Here’s a tab-clearing roundup of longer videos on the Russo-Ukrainian War, drones, tanks, etc. I’m not going to go point-by-point on everything covered here, just pull out a few of the more important bits.
First up: Perun does one of those “tier rankings” so popular on YouTube, this one about supposed “game changing” weapons in the war.
He ranks glide bombs, used heavily by the Russians, as one of 2025’s most effective weapons. “In 2025 there has been no month where the Ukrainians claim the Russians dropped fewer than 3,000 of these things, roughly 100 per day. In April that number was north of 5,000, getting close to the likes of 170 per day.” I had no idea the numbers were that high.
Also top tier: Drones. “Far from drones fading away as people found ways to counter them over time, I’d argue that drones have just become more dominant with every month that passes. Drone performance improved, their payloads became more dangerous, their operators more expert, the tactics of their use evolved, and the relevant production figures added progressively more zeros. To the point where, while in 2022 drones were a significant enabling element on the battlefield, in 2025 they are one of the most definitive elements. Back in February, RUSI assessed that Ukrainian drones now account for about 2/3 of Russian losses. But if you factor in their contributions to the use of other systems, providing reconnaissance for the infantry, spotting for the artillery and the air force, resupply for forward elements, and all the tasks the Ukrainians leverage UAS to do, I’d argue it goes well beyond even just that. And at the core of the military challenge here is the fact that drones are just very effective, very accessible, and hard to counter.” “So far I’d argue in Ukraine for example, small drones have evolved faster than the defenses intended to counter them.” He also covers the rise of fiber-optic drones. More on drones in another video below.
Also ranked very high: Ukraine’s passive acoustic drone detection systems, which are cheap and widely dispersed, and are key to guiding anti-drone kill teams deep behind the front lines to the right spots to take out drones.
Ukraine is also having a lot of success designing and manufacturing cheap interceptors to take out drones. “During one recent Russian attack, about 20% of all the incoming Russian UAVs were brought down by interceptor drones.”
Just about all the Russian wunderwaffen (like the Oreshnik missile) gets ranked pretty low. (He also wants to see more of Ukraine’s Flamingo cruise missle, as he had only one confirmed strike on that. See below for more on that topic.)
Combat shotguns are making a return as anti-drone weapons, but they’re last-ditch options and not ideal.
Russia is still using turtle tanks (AKA “assault sheds”) as the leads for mechanized assault columns. They can soak up a lot of punishment and mount a lot of drone-jamming equipment, but are still getting taken out by skilled drone operators or artillery. “A lot of Russian shed-equipped vehicles now appear to dispense with the main gun.” They also look even more Mad Max now, with arrays of spikes and branches to further tangle drones. “This isn’t just an approach being used by armored vehicles, and also it is not just the Russians. Drones are a survivability problem for everyone.”
Next up: Nicholas Moran talks about what armies can do to counter the drone threat without shiny new anti-drone weapons. “Getting away from the M is US Army speak for talking about something other than equipment. The M stands for material and is one of the factors in DOTMLPF.” (Doctrine, Organization, Training, Material, Leader Development and Education, Personnel, Facilities.)
“Drones have been around since World War II, but it’s only been ten years since the US military officially declared the small UAS as a significant threat. We are still very much in the early phases of integrating such drones into warfare. And nobody knows exactly where the chips are going to lie down when they complete their fall.”
“We’re now some five years on from what quite a few would consider the first war in which drones were highly influential and three years into a major large power conflict. So, I think we can at least have a couple of trends observed by now, which are forming.”
“We see lots of videos of drones killing things which are selectively released often from equipment which inherently has inbuilt cameras. The 60 to 80% of drone strikes which don’t kill their target normally aren’t released as there’s not much propaganda benefit to doing so. Artillery shells don’t have cameras and an ISR drone footage of an artillery strike is not really particularly dramatic anymore.”
“The whole truth does not come from videos. The big killers in war today are the same that they’ve always been. Mines, then artillery. Not for nothing are we seeing the largest minefields in history, or a shortage of artillery ammunition and tubes.”
“Now, to be fair, in early 2025, drones were being estimated to have caused more Russian casualties than artillery, but that was also during a period of shortage of indirect fire assets in Ukraine. At the same time, both armies on the front lines of Ukraine have dispersed to incredible amounts by 20th century standards. Not for fear of a small drone with an explosive charge, which frankly really doesn’t care if you dispersed or not, but because they don’t want to be a tempting clustered target for artillery or SRBMS.”
“Infantry is still king or queen. Ultimately, to take and hold ground, someone with hand grenades and a rifle, maybe with a stabby thing on the end, is going to have to close with and destroy the enemy supported by everything else in the inventory. And it’s going to be someone in the dugout with their own grenades and rifles, supported by everything else in the inventory, trying to stop them.”
“Drones are also not great at killing tanks. As one general put it, the only place more dangerous than being in a tank in the Ukraine battle area is not being in a tank in the Ukraine battle area.” More on this below as well.
“There there are always exceptions, but the vast majority of tanks which have been destroyed by drones have first been immobilized by something else, such as mines, artillery, ATGM, cannon fire, whatever. The response times for kinetic drones right now are just too long to have practical effect unless they happen to be in the right place and they don’t show up in mass. Then when the tank is immobilized by these other assets, the drone can come at its leisure and try to hit the stationary or abandoned tank which likely has the hatch still open as nobody bailing out after a hit is going to be standing on the top of the tank trying to close the hatch in an ongoing battle. And if something happens to that drone, which historically is quite likely, another drone can be sent and another and another.”
