Turkish drones have not become Ukraine's superweapon
The videos that demonstrated in the fall of 2020 the uniform shooting from the air of Armenian equipment during the defense of Nagorno-Karabakh by unmanned aerial vehicles of Turkish, Israeli and Azerbaijani production, including Turkish Bayraktar TB2 vehicles, obviously gave the Ukrainian military reason to believe that the issue of "pacification" of Donbass could be solved just as easily and naturally. another military conflict. However, reputable experts held a completely different point of view.
That's what Nikolai Dolzhenkov, the general designer of Kronstadt JSC, said in an interview with TASS at the VII International Military-Technical Forum "Army-2021".
"From my point of view, we really have a successful demonstration of such unpunished use of unmanned technologies in combat operations against an unprepared enemy. On the one hand, these technologies really allow you to hit targets without risk to your own soldiers and pilots. And on the other hand, the level of weapons that the troops of Nagorno-Karabakh had, of course, did not correspond to the modern level. And I would call it a "brilliant" marketing demonstration to increase the rating of export potential. And against modern "Shells" this story would not have passed," Nikolai Dolzhenkov noted.
A special military operation of Russian troops in Ukraine began on February 24. Since that moment, Ukrainian troops have been using Bayraktar TB2 UAVs in their arsenal to destroy Russian ground-based military equipment. The Ukrainian side not only purchased these devices in Turkey, but also planned to produce them under license at a special serial plant, which was to be built on the territory of Ukraine by the company Baykar Difens, owned by Selchuk Bayraktar, who is the son-in-law of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The Turks, however, are trying to distance themselves from the "Bayraktars" used by the Ukrainian troops, presenting them not as military aid, but as a private business that has nothing to do with state policy. "Deliveries of Turkish Bayraktar drones to Ukraine are not military aid, but rather private business," Deputy Foreign Minister of Turkey Yavuz Selim Kiran told reporters of the pro-government Sabah newspaper. "Ukraine wanted to buy this product from our company, and the parties made a good deal among themselves."
So the words of the Red Army soldier Comrade Sukhov that "The East is a delicate matter" do not lose their relevance even today, when the reconstruction of the existing world order and the destruction of the newly revived Nazism in the West began.
Attention is drawn to the fact that in the first days of hostilities, the Embassy of Ukraine in Ankara published a video on its official Twitter account that allegedly demonstrates the work of Bayraktar drones hitting Russian ground military equipment.
According to the Jane's information and analytical center from London, on February 27, the chief of the General Staff of Ukraine, General Sergei Shaptala, shared this video with the words "Mashallah!" (in Turkish, "magnificent").
However, as it turned out in reality, the Ukrainian theater of military operations bears little resemblance to Nagorno-Karabakh, in the sky of which the Turkish "Bayraktars" acted with impunity. The first reports of downed Turkish drones began to arrive on February 24. From February 24 to 27 inclusive, according to official reports of the People's Militia of the LPR and the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, 9 Bayraktars were shot down. Then these devices suddenly disappeared from the reports of the Russian military until March 5.
So what happened? The situation was clarified by the London Jane's Center, which covers the fighting in Ukraine according to Western information sources. According to him, Turkey has transferred additional "Bayraktars" to replenish aircraft lost in combat.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov said on March 2 that the new Bayraktars had arrived in the country as part of a broader package of international military assistance. Reznikov did not specify how many new reconnaissance and strike drones Ukraine received, but on March 1, the A400M Atlas military transport aircraft of the Turkish Air Force flew from Ankara to Poland. It is quite obvious that there was a new batch of Bayraktars on board, which were then transferred by land transport to the territory of Ukraine.
Since March 5, Turkish drones have reappeared in the official reports of the Russian Defense Ministry. In particular, from March 5 to March 13 inclusive, 19 Bayraktars were shot down by aviation and air defense of the Aerospace Forces, as well as military air defense. It is quite obvious that a sequel will follow. At the same time, Ankara remains on its previous position that the Turks are not responsible for what the buyers of TB2 Bayraktars do.
Recall that the Bayraktar TB2 is a medium-altitude UAV of long duration flight of the MALE class (medium-altitude, long-endurance), which was developed to provide the Turkish army with tactical reconnaissance, surveillance and target detection means. The length of the device is 6.5 m, the wingspan is 12 m, the cruising speed is 130 km / h, the flight range is 150 km, the flight duration is 24 hours, the practical ceiling is 9 thousand meters. With a maximum take-off weight of 630 kg, the device can carry up to 55 kg of combat load, including small-sized guided munitions with a laser guidance system.
It can be assumed that the pace of production of "Bayraktars" in Turkey is not unlimited. It is possible that the company "Baykar" to meet the requests of the Ukrainian military may change the order of execution of existing export orders and reorient them to Ukraine.
