The ''Shahid Soleimani'' class (

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

: شهید سلیمانی, romanized: Shahid soleimani, lit: martyr Suleimani) are the principal surface combatant ship of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy of Iran. These are an Iranian class of missile corvettes and bear the name of

Qasem Soleimani Qasem Soleimani (; 11 March 1957 – 3 January 2020) was an Iranian military officer who served in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). From 1998 until Assassination of Qasem Soleimani, his assassination by the United States in 2020, h ...

, a prominent Iranian military officer, who was the commander of

Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), also known as the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, is a multi-service primary branch of the Islamic Republic of Iran Armed Forces, Iranian Armed Forces. It was officially established by Ruhollah Khom ...

Quds Force The Quds Force () is one of five branches of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). It specializes in unconventional warfare and military intelligence operations. U.S. Army's Iraq War General Stanley McChrystal describes the Quds Fo ...

from 1998, until he was assassinated on 3 January 2020 by the United States in

Baghdad Baghdad ( or ; , ) is the capital and List of largest cities of Iraq, largest city of Iraq, located along the Tigris in the central part of the country. With a population exceeding 7 million, it ranks among the List of largest cities in the A ...

,Iraq alongside

Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis Jamal Ja'far Muhammad Ali Al Ibrahim ( ', 16 November 1954 – 3 January 2020), better known by his ''kunya'' Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis (), was an Iraqi paramilitary leader and former chief of staff of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF). At th ...

. These ships are being built by various shipyards in

Bushehr Bushehr (; ) is a port city in the Central District (Bushehr County), Central District of Bushehr County, Bushehr province, Bushehr province, Iran, serving as capital of the province, the county, and the district. Etymology The roots of the n ...

, Qeshm and

Bandar Abbas Bandar Abbas (, ) is a city in the Central District of Bandar Abbas County, Hormozgan province, Iran, serving as capital of the province, the county, and the district. Bandar Abbas is a port on the southern coast of the country, on the Persian ...

and are operated by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy of Iran.

Design

Hull

These ships are known for their unique

catamaran A catamaran () (informally, a "cat") is a watercraft with two parallel hull (watercraft), hulls of equal size. The wide distance between a catamaran's hulls imparts stability through resistance to rolling and overturning; no ballast is requi ...

(twin hull) design with sharp angles to give it a more stealthy design. The design has been compared to the Chinese

Type 22 missile boat The Type 22 ( NATO designation: ''Houbei'' class) missile boat is a ship class in the Chinese People's Liberation Army Navy. The first boat was launched in April 2004 by the Hudong-Zhonghua Shipyard at Shanghai. The boats incorporate stealth feat ...

and the Taiwanese . According to Iranian officials, these

warship A warship or combatant ship is a naval ship that is used for naval warfare. Usually they belong to the navy branch of the armed forces of a nation, though they have also been operated by individuals, cooperatives and corporations. As well as b ...

's have hulls that are made of

aluminum Aluminium (or aluminum in North American English) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Al and atomic number 13. It has a density lower than that of other common metals, about one-third that of steel. Aluminium has ...

instead of the regular

steel Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon that demonstrates improved mechanical properties compared to the pure form of iron. Due to steel's high Young's modulus, elastic modulus, Yield (engineering), yield strength, Fracture, fracture strength a ...

which decreases their weight. The use of aluminum is an innovation in the Iranian shipbuilding industry, adopted in past few years.

Armament

These warships are equipped with six anti-ship cruise missiles including four long-range ones (likely Noor or Ghadir) and two short-range anti-ship missiles (likely

Nasir Nasir () is a masculine given name, commonly found in Arabic which can mean "helper" or "one who gives victory" (grammatically the Stem I masculine singular active participle of consonantal verb root ''n-ṣ-r''). The female form of the name is ...

) in an order of two long-range and one short-range box launchers on each side behind the

superstructure A superstructure is an upward extension of an existing structure above a baseline. This term is applied to various kinds of physical structures such as buildings, bridges, or ships. Aboard ships and large boats On water craft, the superstruct ...