“Some disabled tanks have had a score of drones try to destroy them. Still didn’t work until finally one drone might show up, which actually does the job. Now, yes, an argument can be made that this is still beneficial on a pure dollar value basis, but it also comes with a slew of caveats related to anything from the availability of recovery assets through to the lack of anything more important for those drone operators to be doing that particular moment in time.”
“Some Ukrainian crews have simply given up counting how many times their tanks have been hit by drones. The best Ukrainian units are reporting a 40% hit rate with their FPVs. Typical units won’t be that good, and that’s flying one drone at a time over the course of hours. Hardly something suitable when a major battle starts, but perfectly suited for the current static warfare environment that we see. Now, that’s the hit rate, not the kill rate.”
“They are also not capable of all weather operations, at least the flying ones. Many are just too small. And when it gets to nighttime, for obvious reasons, the drones used are a little bit more expensive. If an enemy attacks in a storm, you want to have something other than quadcopters to rely upon for your defense. What drones have also failed to do is change the nature of war. The principles of war have not changed. The fundamentals of the offense or the defense have not changed.”
“Drones come and kill things, hardware. Then jammers come to get them to lose control, hardware. Then fiber optic cables come to reduce the vulnerability to jamming hardware. Then kill systems like cannons come. Hardware.”
But we don’t fight with things, we fight with formations that use things.
“A drone may not be able to easily kill a tank but it certainly has a reasonable effect on a bunker, on somebody riding an ATV, or on a supply truck for that tank.”
“I believe the claim is that DJI are making a drone a second and they are being used by both sides in Ukraine. The leader being the Mavic 3.” For more information on that, see here.
“As of early last year, 10,000 drones a month were being expended. And the chances are that that figure is well higher now. The things are being expended like ammunition and a low proportion of them are self-exploding. Most are being shot down, forced down, or crash.”
“Currently, the pendulum is swung in favor of the offensive use of drones. And well, defense is playing catch-up. As it currently stands, the dollar exchange is pretty much in favor of the drone.”
“Using a $200,000 stinger to drop a $10,000 surveillance drone is economically questionable, even if it has to be done. Because if you don’t do that, that $10,000 surveillance drone is going to call in a target for a $400,000 ballistic missile, which will then drop on your $2 million brigade headquarters if you don’t expend a $3 million Patriot missile to kill it. As a result, kill mechanisms need to get cheaper, and the drones need to be forced to become more expensive. And both are happening again.”
“Things like DJIs are civilian grade. They’re not equipped to handle electronic attack. The change and counter change in EM spectrum right now is its own battle which is apparently going on four-week cycles. But if you want to equip the drone so that loss of signal doesn’t immediately result in loss of drone or worse that the drone doesn’t just get hijacked, other measures need to be taken. Be it some form of self-targeting, the use of fiber optics, which leads to its own set of limitations and expense.”
“Then there is resistance to hard kill electronic systems. Currently, microwave weapons are the leading contenders. A single microwave can quickly and efficiently fry the electronics of a whole bunch of drones at once for not much cost.”
“Systems have been demonstrated that are in effect remote weapon stations such as you’ll find on top of a Stryker, or you can put in the back of a pickup truck. They are capable of autonomously detecting, identifying, tracking, and engaging small UAS with a short burst.”
“The reality is the drone swarms don’t work for the simple reason that they take up too much jammable bandwidth talking to each other or controllers. And there aren’t enough operators with enough magazine depth to make a go of it by coordinating conventional operations.”
“Drones may end up flying in packages. Bandwidth concerns may limit the feasibility of true automated swarming.” Better AI may help solve that problem.
“One of the organizational problems or doctrinal problems that the army needs to work on, and this will apply to all armies, is how do you set up the layered network so that the most efficient system is used to engage the best target. So, just because you can shoot down a bomber drone with a Coyote doesn’t mean it’s the best move. Maybe it’s worth letting him get a lot closer to be shot down with a caliber 50 or a microwave.”
“The intent is that ground troops will always make first contact with the enemy by use of a drone or UGV. Now, there are advantages to both. I still haven’t seen the front line of robots in official doctrine, but I still think it’s coming.”
The army is already experimenting with self-driving road vehicles for logistics.
Some of the lessons the Ukrainians have learned may not be appropriate for the more modern and well-equipped U.S. armed forces. ” To kill Orlan and the like at altitude, the Ukrainians have been resorting to things like mothership drones and balloon lifted drones. The US has an air force capable of dominating at 15,000 ft and an F-35 or F-15 with a couple of APKWs hydropods would be a reasonably cost-effective and more responsive way of dealing with the problem. The US has satellite or airborne recon abilities which may take care of tasks that other nations may need drones for. Just how good is an F-35’s radar? Can it detect a number of drones and then hand off to a cheaper system to engage? Or maybe it can illuminate for passive radar purposes without being at risk itself.”
“If we are dramatically reducing our command post sizes, increasing dispersion, massively increasing our air defense EW components, reintroducing air guards, or telling people to break out their ET tools like in the old days, then it’s very obviously demonstrating the case that the US has understood that we need to change things.”
“Remember the [Hans] von Seeckt appraisals after World War I? Nearly four years of terrible trench warfare followed the German attempt at maneuver warfare. After chewing on the matter a bit, the German response about 1921 was the key is still maneuver warfare. And they were right.”
