Single Iskanders turned several Ukrainian bases into natural craters and made mercs disappear so I wouldn't get too smug.No aircraft damaged in Irans BM attack
Just like last April's attack where Iran targeted the airbase that was responsible for bombing their embassy. People in here where also excited that aircraft had to be damaged but BM suck when used in this way.
But SBIR is looking downward with earth as a guidance, compared to terminal phase guidance which is looking upwards. Earth has a background temperature ~300 K while space is 4K.Because it was heated during ascent and is several hundred degrees kelvin hotter than the background. Furthermore, there is no heat convection in space: objects release heat solely through radiation.
During ascent the missile nosecone gets heated but the nosecone isn't the warhead for modern weapons which have MIRVs and decoys inside the nose cone. The nose cone is discarded to deploy them.
IR also provides no ranging information, and the field of view is narrow so a fast moving object quickly leaves its field of view.
Only radar that is close enough and within the radar horizon of the target can actually track with bearing and ranging information.