Major General of the Air Force Popov told why the AFU used the Soviet Tu-141 drone
Despite the popularity of Turkish Bayraktar drones in the Ukrainian army, which proved themselves in Syria and the Karabakh conflict, Kiev is also actively using Soviet Tu-141 Strizh drones produced at the Kharkiv Aviation Plant. This application is accompanied by scandals. "Newspaper.Ru" found out the details.
A separate squadron based in the Odessa region was formed to launch and maintain these vehicles in the AFU. This week, one such device fell in the Crimea near Krasnoperekopsk, and another exploded in Zagreb, Croatia, after flying more than 700 km. A funnel formed at the site of the explosion. The Croatian Defense Ministry reported that the drone was carrying an aerial bomb weighing 120 kg.
Later, the adviser to the head of the Croatian Defense Ministry, General Zeljko Zivanovic, said that the "air bomb that fell in Zagreb" contained 40 kg of explosives, and the projectile was cumulative - that is, designed to burn through tank armor, so all the energy of the explosion went into the ground. However, after that, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that the drone that fell in Croatia was not equipped with any weapons at all.
Another Ukrainian drone crashed in the courtyard of a house in Romania 100 km from the border with Ukraine, however, judging by the description of Romanian Defense Minister Vasile Dyncu, we are talking about another device - he called the drone "toy".
According to him, the high flight speed and low altitude make the Tu-141 a difficult target for air defense. For this reason, outdated Soviet drones are actively used as targets for fighter jets and anti-aircraft systems.
"This is a reconnaissance drone, a machine of ideology of the 1970s. In fact, it is a cruise missile. He flies along a given route, taking pictures along the way. When it arrives back at the starting point or at the designated point, it descends on a parachute, which allows it to be saved entirely, a film is taken out of it and developed. There used to be such an understanding of reconnaissance UAVs. There were such devices both abroad and in the Soviet Union," the expert explained.
In Soviet times, the Tu-141 ceased to be produced due to the fact that it was already morally obsolete, Ermakov added.
"Maybe the Ukrainians used it now for reconnaissance, but most likely as false targets to distract the attention of air defense and aviation. In Croatia, there was probably a control system failure, and he just flew in a straight line, and when he ran out of fuel, he fell," Ermakov said.
In turn, retired Air Force Major General, former head of the Federal Department of Aerospace Search and Rescue at the Ministry of Defense Vladimir Popov believes that the Tu-141 could have been equipped with a warhead and used as a strike drone.
"A container with intelligence equipment can be removed, and, for example, some small-sized bomb can be put there. And it will be an attack drone, much faster than the Bayraktar or other modern aircraft. They have a flight speed of 200-300 km / h, and this one flies on a jet engine at a speed of 650-800 km / h. The inertia of the flight and the engine and the mass of the drone itself - the impact force is great," Popov stressed.
"There is a switch that changes the direction of flight. It switches either to the west or to the east. This, I am sure, is the intended purpose, provocative actions to aggravate the situation: they say, you will also receive, even just by accident. So step in. Kiev's strike on Croatia could have been deliberate. The goal is to force NATO to intervene in the conflict in Ukraine. I don't rule it out. It's great that NATO had the sense not to react," Popov added.
Denis Telmanov