“The trend appears to be that we’re going to use automation to further enable what we’re doing, not change what we’re doing. Is the how, not the what.”
“The characteristics of the offense remain concentration, audacity, tempo, and surprise.”
LazerPig takes aim at what he calls Hurr Durr Drone Syndrome (HDDS), including the idea that drones have made tanks obsolete. He goes into more detail about how the ability of drones to take out tanks is considerably overstated, noting that “cheap” drones capable of taking out tanks aren’t really cheap any more.
(Note: LazerPig had to reupload this video due to a copyright strike, so there’s a chance some of the below is no longer in this version.)
“Symptoms of HDDS include flashy clickbait titles that proclaim any new technology from tanks to jets is doomed, because why spend billions of dollars on a weapon system if a 20 buck drone can take it out?”
“It makes casual references to the ever-increasing loss of Western tanks on the Ukrainian front. Makes grandiose gestures that inflate the actual capability of small FPV drones and surreptitiously, usually just by not knowing any better, parrot Russian propaganda that all Western tanks are too big and too heavy.”
“It ignores the actual opinions of Ukrainian tank crews and fails to take into account that of the 95 Western tanks that have been lost on the Ukrainian front, very few of those were actually taken out by drones. And of that 95, 73 were highly outdated models that have either since been replaced or are in the process of being replaced. Out of those 73, 71 were models built before 1990, and 21 of those were tanks designed in the 1960s.”
“Even under the less than ideal conditions Ukraine fights in, with a comedic list of tanks from various periods and in various states of repair, at the time of recording, for every one Western tank they have lost, 43.7 Russian tanks have been destroyed.”
He says those $20 commercial drones are useless for combat. “The simplest of drones currently on the Ukrainian front cost in excess of $400 to make each. And that is with volunteers, 3D printers, and importing the cheapest made parts from TEMU. And these factories don’t run at a profit. They absorb the full cost through donations, not selling the drones to the military.”
“In the UK, a vast number of drone factories were set up in the hopes of cashing in on the drone military craze. And most of them have failed to expand beyond a single office, 3D printers, small teams of eager 20somes, and a dream. simply because, well…
“Firstly, the actual cost of setting up mass production is far greater than first anticipated, especially when one realizes that it’s not just drone parts they’d need, but camera equipment, night vision, thermals, long-range battery packs, and radio equipment capable of resisting interference, triangulation, and interception, most of which is beyond the capability of these companies.”
“All of this is how a $400 drone becomes a $10,000 drone. Even then, those $400 drones carry about enough munitions to kill a person or knock out light vehicles or generally unarmored targets.”
“In some of these interviews, they have talked about how tanks generally survive multiple hits from drones because the Russians don’t always have access to the heavier munitions required to take them out. Those are considerably more expensive, harder to produce, and considerably more rare, allowing those tanks to race into drone hotspots, take out their target, and withdraw before those munitions arrive.”
“A good example of one of those munitions is the famous Russian Lancet. In a full-time war economy, one of these costs around $20,000 to manufacture, or to put that in perspective, the cost of five artillery shells. This is of course assuming Russia is telling the truth when it gives these numbers up and aren’t just calculating the cost of materials and not including labor setup or the cost of the launcher.”
“The thing about the Lancet is it’s a drone in name only. It’s technically a loitering munition which have been around for quite some time. Every country has been developing them for the past 10 years and some of those were given to Ukraine.”
Just about every country that produces tanks is working on loitering munitions versions for tanks to launch.
“The Switchblade, currently in use by both the US and Ukrainian Army, costs around $60,000 per unit, with the more dedicated anti-tank version costing somewhere in the region of $100,000 per
unit.”
He says he had to delete a long rant about the difference between the Lancet and the Switchblade. “What you need to know is the Switchblade can be carried by one soldier in a backpack, thrown on the ground, and then fired like a mortar within seconds. It’s got infrared as standard. It can do a whole bunch of really clever things like guide other Switchblades onto targets or coordinate with other drones and have multiple Switchblades hit multiple different targets simultaneously, you know, to lower the chances of your enemy going, ‘Oh no, a drone.’ And then doing something really wild like taking cover.”
“The Lancet does none of that. It’s basically just a TV missile on a catapult.”
Cheap drones started out effective until units adapted. “As they develop new systems or techniques or tactics against this cheap weapon, then that system is going to gradually become less effective over time and therefore must evolve to remain potent. The Lancet has gone through multiple versions, each time trying to increase its lethality or counter the defenses Ukraine has developed specifically against it.”
“The Lancet, though it is estimated at costing roughly $20,000 to manufacture via various Russian reports. It was offered at export at $32,000 back when it was only seeing use in Syria. And now it’s no longer offered for export. And that $20,000 number has never been updated as the weapon has grown in complexity…the reality is we don’t know how much it actually costs.”
“It has more than likely now matched the Switchblade in terms of cost.”
We don’t know how effective Lancet is because our information comes from Russian propaganda websites, and Russia has claimed Lancet tank kills on western tanks that were clearly taken out by other means.
“In the later stages of 2022, in response to Ukraine’s increased counterbattery effectiveness, the Russians began pulling hordes of towed artillery out of storage, some of which dated as far back as the Second World War. Yet with the limited ability to retain these units in service due to excessive barrel wear or move them around after they had been fired through the loss of transport vehicles, Russia’s artillery dominance has finally began to wane. And as a result, systems like the Lancet have been forced into this role. The irony here being that a $20,000 drone system, is now doing the work of an artillery shell, which the Russians once bragged they could make for under $1,500.”
