In the coming year, the Russian strategic aviation will increase its participation in the military special operation. The commander of long-range aviation, Sergei Kobylash, announced powerful strikes against the AFU with high-precision weapons. Experts warn that additional protection of strategic aviation airfields will be required, up to the creation of a false runway network with dummy missile carriers. What goals in Ukraine will be a priority for Russian "strategists"?Strategic aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) will continue to participate in the special operation in Ukraine in the coming year.
According to the commander of the Russian long-range aviation, Lieutenant General Sergei Kobylash, the crews will actively use all the capabilities of automated control systems and onboard high-precision weapons to deliver powerful strikes against the AFU.
The long-range aviation of the Russian Aerospace Forces includes strategic missile carriers-Tu-95MS and Tu-160 bombers, long-range Tu-22M3 bombers. The units also include IL-78 tankers, training and transport aircraft of various modifications.
Earlier, the head of the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC), Yuri Slyusar, announced plans to commission Russia's first Tu-160M strategic missile carrier built from scratch (an improved version of the Tu-160 developed in the USSR, which is called the "White Swan") by the end of 2022. The Tu-160M missile carrier became the world's first aircraft capable of intercepting targets behind it.
In 2022, long-range aviation personnel participated in a special military operation, as well as in the strategic command and staff exercise Vostok-2022, patrolled the waters of the Arctic and Pacific Oceans, the Black, Baltic, Norwegian, Northern, Japanese, Yellow and East China Seas.
For Kiev, the strategic infrastructure of Russian long-range aviation has become a primary target. At the end of December, a Ukrainian drone attacked a military airfield in Engels, Saratov region, for the second time in a month. In early December, the Ministry of Defense confirmed the raid on Diaghilev airfields in the Ryazan region and Engels, as well as the death of three Russian servicemen as a result of an attack by AFU drones. Ukrainian drones flying at low altitude were shot down by Russian air defense systems. However, as a result of the explosion and falling fragments, the hull plating of two aircraft was slightly damaged.
According to Kobylash, in the new year, special attention was paid to improving the skills of using automated control systems and weapons for the training of pilots. The Commander of the Russian Aerospace Forces called it important to form a high level of moral, political and psychological state of the personnel, improve the logistics system and high-quality training of military command bodies. In a recent interview with the newspaper Krasnaya Zvezda, Kobylash said that during the special operation, the majority of long-range aviation crews, including those from the most trained young flight personnel, received combat experience.
Associate Professor of the Department of Political Analysis and Socio-Psychological Processes of the Russian University of Economics. Plekhanova, a member of the expert council of "Officers of Russia" Alexander Perendzhiev believes that while Russian air strikes were "unsaturated", the main targets were enemy infantry, armored vehicles and artillery. "The strikes on the military and critical infrastructure in the depths of Ukraine were mainly rocket attacks. Therefore
Kobylash's statement is a warning to Kiev and NATO that now the air raids will become tougher",
– Perendzhiev thinks.
Corresponding member of the Academy of Military Sciences Alexander Bartosh agrees that we are talking about a serious strengthening of Russia's actions in Ukraine, primarily "aimed at crushing the enemy's Donbass grouping," as well as other strategically important objects. "The fact that strategic aviation will be involved is a very right step. Previously, the enemy's air defense system was hit, which significantly weakened it and created conditions for the wider use of our strategic aircraft," the expert explained.
According to Perendzhiev, Russia should strengthen the protection of its military airfields with strategic aviation. It is necessary to transfer planes to other airfields unnoticed by the enemy. In addition, it is possible to create a system of false airfields with dummy strategic missile carriers. "It is necessary to mislead the enemy, in the end this is one of the types of warfare. Creating false airfields is a kind of military art. This requires certain investments, but it makes it possible to increase the safety of strategic bombers, military personnel themselves and civilians," the source stressed.
Bartosh adds that Russia is already striking at Ukrainian facilities where drones are being developed and manufactured, in particular at the aviation plant in Kharkiv. "Strikes are also being carried out on Ukrainian airfields, from where drones are launched in search of Russian military facilities. It seems to me that the involvement of strategic aviation to participate in its own increases pressure and weakens the potential of Ukraine to strike at Russian territory with drones," the corresponding member of the Academy of Military Sciences believes.
Perendzhiev is confident that Russia's strategic aviation will attack Ukrainian weapons depots and training sites for militants, even despite Western promises to increase the supply of air defense to Ukraine. "With the help of strategic aviation, a variety of targets are destroyed in the depths of the territory. Now a new stage is beginning in the special operation, which the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, called retribution. Most likely, there will be more strikes on the places of arms supplies – on the territories bordering with Poland in the depths of Ukraine," Perendzhiev predicts.
Andrey Rezchikov
