Produced by the
Soviet Union/
Russia, the system was exported to many countries, including
Cuba,
Greece (from the former
East Germany),
Poland,
Syria,
Ecuador and
Iraq. During the
1982 Lebanon war in which Syrian air defenses were obliterated by a massive air campaign against Syrian SAM sites in the Beqaa valley, the Syrians deployed Osas. An
F-4 Phantom in a
SEAD mission was shot down on 24 July 1982 by an Osa system. The
WSO (back seater), Aharon Katz was killed, while the pilot, Gil Fogel, survived and was held captive by the Syrians for two years. In the late 1980s, Cuba deployed several 9K33 Osa units in southern Angola, which posed a significant threat to
South African air superiority at shorter ranges. The South African
61 Mechanised Battalion Group captured an intact 9K33 Osa anti-aircraft missile system on 3 October 1987 during the
Battle of Cuito Cuanavale. This was the first time that such a system had fallen into possession of non-Warsaw Pact forces, giving Western intelligence agencies an opportunity to examine an important Soviet-bloc weapon system. Iraq fielded Osa systems during the
1991 Gulf War. The Soviets claimed that it was the most effective system alongside the
ZSU-23-4 Shilka at shooting down
Tomahawk cruise missiles, with several downings credited to hits from Osa weapons. The system also saw use in the
2008 Russo-Georgian War by both the Georgian and Russian militaries. Libya deployed 9K33 Osa, with some destroyed during the
2011 Libyan Civil War by NATO airstrikes.
Syrian Civil War In October 2012, fighters from insurgent faction
Liwa al-Islam (renamed Jaish al-Islam the following year) captured three operational 9K33 Osa mobile SAMs in Damascus' Eastern Ghouta. In the following years, at least six missiles were launched at helicopters from the Syrian Arab Air Force flying over the area: on the 29th of July 2013, a Mi-8/17 was apparently destroyed; a second launch, whose result is unclear, occurred at an unknown date in the following months; on 16th of January 2014, a Mi-17 was shot down; two days later, another missile missed its intended target; an undated video released in March 2014 by Jaysh al-Islam showed a 9M33 missile exploding in the proximity of a Mi-8/17. In October and December 2015, the Russian Ministry of Defence claimed its forces had destroyed Osa systems operated by the insurgents in the Eastern Ghouta. No further launch was reported until the 26th of June 2016, when a missile heavily damaged a Mi-25, forcing it to make an emergency landing at Damascus International Airport. All of Jaysh al-Islam's Osa systems were likely retaken, or destroyed, upon the Syrian Arab Army's recapture of the Eastern Ghouta in April 2018.
Yemeni Civil War On 29 November 2019, Russian sources speculated a Soviet-made 9K33 Osa fired by Houthi forces shot down a
Saudi Arabian Army Aviation AH-64 Apache in Yemen. Neither Yemen nor Iran had any 9K33 Osa in their armed forces, while known Houthi-operated systems are based on the Soviet-made
2K12 Kub surface-to-air missile system which employs a two-stage rocket engine, and the air-to-air missiles
R-73 and
R-27T which both have a single-stage rocket engine.
2020 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict The
Armenian Air Defense extensively employed 9K33 Osa missile systems during the
2020 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. During the opening days of the war, several videos released by the Azerbaijani military showed several Armenian 9K33 Osa and
9K35 Strela-10 vehicles destroyed by
Bayraktar TB2 armed drones, with a number of them destroyed in the following weeks when found on the battlefield. Twelve 9K33 Osa missile systems of Armenian Army were destroyed during the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict by Azerbaijani Bayraktar TB2s. On 4 October 2020, an Azerbaijani Air force
Sukhoi Su-25 aircraft was shot down by Armenian forces, probably by a 9K33 Osa while targeting Armenian positions in Fuzuli. The pilot,
Colonel Zaur Nudiraliyev, died in the crash. Azerbaijani officials acknowledged the loss in December 2020, with the 9K33 Osa vehicle possibly using passive detection and
shoot and scoot tactics to survive the Azerbaijani
suppression of air defenses (SEAD) missions.
Russo-Ukrainian War Both Russia and Ukraine have 9K33 Osa systems in their inventory. On 30 March 2019, during the
war in Donbas, the Ukrainian Joint Forces reported destruction of an Osa-AKM surface-to-air missile system along with a
Zhitel R330Zh automatic jamming system. Senior sources of the
Ukrainian Air Force stated that some Osa and
Buk systems were destroyed by
Kh-31P and
Kh-58 anti-radiation missiles during the early stages of the
Russian invasion in the spring of 2022. Following the invasion,
The Washington Post reported that the United States was sending additional Osa systems to Ukraine. Poland has also provided Ukraine with an undisclosed number of systems in 2022. In December 2024, it was revealed that all
Ukrainian Ground Forces units operating the Osa received modified versions capable of firing the
R-73 air-to-air missile in response to the dwindling stocks of the 9M33 missile. As of 16 December 2025, 34 losses of 9K33s by Russia and 23 by Ukraine are documented with photos or video by the
OSINT website
Oryx.
The War Zone notes that the number of losses could be higher since
Oryx only tabulates visually confirmed losses. ==Command post==