. These warships are the first Iranian warship to be equipped with a

vertical launching system A vertical launching system (VLS) is an advanced system for holding and firing missiles on mobile naval platforms, such as surface ships and submarines. Each vertical launch system consists of a number of ''cells'', which can hold one or mo ...

(VLS). The VLS armament component includes six bigger cells for

surface-to-surface A surface-to-surface missile (SSM) is a missile designed to be launched from the ground or the sea and strike targets on land or at sea. They may be fired from hand-held or vehicle mounted devices, from fixed installations, or from a ship. They ar ...

cruise missiles and 16 smaller ones for

surface-to-air missile A surface-to-air missile (SAM), also known as a ground-to-air missile (GTAM) or surface-to-air guided weapon (SAGW), is a missile designed to be launched from the ground or the sea to destroy aircraft or other missiles. It is one type of anti-ai ...

s, all of which are located behind the command bridge. The lead warship, ''Shahid Soleimani'', is equipped with six 23 mm

gatling gun The Gatling gun is a rapid-firing multiple-barrel firearm invented in 1861 by Richard Jordan Gatling of North Carolina. It is an early machine gun and a forerunner of the modern electric motor-driven rotary cannon. The Gatling gun's operatio ...

s (likely Asef), one 30 mm auto-canon and two chaff dispensers. These are also incorporated in other warships of the class. According to Commodore

Alireza Tangsiri Commodore Alireza Tangsiri (; born 1962) is an Iranian naval officer who serves as the commander of the IRGC Navy, appointed in 2018. Military career Tangsiri was a naval brigade commander during the Iran-Iraq War. He later headed the Islam ...

, ''Shahid Soleimani''-class vessels have been equipped with different types of missiles with varied ranges of 200, 300 and 750 kilometers respectively, as well as with a new 2,000-kilometer-range cruise missile named Ghadr-474, to boost their

firepower Firepower is the military capability to direct force at an enemy. It involves the whole range of potential weapons. The concept is generally taught as one of the three key principles of modern warfare wherein the enemy forces are destroyed or ...

. Tangsiri later said that ''Sayyad Shirazi'' and ''Hassan Baqeri'', the other two warships of the class currently in service have been equipped with 16 Navvab vertically-launched missiles and 6 Sayyad-3 missiles.

Radars and electronics

Intelligence and reconnaissance monitoring, surface and subsurface and air traffic monitoring are among the duties of these vessels and are equipped with Iran's most advanced electronic warfare systems. The main fire-control radars of the built ships are yet to be installed.

Propulsion

The ''Shahid Soleimani'' class of warship are all powered by four indigenously developed

diesel engine The diesel engine, named after the German engineer Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which Combustion, ignition of diesel fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to Mechanics, mechanical Compr ...

s which gives a top speed of and a range of .

Other equipment

The warship also have aviation facilities, a helipad, and a crane under it which is used to launch and retrieve fast attack boats. The ships can carry three fast attack boats and have the ability to retrieve and rearm them.

History

After the end of construction at the Shahid Mahallati Shipyard on 14 June 2022, the

lead ship The lead ship, name ship, or class leader is the first of a series or class of ships that are all constructed according to the same general design. The term is applicable to naval ships and large civilian vessels. Large ships are very comple ...

, underwent rigorous

sea trial A sea trial or trial trip is the testing phase of a watercraft (including boats, ships, and submarines). It is also referred to as a "shakedown cruise" by many naval personnel. It is usually the last phase of construction and takes place on op ...

s. During sea trials the lead ship was equipped with four 12.7 mm machine guns which were later replaced with four 20 mm gatling guns. On 5 September 2022, ''Shahid Soleimani'' was commissioned into IRGC's navy branch in a commissioning ceremony.

Ships in class

References

{{Reflist Corvettes of Iran Ships built in Bushehr Soleimani, corvette, Shahid