“Both sides are potentially lacking the equipment that would have traditionally performed that job and are falling back onto cheaply-made drones to fill the gap.”
HDDS also ignores all the anti-drone technology developed in the last three years.
“In spite of the existence of heavy drone-based munitions that can take out tanks, Ukraine still uses tanks quite a lot.”
One correction: LazerPig says the cope cage were deployed in response to Ukraine’s use of drones, but mentions actually date to the beginning of the Russian invasion in 2022.
“In the first days, Lancets were being used on mass, the Russians would be forced to stop jamming the frequency that the Lancet was being used in. The Ukrainians would simply cycle through frequencies, find the one that wasn’t being jammed, and then jam it themselves, causing the lancets to just fall out of the sky.” The technical difficulties involved here make me wonder if this is a “just so” story.
“In a response, the Russians are now forced to turn off their jamming systems when firing a Lancet to prevent the Ukrainians from figuring out the frequency.”
Counter-jammer technology is not something you find on a $400 drone.
“You might think the best defense against [jamming] is to simply have the drone change frequencies, and you’d be right. But changing frequencies isn’t as easy as pressing a button or changing a dial. In fact, in many cases, the aerial assembly has to be completely ripped off and replaced with one with a newer frequency. Hence why a lot of drones [are] shipped without an aerial, allowing the receiving unit to add their own as needed.”
“Sometimes the drone automatically picking one that is not actively being jammed is quite expensive. And another reason why things like the Switchblade are more expensive than the Lancet. But that’s the old idiom, you get what you pay for.”
“Putting soldiers lives at risk with cheaper equipment that might not always work is the lesson the US military has learned the hard way. Ask any US veteran and they will happily bitch to you about any number of equipment problems based entirely on that topic, often for several hours without ever stopping for breath. It’s quite impressive.”
The response to drone jamming has been the advent of fiber-optic drones. “These drones have caused all kinds of hell for both sides, to the point where parts of the front lines are littered in webs of fiber optic.”
The response to fiber optics has been barbed wire and more cages. “In the front lines of both sides, supply routes are now covered in large arc structures, a cope cage supreme, if you will, that prevent drones attacking convoys and supply trucks. And both sides will typically spend days or often weeks trying to find holes or discreetly make holes in these nets and then have several drones lie in weight across the road ambushing any vehicles they find.”
“This has led to Ukraine up armoring everything from medevac to supply trucks in order to minimize the damage caused by these ambush drones. In much the same way US and British forces in Iraq were forced to up armor their patrol vehicles owing to the threat of IEDs.”
“Ukraine’s best counter to drones remains, and has surprisingly remained, old radar-guided anti-air systems from the Cold War.” Most drones are not remotely stealthy.
“Mobile anti-air systems like the Gepard have proven exceedingly effective at taking them down. Meaning to avoid systems like this, drones have to fly low to the ground, which makes finding targets considerably harder.”
Countries are also developing electronic warfare and laser systems to take out drones. “Where these systems fit into our current doctrine is still being written. And where these things are now technologically will be considerably different in a few years time. Ultimately, these weapons will need mounting onto something. And why can’t that something be a tank? Laser tanks are finally here.”
“It is not the biggest army that wins. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”
A lot of this is true, but I’m wondering if the atomized nature of the Ukrainian front isn’t a big factor against cheap drones here. I imagine smaller, cheaper drones with only a few pounds of explosives might be considerably more useful in an urban combat environment that limits jamming and countermeasures. There’s also, I think, a drone class heavier than the lightest drones but lighter than Lancet or Switchblades that could still be racking up mobility kills against tanks and other armored vehicles in such an environment.
Next up: Megaprojects Simon Whistler breaks down Ukraine’s new Flamingo cruise missile.
“If the missile you’re launching at the enemy is easy to take down because it’s not very fast or stealthy, the least you can do is pack it with so many explosives, you basically guarantee complete destruction if just one of them breaks through the enemy lines. And this at least is the basic logic behind the FP5 Flamingo, Ukraine’s new heavy hitter missile.”
“Experts, both domestic and foreign, hailed its arrival. But they warn against obsessive optimism. Because while the Flamingo packs a hell of a punch, it also leaves a lot to be desired.”
“The missile “is constructed mostly of recycled ordinance and aircraft parts.”
“The Flamingo excels in two key areas: warhead capacity and range. The missile is armed with a 1.15 ton or 2500lb warhead, which is just a comically large amount of explosive material for a single missile. For comparison, the BGM 109 Tomahawk land attack missile, which is a reliable American long-range missile, packs about 450 kilos or 1,000 lb of explosives, and the Flamingo comes with 2.5 times that.”
“The engine used with the Flamingo is believed to be the AI-25. This engine is comparably much larger than engines on similar missiles, and it’s used with several aircraft, including Turkey’s combat drone, the Bayraktar. The use of a large engine, one that measures 3.3 m in length and 62 cm in diameter with a weight of over 350 kilos or 770 lb, allows the engineers to skip miniature turbo jets and turbo fans. These propulsion systems are usually preferred for long-range cruise missiles, but they’re really expensive, unlike the AI-25.”
