They Need To Get Their Story Straight

Here's an excerpt from the UK Daily Mail about the results of the attack on chemical weapons facilities by US, UK and French forces:

The Pentagon could not [as of last night] confirm how many missiles hit their targets, but Russian military forces claim Syrian air defence systems managed to shoot down 71 out of 103 missiles. 

Yet Syrian state TV said it shot down 13 missiles, which were taken down in the Kiswah area south of Damascus, the capital.

 

It's amazing to hear the Russians claim that over two thirds of the attacking missiles were shot down.  It's such a joke.  Cruise missiles come in at approximately 600 miles per hour.  They also fly at very low altitudes, sometimes as low as 50 feet above the terrain.  Most of the cruise missiles came from ships in the Mediterranean Sea.  While the Syrians may have had warning that the missiles were coming, the missiles were approaching the coast over water and were almost certainly flying at such a low level that they were not visible on Syrian radars.  The chemical weapons facilities hit in Damascus are between 55 and 60 miles from the sea.  That means that the Syrian defense systems would have ten minutes at most to detect the incoming missiles, target them and then shoot them down.  The chemical bases near Homs are less than 30 miles from the sea which would give Syrian forces less than five minutes to react to incoming missiles.  The Syrians do not have anti-missile systems that fly over the battlefield and look down at incoming missiles and adjust trajectories in order to hit fast moving missiles.  Shooting down one cruise missile would be a major achievement for the Syrians.  Shooting down two thirds of them is a rather silly claim.

 

Then, of course, we have the nonsensical situation in which the Syrians and their Russian allies can't even get their lies straight.  Is it 13 or is it 71 missiles that were supposedly shot down?  Why must these fools issue their bogus propaganda stories in such a clumsy fashion?

UPDATE:  A few minutes ago, Lt. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the director of the Joint Staff, said that "none of our aircraft or missiles in this operation were successfully engaged" by Syrian regime.  So it seems that 13 or 71 is actually zero.