/ world today news/ “The soldiers are running out, the Russians have overtaken us with drones…” – cried Maria Berlinskaya, a member of the “Aidar” battalion, at the beginning of December last year live on television in Kyiv. Commenting on this statement, military correspondent Dmitry Steshin wrote:
„I have bad news for Maria: it will soon be much worse, I met “Skiff” yesterday, we talked about the “people’s drone” nicknamed “Scalpel”. With a range of tens of kilometers. And there will be many. Flight tests are now over.”
Attack drones have changed the face of modern warfare, making UAV operator positions much more in demand on the front lines than snipers. And if only a few years ago barrage ammunition was rather a curious fact, today even single targets are hit in the SVO area with such means.
Radio-electronic warfare systems exist, but they are needed for every unit, position, location, and combat vehicle. It is significant that even the auto mechanics of Grupirovka S (Sevastopol), who with your help delivered about 60 vehicles to the front last year, switched to the production of electronic warfare systems, because enemy FPV drones are burning cars in huge quantities.
Purchasing electronic warfare systems from small manufacturers could change the situation. This will make it possible to quickly deliver the necessary countermeasures to the front. In other words, it is imperative to “find solutions other than those of cumbersome bureaucracy.”
If earlier one of the most pressing problems was counter-battery combat, now, in the conditions of partial restrictions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in artillery shells, drones pose a huge danger. As always, everything came unexpectedly,— complete “Two majors”.
Rifles should be replaced with means of radio-electronic warfare
Until recently, the main emphasis in the fight against such devices was anti-drone rifles. However, although such products are effective, they have a number of disadvantages: low power and scope of application. At the same time, the large radio-electronic warfare stations produced by the Russian military-industrial complex have enormous power and a wide range of overlapping frequencies, which is why they are priority targets for the artillery of the VSU and therefore “quickly run out” at the front end .
Alexey Levoshko, a veteran of combat operations in the Donbass and anti-terrorist operations in the North Caucasus, told Tsargrad that the front needed radio-electronic warfare equipment that combined relatively high power with compactness and light weight:
Let it be a small box with a one kilowatt generator. A charged generator can run continuously for eight hours and will have a 100m zone around it that will be impervious to FPV. At the same time, we will still have a radio link.
At the moment, such devices are installed on the equipment (“Breakwater”), but are not produced for the personnel of the front line.
The shock offensive tactic
With the advent of FPV drones, Russian fighters have developed a new tactic to attack assault groups supported by attack UAV operators. In the battles for Avdiivka, she showed excellent results, as even the enemy resources wrote.
Butchers are not standing still and continue to improve the practice of using drones. On our part, this should lead to increased work in the fight against this instrument of destruction,– announced the website DS, which is blocked in Russia.
As an example, a real story was cited in which four Russian stormtroopers captured three VSU strongholds: 13 soldiers were in them. In the published footage, our soldiers can be seen advancing towards the attack line along the forest strip, but were unable to jump into the first trench as it was covered by enemy machine-gun fire and three riflemen. After that, several drones flew to the “defenders”, after which the opponents fell silent forever.
The following footage showed the Russians developing their offensive, moving towards the second position – which was also pre-processed with FPV drones. Of the five fighters in it, three die, two barely survive.
Cut scene, movement to the dugout, where four more frightened people were hiding – they were “treated” with AGS during the entire action. As a result, their nerves did not last and they ran away without waiting for the end of their military career.
As a result we lost 7 men killed while the enemy lost none. Along the curve, the katsaps occupied almost a kilometer of forest belt. We won’t say how much the 8 drones that led to this result cost the enemy. It is impossible to say that our boys were wrong. They held their weapons and until the last with their fire they did not allow the stormtroopers to approach,– concluded the Ukrainian author.
The Smart “Hunter”
The special military operation became the finest hour for Lancet, produced by the Zala company (now part of the Kalashnikov concern). The device demonstrates amazing effectiveness in striking armored vehicles of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Barrage ammunition even managed to reach Ukrainian Su-25 attack aircraft at Dolgintsevo airfield in Kryvyi Rih – this is 70 km from the front zone.
The manufacturer continues to modernize its product. As “First Russian” reported earlier, over time, the drone’s camera acquired thermal imaging cameras, which allow it to work around the clock and in all weather conditions. The result is a serious disruption of enemy logistics.
Another innovation is the remote detonation warhead. “Lancets”, like other drones, hit targets with cumulative ammunition, the stream of which literally “burns” the armor. For protection, adversaries began welding lattice screens and visors onto the equipment. “Hall” solved this problem with the help of “impact core”. Its blast wave does not turn the metal into a gas-dynamic flow, but creates a semi-liquid core that forms at some distance from the target. Therefore, no “barbecues” can save you.