“The AI-25 was incredibly available for Fire Point to purchase in huge numbers from stockpiles. Officials said that they found thousands of these engines at dumps and landfills around Ukraine, in a very practical and literal showcase of the adage, ‘One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.’ Fire Point did not restore these engines to full usage, which would allow them a maximum flight time of 10 hours, but only enough power for the Flamingo to go for 4 hours. They replaced the titanium parts with cheaper materials to save both time and money, and engines that were deemed too damaged were used for spare parts.”
“The biggest advantage of such a powerful engine, which is usually used with much heavier aircraft, is the incredible range of this missile, which is reported to be 3,000 km or about 1,850 miles. This is almost double the range of the block five Tomahawk missile mentioned earlier, and it’s more than enough to strike Russia anywhere in the European part of the country.” Though he notes that claim hasn’t been verified yet.
“The missile travels at speeds about 900 km or 560 mph, which is comparable to the speeds of western missiles.”
“The Flamingo does not have a complex visual guidance system, such as terrain contour matching systems or digital scene matching area correlation systems, which are very common with Western missiles, which are also, of course, a lot more expensive. It does, however, use satellite navigation to guide itself toward the target.”
“The Flamingo uses a jamming resistant controller reception pattern antenna layout, which kind of feels like word salad, doesn’t it? But what it means is that the antenna layout is designed to resist radio jamming and spoofing, keeping the missile on its course.”
“However, the Flamingo lacks any technology to hide from radar, which makes it extremely unstealthy.” But it’s fiberglass construction is less visible on radar than metal.
“Similar to how the A-10 Warthog is an aircraft built around a 30mm rotary cannon, the FP5’s airframe is built around its massive warhead.”
“At first glance, it might remind you of the V1, but the Flamingo is much larger at a length of between 12 and 14m and a wingspan of six.”
He notes the missile’s vulnerability to Russian fighter aircraft, but given how heavily those are overtaxed, I wonder how much they can “fly cap” over the vast distances of Russian airspace, especially after the further dispersion away from Ukraine following successful drone attacks on Russian airbases.
Skipping the history of Ukraine development/acquisition of long range strike platforms.
“After the official unveiling on August the 17th, 2025, production rolled out at a rate of about 50 missiles a month, and Fire Point announced that they plan to increase production to seven missiles a day by the end of the year.”
“The majority of the missile is created from already existing components that can be put together in a factory that’s relatively safe. Even if the factory were to be destroyed, the Flamingo is so easy to put together, the entire manufacturing process can be moved as long as the warheads and the engines are kept safe.”
“And Ukraine’s not alone in this task either. To help streamline production, Denmark announced that a Fire Point subsidiary would start solid fuel production in Denmark by the end of the year.”
“At the time of recording, there is only a single documented use of Flamingo missiles by Ukraine. And their effectiveness is, to quote the Chernobyl TV show, not great, not terrible. Three missiles is a nice reference. Not great, not terrible.”
“Three missiles were launched in a poorly defended target in northern Crimea, and yet only two arrived on site, proving the Flamingo is fairly easy to shoot down. One of the missiles that actually arrived missed the target by about 100-200 meters. The second missile, however, caused significant damage to the building, also damaging six hovercraft despite landing between 15 and 40 meters away from the target.”
“This shows that there are still a lot of kinks for Fire Point to work through to perfect these missiles. The claimed accuracy of the Flamingo is 14 meters, but neither of the two missiles hit within that mark. However, the missile that hit the closest still managed to cause enough damage to deem it a successful strike, showing that the massive warhead can compensate for the lack of accuracy.”
Skipping over his analysis of which Russian air defense systems can shoot it down, since there’s ample evidence of numerous Russian systems letting a wide range of drones and missiles through without shooting them down.
Also skipping over his analysis of the Ukraine campaign against Russian oil infrastructure, as that’s been well documented here. But: “To add insult to injury, the FB5 Flamingo makes the drones used in those attacks look like firecrackers.”
“With this in mind, it’s almost guaranteed that Ukraine won’t be mindlessly launching flamingos at Russia, but will instead carefully plan the flight routes to maximize their effectiveness.”
The Flamingo currently takes a lengthy 20 minutes to set up and launch.
“Valerie Romanenko, a leading aviation expert and researcher with the Ukrainian State Museum of Aviation, says that upon exploding, the Flamingo will destroy any production plant. The facility will be impossible to rebuild because the explosion will result in complete destruction, leaving behind itself a 20 meter crater.”
Large Russian oil facilities are, naturally, likely to be targets.
“It’s interesting how all of the news outlets used Novosibirsk as the designation point of the Flamingo’s range capabilities, because Novosibirsk just happens to be close to Biysk, the home of the Biysk Oleum plant. The Biysk Oleum plant is Russia’s largest producer of military grade explosives and artillery shells. Every month, Russia supplies its forces with about 120,000 artillery shells. And normally, these shells are produced in Nizhny Novagrod, which is about 1,300 km away by road from Ukrainian borders, which means that the shipments are well within the reach of Ukrainian weapon systems. Because of this, Moscow decided to move their production to the Biysk Oleum plant, thinking that production there would be safe.”
“Cue the Flamingo: A huge missile that could in theory destroy the entire plant with one strike and a 3,000 km range. The is just outside of the Flamingo’s range by a few hundred km. But both Ukrainian and Russian forces are well aware that the Flamingo is a huge threat for this production plant.”
“The Biysk Oleum plant isn’t the only arms manufacturing factory at risk. Shahhead drones, which Russia has adopted from Iran, are produced in Yelabuga and Izhevsk factories which are well within range for the FB5. And the same can be said for the Oreshnik missile factory in Votkinsk.”
