Fears are growing over Iran's ability to strike deep inside Europe with suicide drones and missiles amid warnings that terror sleeper cells could unleash chaos across the continent at any moment.
The war in the Middle East intensified on Monday, with attacks from Iran and Iranian-backed militias hitting Israel and the Arab states.
Worries over a potential Iranian strike further into Europe come after an Iranian drone struck a British RAF base in Cyprus overnight, in a conflict that began with the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over the weekend.
For years, Iran has been working to increase the range of these projectiles, and the most lethal is believed to be the Khorramshahr 4 missile.
It has a range of 2,000 to 3,000km and carries a 1,500kg warhead, according to the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, a US-based think tank.
It can be launched in volleys, and if used, the missiles could reach a large swathe of Europe, including Greece, Italy, Germany, Poland and Denmark.
Dr. Sidharth Kaushal, a senior research fellow at RUSI, told the Daily Mail that the Khorramshahr is a 'derivative' of a North Korean ballistic missile.
He said: 'It was always speculated that this would have been the delivery vehicle for a nuclear warhead if the Iranians had ever developed one.'
Shahed suicide drones, with a range of 2,000km, could also strike parts of Europe, while an array of missiles with ranges of about 1,200 to 1,500km have already been reaching countries across the Middle East, such as Israel, the UAE and Bahrain.
These another layer of pressure to its potential targets.
Slower than missiles but easier to launch in large numbers, Iran's one-way attack drones may be used in repeated waves to wear down air defences.
Iran is believed to possess the largest and most diverse missile arsenal in the Middle East. However, the exact count is difficult to pinpoint due to the Islamic Republic's so-called 'missile cities' and lack of transparency.
The Islamic Republic's nuclear facilities were bombed by Israel during the 12-Day War last year.
But the regime has a large arsenal of shorter-range systems capable of reaching its neighbours and US military bases across the region, and several of these are believed to have survived Israel's strikes last year.
Dr. Kaushal warned that as the US and Israel continues to whittle down Iran's senior defence leadership, the country's military doctrine of 'mosaic warfare' may make it harder to understand and predict its next moves.
He said: 'Ever since the 2000s, the Iranian concept of so-called "mosaic warfare" [has been] built around the idea that their leadership might be crippled in a war with the United States, and so they would have to devolve control down the levels of command to ensure that their military could continue to function.
'The basic concept is that people at lower levels [who] may have been given standard... rules of engagement in peacetime would presume greater authority if they can't make contact with higher command
'There is a question of just how much authority to do things that might widen the war sits now with people who would not have [ordinarily] controlled.'
Dr. Kaushal added: 'A lot is unknown about exactly what this would look like under the hood of the Iranian system.'
The overnight strike on RAF base Akrotiri in Cyprus prompted the Ministry of Defence to evacuate the families of those living on the site as a 'precautionary measure.'
And on Monday, Iran launched its second attack on the British base, but the two unmanned suicide drones were shot down just in time.
The Daily Mail understands that the weapons sent by the Iranian regime were destroyed by RAF Typhoons from RAF Akrotiri.
Sirens were blaring, and personnel were told to 'take cover' at the UK's air base in the Mediterranean, which had already been hit by a 'kamikaze' attack drone sent by Tehran last night.
Fears are also bubbling that Iran will call on its sleeper terror cells to attack targets across Europe.
A sleeper cell is a covert group of operatives affiliated with a state or non-state actor, such as a terrorist group, who infiltrate a country or community, essentially hiding in plain sight for a prolonged period of time before they are activated to carry out acts of terrorism, spying or sabotage.
Marc Henrichmann, a member of the German parliament's intelligence committee, yesterday warned that the weekend's attacks won't stay isolated to the Middle East.
Speaking to German media, he said: 'The escalation in the Middle East doesn't just affect the region itself.
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