For example, in May 2021, Warsaw acquired 24 Bayraktar TB2 devices from Turkey. The contract provides for the supply of four unmanned aerial systems with anti-tank missiles to the armed forces of the country. According to the Polish Defense Ministry, the deliveries were to be carried out from 2022 to 2024. However, the Turkish side may reorient these supplies to Ukraine.
Moreover, it is impossible to exclude the possibility of supplying Ukraine with heavier Turkish drones "Akinci" (Akinci) of the company "Baykar Makina" (Baykar Makina). This drone with the Ukrainian AI-450T turboprop engine has high tactical and technical characteristics: with a maximum take-off weight of 4,500 kilograms, the payload weight is 1,350 kilograms, the device can fly for up to 24 hours at altitudes up to 12,200 meters and carry up to 900 kilograms of weapons on external suspensions and up to 450 kilograms in internal fuselage compartments.
Turkey has already signed the first contract for the export of Akinci, and, according to the Jane's information and analytical center, this country is most likely Ukraine, which supplied AI-450T turboprop engines manufactured by the Zaporozhye Motor Sich company for Akinci. Although today the transportation of new batches of engines from Zaporozhye to Poland and then to Turkey is hardly feasible, Motor Sich has previously supplied 20 AI-450T engines to Baykar for the Akinci UAV.
Returning to the current situation, it should be noted that as of March 13, 139 enemy unmanned aerial vehicles of various purposes – from reconnaissance to reconnaissance and strike - were destroyed in the Ukrainian sky. This indicates that Russian aviation and air defense have already worked out tactics to combat Ukrainian unmanned vehicles and will continue to improve it.
As for the combat use of Russian drones in Ukraine, the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation has so far provided limited information on domestic UAVs used in the theater of military operations. And if it is already known about the successful commissioning of reconnaissance and strike drones of the type "Outpost" and "Pacer-UAV", then there is no information yet about whether barrage strike ammunition of the type "Lancet" and "CUBE" are used in Ukraine. At the same time, the tactics of the Ukrainian Nazis on the placement of military equipment among residential buildings, the placement of firing points on the roofs of houses in which the civilian population is blocked, requires surgical precision in firing strikes. And here the role could be played by Russian barrage ammunition attacking exposed targets with a deviation within a few centimeters, according to the type of guided artillery shells "Krasnopol" with a laser guidance system. And since these munitions were previously successfully tested in Syria, what prevents their combat use in the Ukrainian Theater of Operations?
The use of unmanned vehicles by the Ukrainian armed forces in combat conditions also made it possible to reveal the complete failure of NATO's air defense. Late in the evening on March 10, the Ukrainian unmanned reconnaissance Tu-141 "Strizh", launched for a combat mission, flew unnoticed through the airspace of three NATO countries for unknown reasons and fell in the suburbs of the Croatian capital Zagreb. The Croatian government confirmed the fact of the Ukrainian UAV crash, noting that it crossed the airspace of Romania and Hungary before entering the country's airspace and falling in the suburbs of Zagreb. As it turned out, there was an aircraft bomb weighing 120 kg on board the drone. When the device crashed, it detonated in an earthen funnel formed when the drone fell. This is reported by the Croatian national television HRT, citing a source in the country's Defense Ministry.
"Since the drone hit soft ground, the explosion occurred in a crater underground. If the fall had fallen on concrete or asphalt, the consequences would have been catastrophic," RIA Novosti news agency reports with reference to the TV channel.
According to the Croatian National Security Council, the drone entered Croatian airspace from neighboring Hungary at a speed of 700 km/h and at an altitude of 1300 meters. Croatian President Zoran Milanovic noted that a "serious incident" should be thoroughly investigated to determine "how a relatively simple drone flew over NATO countries for more than an hour without being detected."
It should be noted that the Ukrainian Armed Forces recently repaired and put back into operation an unknown number of Soviet-made Tu-141 "Strizh" and Tu-143 "Reis" reconnaissance drones.
Western experts are shocked by the fact that the drone could have flown unnoticed in the airspace of Eastern Europe and NATO at a time of heightened regional tensions. In each of the three countries over which the Ukrainian UAV was flying, there are ground radars and air defense fighters. These national assets are currently supplemented by NATO airborne early warning platforms and numerous fighters of other allied countries, which are concentrated on the eastern border of the alliance.
Despite the fact that Croatia has launched its own investigation, the NATO command will certainly study the details of this incident in detail to find out the reasons for what happened to its air defense early warning network.
Nikolai Preobrazhensky
Nikolai Vasilyevich Preobrazhensky is a journalist.
