Disclosed is a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system for target recognition with complex range profile. The SAR system comprising a memory, a recurrent neural network (RNN), a multi-layer linear network in signal communication the RNN, and a machine-readable medium on the memory. The machine-readable medium is configured to store instructions that, when executed by the RNN, cause the SAR system to perform various operations. The various operation comprise: receiving raw SAR data associated with observed views of a scene, wherein the raw SAR data comprises information captured via the SAR system; radio frequency (RF) preprocessing the received raw SAR data to produce a processed raw SAR data; converting the processed raw SAR data to a complex SAR range profile data; processing the complex SAR range profile data with the RNN having RNN states; and mapping the RNN states to a target class with the multi-layer linear network.