“Ukraine, for its part, obtains the capability to destroy virtually any defense industrial facility on the Russian territory. This entails a fundamental change in the balance of power.”
The usual new weapon system caveats apply.
As I’ve stated before, one of the first targets for a long-range drone with a large warhead (assuming they can make the targeting more accurate) should be the Omsk Transiberian railway bridge over the Irtysh river, some 2500km from Ukraine. As far as I can tell, that’s the only rail line in Russia that connects Moscow with Russia’s far eastern territories, and is presumably a key supply gateway to China. Russia could reroute some traffic through Kazakhstan’s rail network (which runs on the same Soviet 1,520 gauge rails), but I imagine there would be considerable pain in rerouting things that way. Plus the sort of floating bridges needed to repair that span seem to be in short supply.
Anyway, I though all of those videos had interesting points to make, even though that’s a lot of video to watch (or texts to read).
Rheinmetall has a new “GameChanger” drone (so they say) with an official “Rheinmetall Combat Drone” moniker that only a German company could love. I don’t see it as an actual gamecharger, but it is pretty interesting: a fixed-wing drone that can drop three other quadcopter drones (or, technically, loitering munitions), each of which can then be guided to the target.
The Rheinmetall Combat Drone is based on the German arms maker’s Luna NG reconnaissance drone and can carry the Hero-R type loitering munition.
“The Rheinmetall Combat Drone is the game changer for protecting your troops and fighting tactically relevant targets,” the company stated.
“Effectors as payloads transform the multipurpose drone from a sensor-to-shooter system into a highly efficient means of reconnaissance with com/network relay and SIGINT (Signals Intelligence) capabilities.”
The NG is the latest in the Luna family of reconnaissance drones, with an endurance of 12 hours and a data link range of 100 kilometers (62 miles). Satellite Communication would provide it with increased range.
The robust fiberglass composite drone has a take-off weight of 40 kilograms (88 pounds) and a service ceiling of 5,000 meters (16,404 feet).
The runway-independent vehicle can be launched with a rope hoist catapult and landed with a parachute and has stealth features with low acoustic, thermal, and radar signatures.
There’s an official video, but Rheinmetall has disabled embedding. So here’s a random Ukrainian guy (judged entirely from the trident on his hat) who’s evidently offering commentary on the drone, and has thus embedded most of the Rheinmetall video into his own. The relevant portion starts around 1:42 in.
Rheinmetall is a very solid MilTech company, but they tend to publicize things well in advance of commercial availability. (They’re hardly alone in this.) As such, I wouldn’t expect released versions to show up in the Russo-Ukrainian War. But they might send a few there for field testing.
I can see use cases for this weapon, especially for hunting down high value targets deep behind enemy lines. But this is sort of like the Cadillac Escalade of drones, while Ukraine’s flying yeet of death is more like an electric scooter: much shorter range, much more annoying, and much more cost effective for their intended task.
The Russo-Ukrainian War is probably cramming decades of drone development into white hot years of combat evolution (as wars tend to do), and every world military needs to be paying attention.
Here’s a longer-than-usual LinkSwarm, since last week’s edition was wiped out by the ice storm power outage.
The leftwing corruption of all government institutions continues apace. “US lost 287,000 jobs while government was reporting +1 million in gains.” (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
“That’s because economic growth is slowing down,” explains research fellow EJ Antoni. “Even the areas which contributed positively to gross domestic product (GDP) are not necessarily signs of prosperity. For example, business investment grew at only 1.4 percent in the fourth quarter, but that was almost entirely inventory growth. Nonresidential investment, a key driver of future economic growth, was up just 0.7 percent.”
“Meanwhile, residential investment fell off a cliff,” Antoni continued, “dropping 26.7 percent as consumers were unable to afford the combination of high home prices, high interest rates and falling real incomes. No wonder homeownership affordability has fallen to the lowest level in that metric’s history.”
There was a gain in net exports, but that was largely a mirage created by a major slowdown in international trade. “Imports are simply falling faster than exports, which shows up as an increase in GDP.”
But probably most concerning to Antoni is the sharp decline in real disposable income in 2022, which exceeded $1 trillion.
“This is the second-largest percentage drop in real disposable income ever, behind only 1932, the worst year of the Great Depression,” he observed. “To keep up with inflation, consumers are depleting their savings and burning through the ‘stimulus’ checks they received during 2020 and 2021. Credit card debt continues growing, while savings plummeted $1.6 trillion last year, falling below 2009 levels.”
Boom. “Texas has punted Citigroup from the syndicate that’s set to manage the Lone Star state’s largest-ever municipal bond offering, saying the bank’s policies for gun retailers discriminate against the firearms industry.”
Grand Theft Pollo. The food service director of an impoverished Illinois school district was charged with stealing $1.5 million of food — most of which was chicken wings. Vera Liddell, 66, allegedly began stealing from the Harvey School District during the height of COVID-19.” (Hat tip: Dwight.)
Bill Maher continues to take regular red pills. “The problem with communism and some very recent ideologies here at home, is that they think you can change reality by screaming at it.”
We could be heroes, just for one day. Or once a month, as the case may be…
This week in rapper murders: “Tampa rapper arrested for young mother’s murder days after being acquitted of recording studio double-murder.”
A Tampa jury acquitted Billy Adams of killing two men in a makeshift recording studio in Lutz. He walked free from a Tampa courtroom on January 27.
