Russia enhancing attack drones to challenge Ukrainian air defenses - British intelligence

07.12.2023 02:20

Ukrinform

Since the middle of 2023, Russia has begun to supplement Iran's Shahed one-way attack UAVs with components manufactured at domestic factories. Now the Russians are trying to make improvements to the design based on operational experience.

The British Ministry of Defense reported this on the X social network with reference to intelligence data, Ukrinform saw.

According to intelligence, late November 2023 the reports came that the downed Russian UAV was equipped with a Ukrainian SIM card and a 4G modem. This is likely a Russian improvised modification to improve real-time navigation using cell towers to reduce reliance on satellites.

It is likely that this is also an attempt to hamper Ukraine's electronic warfare efforts. Some other Russian-made UAVs have been painted black, making it difficult to visually identify the drones at night.

Russia is increasingly using one-way attack UAVs in mass strikes, trying to exhaust Ukrainian air defenses. However, Ukraine continues to successfully intercept most of them, the agency concludes.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) previously warned that Russian troops had begun to attack Ukrainian infrastructure using new Italmas drones.

Russian Minister of Finance Anton Siluanov claimed almost all imported drones that Russia employs today had been delivered from China.