The Soviet Union has begun shipping rocket-firing mosquito patrol boats of the Komar type to Syria, informed sources here said today. Reports to that effect have been current in Washington for several weeks but it was only today that it was confirmed that at least six of the boats arrived in Syria between the end of 1963 and now.
The boats, which have a 600-mile range, and a top speed of 30 knots, are capable of firing guided rockets at targets 10 to 20 miles from the launching pads aboard. The ships, weighing 66 tons and having a length of 83 feet, were described by armament experts here as being in effect mobile, missile launching platforms, capable of hitting targets either on land or afloat.
The Komar-type boats are of the same models supplied by the Soviet Union to both Egypt and Cuba. Egypt is said to have received at least six of these ships last year, while Havana got its flotilla in 1962.
State Department officials, queried about these deliveries today, said they had no information on the matter.
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