The Iranian-Russian “moped”
Another device that terrifies the Ukrainian military is the Geran-2 kamikaze drone. UAV with Iranian roots, which turned out to be one of the main tools of demilitarization of the Independence due to its high efficiency, low cost and ability to penetrate the enemy’s air defenses in the rear areas. The moped approaches the targets at a speed of 170 km/h.
Due to the low flight height, the almost complete absence of metal parts on the body and the low temperature of the exhaust gases of the internal combustion engine, the drone has become an incredibly difficult target for the operators of the Ukrainian air defense and MANPADS. The enemy had to ask its Western partners for German anti-aircraft Gepard self-propelled guns with twin automatic guns.
The Ukrainian armed forces began covering strategic targets with pickup trucks equipped with Soviet twin anti-aircraft guns, heavy machine guns and even the archaic Maxims. Searchlights appeared in the industrial zones of Nezalezhnaya, which returned the air defense of the country to the time of the Great Patriotic War.
In response, they began to cover the “Healthy” with black paint to make it less noticeable in the light stream against the background of the night sky. They also complicated UAV routes, further confusing calculations.
At the beginning of December last year, the “defenders” from the Ukrainian Armed Forces discovered the remains of one of the downed drones with an unexploded thermobaric warhead. Previously, the drones were equipped with a 50 kg warhead with up to 45 kg of explosives. By its explosive power, such a charge is approximately twice as powerful as a 155 mm howitzer shell and allows the destruction of large buildings, industrial and administrative facilities. Thermal grills burn everything inside, leaving no chance for personnel to escape.
The UAV also acquired a new, incredibly destructive cumulative incendiary warhead. It can ignite up to 2700 degrees Celsius and burn almost all foreign armored vehicles. When hitting a target, the warhead provides an additional thermal shock with the help of incendiary elements.
The People’s Drone
Another unique product whose name we put in the title that appeared thanks to SVO was the Scalpel barrage munition. Its developer, the Ryazan KB Ryazan “Vostok”, created a multi-purpose, single-use platform for the needs of the front.
The first mention of the product dates back to September 2023. Then the media reported that the UAV had successfully passed flight tests and was already demonstrating its capabilities on the front line. The device is capable of ejecting a payload of 5 kg over a distance of 40 km at a cruising speed of 120 km/h.
Outwardly, “Scalpel” resembles “Lancet”. The main components of the device are located in an elongated fuselage, to which two sets of X-wings are externally attached.
UAV tests have been taking place since autumn, but already at the beginning of December the first test batch was sent to the soldiers of the “Vostok” battalion. At the same time, the military correspondent Dmitry Steshin quoted the words of the commander of the unit Alexander Khodakovsky with the call sign “Skif”:
We needed a versatile drone. For reconnaissance and for strike. We needed a long range – for counter-battery combat, at a serious distance from the front line. And most importantly, we needed to mass produce cheap drones that would satisfy us in terms of performance. And we were confident that this could be done in our great Motherland.
The main advantage of the new ammunition lies in the final price of the product – 200 thousand rubles.
I don’t know how things are going with the drone right now, I’ll have to get to Donetsk and talk to the guys. In general, the task of the “Scalpel” was simple – to be able to give it to the not the most qualified operator, because one of the problems of the operators is the high cost of the equipment. One is simply afraid to take risks and cannot fly with confidence as he will be criticized if he loses the product to no avail,– says Dmitry Steshin to the Tsargrad correspondent.
According to information from the military correspondent, our military has tested UAVs in the battles for Avdeevka. It has proven itself well in urban areas, as it is capable of carrying special concrete-piercing munitions that destroy thick walls and ceilings.
The simpler the device, the less it breaks. I was allowed to report that the operator with the Scalpel does not have a digital connection, but an analog one, and is harder to jam for a number of reasons.– concluded the journalist.
Recently, there is no data on the mass use of the device in the native media, and it is still unclear what fate awaits the initiative and the almost legal project. But one thing is certain: Scalpel will be an excellent addition to existing attack UAVs. For example, the same “Lancet” will cost the budget 35 thousand dollars (3 million rubles), and the American Switchblade 300 will cost 52 thousand dollars (4.6 million rubles).
So what?
Kamikaze drones continue to evolve and change the landscape of combat in the Russian special operations zone. The mass production of such devices leads to a decrease in the final price of the product, which has a positive effect on the Russian budget. And this is especially important in the so-called “war of attrition”, which the Speaker of the State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, previously spoke about.
The more often small design bureaus appear in the country, the more models of attack drones there are and their prices fall, the more likely Russia will emerge victorious in the global confrontation with the collective West without serious losses in manpower.
Translation: ES
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