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by kitteh 2533 days ago
The 530 is a SARH missile. It requires a radar system (found in the French Mirage aircraft for example) to lock and paint it's target the entire time for the missile to track and eventually detonate. It would be pretty difficult to do and the acqusition/targeting radar would need to be cooled and energized for the duration of the flight. Launching A2A missiles from the ground is pretty rare but it is possible as evidenced recently by Yemen ground launching a Russian R27T infrared missile successfully at a Saudi F15.
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For anyone else not familiar with military hardware: SARH = semi-active radar homing. The missile itself passively detects a radar signal reflected off a target by an external source, such as the launching aircraft.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semi-active_radar_homing

It's become somewhat common to see AAMs fitted/designed to be surfaced launched. See Iris-T SL or Rafael Spyder system. Most Python missiles being produced/retrofitted are for ground launch.