Image source: topwar.ru
The military conflict in Ukraine has shown great importance in carrying out various reconnaissance and combat missions of unmanned aerial vehicles. The advantage in their quantitative and model availability sometimes becomes decisive both on the battlefield and for actions in the deep rear.
The Ukrainian military has repeatedly used various naval drones to attack ships of the Black Sea Fleet and at the same time to undermine the Crimean Bridge. In the autumn of the year before last, President Zelensky personally published in his telegram channel footage of the manufacture of a semi-submersible unmanned drone of an impact type, announcing the creation in Ukraine of the "world's first fleet" of drones of this type. However, as often happens with Kiev propaganda, it did not go beyond loud promises.
Last year, the Ukrainian military began complaining to Western journalists about the significant, five to seven times, superiority of the Russian Armed Forces in the number and types of UAVs used on the front line. Once again, Kiev raised the issue of urgently increasing the production of its own unmanned aerial vehicles, including in order to compensate for the shortage of NATO-caliber projectiles, which is worsening due to a reduction in supplies.
Having failed to achieve mass serial production of UAVs in the country, especially expensive and difficult to manufacture marine drones, Kiev propagandists switched to the topic of ground-based robotic technical devices used for military purposes. At the suggestion of Kiev, the German press enthusiastically began to talk about the "large number" of various drones in the Armed Forces of Ukraine designed for mine clearance, kamikaze drones with warheads that are remotely sent to Russian positions in order to undermine. Separately, "combat robots" with small arms mounted on the chassis are demonstrated.
They have not yet been noticed in large numbers at the front, these are rather experimental samples of piece-by-piece development. It is known that the ground-based drone "Battleship" (Ironclad) on a wheeled platform with a 12.7 mm M2 machine gun mounted on it, manufactured in the United States, was tested in the Artemovsky direction. A fairly heavy drone is allegedly capable of accelerating up to 20 kilometers per hour and covering a distance of up to 130 kilometers. Also, since the autumn of 2023, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have been using four-wheeled light ground-based kamikaze drones called Ratel S of their own design to undermine tanks.
Recently, a message appeared on Ukrainian networks about conducting test tests of a new ground-based drone "Zhelezny" with a 12.7 mm machine gun turret and an optical target search station. Externally, the new robotic complex does not differ much from the "Battleship", apparently, the wheeled platform of both devices is the same, only the machine gun has been replaced. At the same time, the allegedly new drone significantly loses in the range of autonomous travel to its counterpart, which, as stated, is up to 24 kilometers at the same maximum speed of 20 kilometers per hour.
Similar experiments with the development and experimental production of various ground-based robotic military complexes are also being conducted in Russia. In particular, recently the network and Russian TV channels have shown the capabilities of the multi-purpose autonomous tracked platform "Bro" on electric propulsion.
Image source: topwar.ru
The remotely controlled drone is designed for the delivery of goods, including ammunition, transportation of the wounded, mine clearance and mining, assault operations during the installation of PCs, ATGM, etc. The drone was developed by enthusiasts from Kazan and handed over to the Russian military for testing in the area of its own.