Three days later, a young mother who was pregnant with her second child was found shot to death in a residential area of New Tampa. Her toddler was still in her vehicle nearby.
A week after her death, Tampa police said Billy Adams “did admit to being the one to pull the trigger.”
Given that the original video generated doubts as to its veracity, I thought I would post this followup that goes into more detail about Ukraine’s low-cost suicide drone/loitering munition.
These look considerably less jury-rigged than the previous drones.
“These are publicly funded…Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense made a public appeal for donations to buy 1,000 of these.”
There seem to be different types with different warhead sizes. “The technical details are a bit vague. I’ve seen mentioned ranges of just two kilometers to over 10 kilometers.”
We see the successful attacks, but not the failures.
“These cost around 200 to manufacture, so they’re also extremely cost effective.” Indeed, even more cost-effective than my original estimates.
I’ve previously covered suicide drones and drones dropping RPGs. Now Ukraine is evidently cutting out the middleman and passing the savings on to Ivan by just strapping RPGs to light drones and guiding them in.
Here’s a screen-grab of this masterpiece of redneck engineering:
The is a great application of one of Murphy’s Military Laws: “If it’s stupid but it works, it ain’t stupid.” For the Russians, it must be quite embarrassing to get yeeted into the afterlife by Doogie Howser’s science fair project.
I’m somewhat surprised that drones that small can carry the RPG rounds effectively, but presumably they’re replacing camera gear or something close to the same weight.
An RPG-7 costs about $2,500 each, while a BMP-3 costs about $800,000 each. Even if you double the price for the quadcopter ($2,500 is a bit pricey, but not out-of-line for some pro rigs), you still get a hugely useful loitering munition for less than 1/100th the cost of the target you’re taking out…
The state-owned Israel Aerospace Industries arms firm on Thursday unveiled a new small hand-launched loitering missile, or attack drone, that can land back in a soldier’s hand without exploding, the company said.
The announcement came as IAI had been awarded a multi-year, multi-million-dollar contract with the United States Department of Defense to develop a version of the missile for the American market.
The device, dubbed Point Blank, is a small electro-optically guided missile that can be carried in a soldier’s backpack. It can be launched and operated by a single soldier.
Loitering munitions are also known as “suicide drones” or “kamikaze drones.”
Snip.
According to IAI, the device weighs about 6.8 kilograms (15 pounds) and is about 90 centimeters (3 feet) long. It can fly at altitudes above 460 meters (1,500 feet), at a maximum speed of 286 kilometers per hour (178 mph), and can hover in the air while the operator confirms a target’s nature and exact position.
The device includes electro-optical systems to validate and collect surveillance information in real-time, as well as a warhead in order to destroy a target, it said.
If the operator decides not to attack, the device can be flown back and land in their hand safely, according to IAI.
“The system answers the battlefield requirement to provide tactical units ranging in size from small tactical teams to battalion level, with an independent and organic capability to increase their lethality,” IAI said in a statement.
The Point Blank variant being developed for the US Department of Defense is dubbed ROC-X, and first prototypes and training would be provided in the coming fiscal year, the company said.
This video shows a vaguely X-Wing shaped drone that looks like it might have been assembled from an Estes rocket kit:
Switchblade-300 drones cost about $6,000 each, so presumably these are cheaper, and the ability to just toss them into the air before guiding them to the target will probably make them useful in a variety of dense environments where Switchblade might be difficult to launch.
Assuming that the Russo-Ukrainian War extends to the end of the year (a distinct possibility), don’t be surprised if Point Blank/ROC-X sees real world trials there.
Sometimes serendipity writes your blog post for you. I literally had just finished watching this video about U.S. Switchblade drones being sent to Ukraine when an NRO article on the same topic showed up in my in-box.
It’s an interesting video, but the title is false advertising, as it says nothing about how effective the drones are against helicopters.
Basically there are two variants of the Switchblade drone:
The Switchblade 300: Range 10 km, Endurance 15 min, Weight 5.5 lb (2.5 kg), Speed Cruise: 63 MPH, Dash: 100 MPH and it fits inside rucksack (includes payload, launcher, transport bag), launches from a tube like a knee-mortar, cost of $6,000.
The Switchblade 600, a much larger loitering drone designed for harder targets (including armor) with a 1.8 meter launch tube:
Switchblade 600 represents the next generation of extended-range loitering missiles, delivering unprecedented RSTA support and featuring high-precision optics, over 40 minutes of loitering endurance, and an anti-armor warhead for engaging larger, hardened targets at greater distances.
As an all-in-one, man-portable solution, Switchblade 600 includes everything required to successfully plan and execute missions and can be set up and operational in less than 10 minutes. Equipped with class-leading, high-resolution EO/IR gimbaled sensors and advanced precision flight control, Switchblade 600 empowers the warfighter with quick and easy deployment via tube-launch, and the capability to fly, track and engage non-line-of-sight targets and armored vehicles with precision lethal effects without the need for external ISR or fires assets.
Patented wave-off and recommit capability allows operators to abort the mission at any time and then re-engage either the same or other targets multiple times based on operator command.
Whether it’s from fixed defensive positions, combat vehicles with integrated organic precision fire, or air-launched applications, Switchblade 600 provides field commanders with a multi-mission loitering missile system capable of multi-domain operations.
No cost given for the Switchblade 600, but reportedly lower than the Javelin’s $250,000, and it has much greater range.
Both are suicide drones, diving into their targets.
