes destroying more than 150 Iranian naval vessels and more than 11,000 targets — claims that have not been independently verified.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, however, testified before the Senate the week of July 21 that Russia and China were, at different levels, limiting and enabling Iranian operations — a characterization CBS News described as “somewhat unclear” but notably more candid than Rubio’s public dismissal. General Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was more direct in April 30 congressional testimony: Russia is “definitely” supporting Iran, including satellite imagery and orbital surveillance data.

Earlier in the conflict, Hegseth had warned that Russia “should not be involved” even as open-source indicators were already consistent with active involvement. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov denied the intelligence-sharing accusations at a France 2 television interview on the sidelines of the G7 foreign ministers’ meeting in France on March 27, 2026.

At the same G7 gathering, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas stated directly that Russia was “helping Iran with intelligence to target Americans, to kill Americans.”

Does Co-Belligerency Apply?

Russia has not deployed ground troops to the Gulf theater. Its ground forces remain tied down in Ukraine, and analysts assess any Russian support is more likely to come in the form of intelligence, technology transfers, or drone production than direct military engagement. But the legal and military doctrine concept of co-belligerency does not require ground forces — it requires material assistance that enables attacks on a third party’s armed forces.

Under the laws of armed conflict, provision of specific targeting intelligence — live-time data enabling the launch of drones and missiles at named US positions — crosses from neutral political support into material participation. Russia has provided, by official account: satellite imagery of specific US base locations before Iranian strikes; battle damage assessment imagery after those strikes; electronic intelligence including radar signal characteristics of US systems; Krasukha-4 electronic warfare hardware; Kometa-M CRPA anti-jam modules; upgraded Shahed/Geran drones; and electronic warfare and drone employment guidance.

Russia’s motivation is legible. A prolonged US-Iran conflict drains American air defense stockpiles — Patriot missile consumption in the first four days of Operation Epic Fury ran approximately 225 per day against Lockheed Martin’s production rate of roughly 1.7 per day. It diverts Washington’s strategic attention and resources from Ukraine. And it imposes costs on the NATO partners whose air defense systems depend on US production capacity.

Russia has formally condemned the US-Israeli strikes against Iran as an “unprovoked act of armed aggression.” For Moscow, backing Tehran with information and hardware short of direct military intervention is a way to bleed a rival without crossing what it calculates as the threshold for direct US retaliation.

The cyber dimension of the Moscow-Tehran axis exists but is more limited than some reporting has suggested. CSIS analysts Nikita Shah and Justin Sherman concluded in a July 14 analysis that claims of outright Russian-Iranian cyber collaboration in the 2026 conflict — stemming from a Ukrainian intelligence assessment identifying interactions between Russian groups Z-Pentest Alliance, NoName057(16), and DDoSia Project and Iran’s Handala Hack — were “overstated” based on the evidence available, and the low-level hacktivist coordination identified is “highly unlikely to result in a high-impact cyberattack or game-changing event” relative to the drone and satellite dimensions.

The more consequential and verifiable dimension of Russian assistance is the one confirmed in drone debris: the Kometa-M module recovered at RAF Akrotiri, identical to the hardware in Russian Geran drones firing against Ukraine, representing the most direct physical evidence that Russia has transferred to Iran the specific technology needed to defeat the electronic warfare tools the United States had been using to degrade Iranian strike accuracy.

Neither Russia nor Iran has publicly commented on the NBC News intelligence-sharing report. The arrangement, US and European officials said, continues.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Why is the US unable to simply jam Iranian drones and missiles the way it could earlier in the conflict?

Earlier in the conflict, US and coalition electronic warfare systems could effectively degrade the accuracy of Iranian GPS-guided weapons by broadcasting noise across the GPS frequency band — a technique that works when the target weapon relies solely on the American GPS satellite network for navigation. That window has closed. Iranian drones now carry Kometa-M CRPA modules, Russian-designed Controlled Reception Pattern Antenna arrays that use multi-element antenna systems and digital signal processing to null-steer interference signals away from the receiver while maintaining lock on legitimate satellite signals overhead. At the same time, Iranian ballistic missiles use GPS, Russia’s GLONASS, and China’s BeiDou-3 simultaneously — three constellation systems on different frequency bands that no single jamming system can address simultaneously. In the terminal descent phase, optical and thermal sensors take over, and those cannot be defeated by radio frequency jamming at all.

What specifically is Russia giving Iran — and how is signals intelligence different from satellite imagery?

Russia has provided two distinct categories of intelligence. Satellite imagery (IMINT) — photographs of US base layouts, troop concentrations, and equipment positions — is what Zelenskyy documented in his July 25 disclosure and what Reuters first reported in April 2026. Signals intelligence (SIGINT), specifically electronic intelligence (ELINT), is a different and in some ways more operationally valuable category: it consists of data collected by monitoring the electromagnetic emissions of specific enemy radar systems, communications equipment, and weapons platforms. ELINT gives Iran the technical fingerprint of specific US systems — their operating frequencies, pulse characteristics, coverage gaps — which Iranian electronic warfare operators can use to build targeted jamming systems or to exploit known radar blind spots. Russia has spent decades collecting ELINT on Western military systems and now appears to be sharing relevant portions of that database with Iran.

Is there confirmed evidence of Russia providing this hardware to Iran, or only intelligence-community assessments?

Physical evidence and intelligence assessments both exist. On the physical evidence side: wreckage of a Shahed drone that struck RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus on March 2, 2026, was confirmed to contain a Kometa-M CRPA navigation module identical to hardware found in Russian Geran drones firing against Ukraine — a direct technology transfer documented in debris analysis. Krasukha-4 electronic warfare systems, manufactured by Russia’s KRET/Rostec, have been confirmed in Iranian inventory as of September 2025. On the intelligence assessment side: a US official and a European official with direct knowledge told NBC News (July 31, 2026) that Russia is providing electronic intelligence helping Iran pinpoint US forces; General Dan Caine testified to Congress on April 30, 2026, that Russia is “definitely” supporting Iran including satellite imagery; and Defense Secretary Hegseth acknowledged Russia and China were “at different levels” enabling Iranian operations at a Senate hearing July 21.

What can US forces do to counter Iranian drones that now carry CRPA anti-jam technology?

Electronic warfare jamming is no longer effective as a primary counter to CRPA-equipped drones. The remaining layers are kinetic interception (interceptor missiles, close-in weapons systems, directed-energy lasers) and navigation spoofing — broadcasting false satellite signals to mislead the drone’s position calculation, rather than trying to overpower the signal. Spoofing is harder to execute at scale and has its own limitations against receivers with inertial navigation backup systems. Directed-energy and high-powered microwave systems can defeat drones regardless of navigation method by burning out their electronics, but require line of sight and have range limitations. The broader strategic problem — as TechTimes has documented in prior coverage — is that kinetic interception consumes Patriot and other high-cost interceptor missiles at rates far exceeding production capacity, while Iran’s Shahed-class drones cost a fraction of the interceptors fired against them.