When he was a young teenager, Wahid Nawabi would go to the roof of his family’s home in Kabul and watch the Soviet helicopters flying in the distance.
For most of his childhood, Afghanistan had been peaceful and increasingly prosperous. But that all changed after the nation’s democratic government was overthrown by Marxist military officers in 1978 in the Saur Revolution. In December 1979, the Soviet troops invaded, plunging the country into what has become 40 years of war, violence, and instability.
In 1982, Nawabi and his family fled. Nawabi, then only 14, led his three younger sisters on a harrowing 48-day journey to escape the war-torn country to reunite with their parents in India.
Because of that experience, Nawabi said he feels a personal connection with the more than 5 million refugees who have fled Ukraine in the wake of this latest Russian invasion. Now as an American and as the chief executive of AeroVironment, a leading provider of military-grade fighter drones, Nawabi said he has a moral obligation to aid the Ukrainian defense effort.
“We need to help the Ukrainians get their freedom back,” Nawabi told National Review. “I’ve gone through that experience. It’s heart-wrenching for me.”
Last month, the U.S. government sent 100 of AeroVironment’s Switchblade drones to the Ukrainians, part of a massive weapons package. Switchblades have been described as “kamikaze drones,” because after they lock on to their target, they fly in and explode. The Switchblade 600, which can fly for more than 40 minutes with a 25-mile range, is designed to take down tanks and other armored vehicles. The smaller Switchblade 300, which weighs less than six pounds and can be carried in a backpack, is meant for smaller targets.
He’s also donated 100 Quantix reconnaissance drones to Ukraine.
This also gives me an excuse to link this other NRO piece on how drones are changing warfare.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has shown the world drones’ power to change the way wars are fought. America should take note.
The most unlikely hero of the war in Ukraine has been a drone — or, to use the Pentagon’s preferred term, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The Turkish-made Bayraktar TB-2, a medium-altitude, long-endurance drone that’s 21 feet long with a 39-foot wingspan, can stay aloft for 24 hours at a stretch. It also carries a lethal punch: a “smart” munition that has been taking out Russian armored and supply columns and helping to grind the Russian ground offensive to a halt.
Meanwhile, civilian clubs of Ukrainian drone enthusiasts have weaponized their much smaller, commercially made drones — including Chinese-made DJI machines — by flying them above ridgelines and buildings to conduct reconnaissance on enemy units and send the information back to Ukrainian artillery units and other commanders. According to the Independent, Ukrainian officers have even been traveling to Poland to learn how to do the same thing with their military UAVs.
In short, the Russian invasion of Ukraine is showing the world how drones will change the way wars are fought going forward. The question now is: Will our military realize that UAVs as the airpower weapon of the future, or will the lessons of Ukraine be pushed aside and forgotten?
A lot of U.S. military organizations are getting into drones in a big way, so I’m betting more the former than the latter.
There’s a related issue that needs to be confronted first, however. Why are the Ukrainians relying on drones made in Turkey and China instead of American drones? It’s true that we are planning to provide Ukraine with Switchblade “kamikaze” drones, which are small enough to be carried in a backpack and explode when they hit their target, and training a small number of Ukrainians to use them. But there’s much more in the way of drones that the U.S. could be offering Ukraine, and the fact that we are not explains why we’re still behind in realizing the potential of UAVs as an airpower weapon.
First, our ability to export our best and most valuable drones — e.g., the General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper or the Northrop Grumman Global Hawk — is hampered by an international agreement known as the Missile Technology Control Regime, which unaccountably treats unmanned-aircraft technology like ballistic-missile technology. I have written before about how this treaty limits U.S. exports even to allies such as the UAE, who as a result have to rely on Chinese-made UAVs instead.
Second, there is an association in the minds of voters and policy-makers between drones and the war on terror, which has limited the leeway Pentagon strategists have to embrace the full potential of these revolutionary and disruptive weapons. For example, right now the Air Force is planning to retire an entire fleet of one of our best long-range intelligence-gathering tools, the RQ-4 Global Hawk Block 30 remotely piloted surveillance aircraft, most of which are under ten years old and still in very serviceable shape. The stated reason for their retirement is that they can be shot down by highly advanced anti-ballistic-missile systems. But by flying at altitudes where they are less vulnerable to those systems, they could still serve as the bedrock of an extended intelligence-sharing network, allowing the U.S. and its allies to keep watch over the Black Sea, Iran, the Taiwan Straits, the South China Sea, and North Korea. They could even be shared with our NATO allies and Ukraine through a lend–lease agreement designed to create such a network.
In the future, squadrons of armed UAVs have the potential to be used for close air support and full-scale air campaigns against enemy ground forces on a much larger scale than they have been in Ukraine — and for airborne ballistic-missile defense. But right now, NATO should be flying large U.S.-made and fully weaponized UAVs such as the Reaper from Poland into Ukraine and handing the controls over to the Ukrainians.
There’s no question that drones are going to be a big part of future warfare, not least because a drone is a lot cheaper than a tank, a helicopter or a fighter aircraft. I would imagine that in 20-30 years, we’re going to see AI-driven autonomous drone swarms unleashed in a combat area to wreck havoc on enemy units. It takes a while for armies to find the proper middle ground between “We can use planes to drop oats to the horses” and Wild Billy Mitchell’s “Airpower will overwhelm all other military units” advocacy.
The Russo-Ukranian war is giving an awful lot of militaries chances to test out their theories of drone warfare in real combat conditions.
