War in Ukraine: Dronmi attack from containers invented the Russians (interview)
Interview with analyst Lukáš Visingr.
The article was originally published on Aktualně.cz.
« The attack will undoubtedly strengthen the paranoia and the fear of the Russians, because every container suddenly becomes suspicious. There will be more border controls and inland, the flow of goods will slow down, » says Czech security analyst Lukáš Visingr o the consequences of a successful Ukrainian operation, in which the swarms of drones hidden in ship containers attacked Russian air bases on Sunday.
You were surprised by the report of the successful Sunday attack of Ukrainian drones on Russian air bases, or did you expect anything like that?
It could be expected. Many experts have been warning for years that small unmanned aircraft could be used for some mass attacks on strategically important goals or terrorist attacks.
It has appeared in some films or books, and in a smaller scale, similar attacks have already taken place in real life.
Where?
The Russian base in Syria has been attacked several times by several small drones. So the Ukrainian attack was not so remarkable in that drones were used.
Rather, the logistics and news side of the matter was impressive. That is, the fact that the Ukrainians were able to get these drones near the Russian bases.
If such an attack was expected, did the Russians fail to defend their air bases?
On the one hand, it is a huge failure, but on the other, no country today is ready for something like that – perhaps with the exception of Israel. Many people mocked the Russians on Sunday, but I am afraid that if something like this was hypothetically did, for example, China, for example, to the US Air Force, the result would probably be quite similar.
Lukáš Visingr
- Military and security analyst and publicist. It focuses on modern weapons, armed forces, conflicts and security threats. It regularly contributes to ATM magazines, the Class Revue, War Revue and World War II and published the book 21st Century Weapons.
So how to defend against such attacks?
Technology for protection against small unmanned aircraft is currently developing very intensively.
We see it in the war at Ukraine. Everything is being tested and deployed: conventional firearms controlled by some automatic systems, lasers, networks and fighter drones.
In some countries, experiments with birds of prey trained to shoot down drones are made.
The methods are several and at present we are simply located at a certain stage of intense races in arms between drones on the one hand and the anti -chief measures on the other.
I was intrigued by the birds …
It really is experimenting, but I note that it is rather against a really small commercial drone.
I think the future is in a combination, it will be a multi -layer system that will include machine guns, lasers, electronic jammers and certainly fighter drones.
For example, at this year’s Idet 2025 fair in Brno, several defensive drone systems were presented, including fighter drones. They attack enemy drones by direct impact or throwing networks.
In Ukraine, such devices have been used for a long time and some of them have experienced quite interesting achievements. So I think the future is simply in a multi -layer system that must be integrated and extremely flexible. Because such an attack will take place in a maximum of a few minutes …
How come there were not soldiers with shotguns on the Russian bases?
It is possible that the Russians just didn’t really count on something like that. They have become accustomed to the Ukrainians carrying long -distance strikes with their drones, which may interfere with a few hundred kilometers from the Ukrainian border.
They have drones who are able to handle in some way through the Russian air defense. But these are larger machines.
This was something completely different, and it seems that no one in the Russian aviation occurred that these small suicide drones could attack so far from the Ukrainian border. So yes, there was probably no guy with a shotgun, because no one thought it might be needed.
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The machines that were affected were strategic bombers. These were mainly types of TU-95 and Tu-22. Can you give us a little closer to us what aircraft were?
These are machines that come from the period Cold War. Tu-95 is older, was made in the 1950s. Both of these types are used for those massive missile strokes on Ukrainian cities and infrastructure.
The Russians delete different types of controlled shots. These missiles have a higher success rate in overcoming Ukrainian air defense than Russian unmanned aircraft.
They also carry much larger combat heads – hundreds of kilograms, while unmanned aircraft carry charge in the order of tens of kilograms. So the fact that the Russians have now lost some of these machines is certainly a painful loss for them.
How many of them were hit?
We don’t know for sure. The Ukrainians talk about about 40, but I think this is the total number of attacked machines. The number of those that have been damaged or destroyed is certainly significantly lower. It will be something between 10 and 20.
The total number of Russian strategic bombers is around 120, but far not all are functional – they will be 70 to 80, a maximum of 90.
So even ten destroyed aircraft is a noticeable loss. All the more so because they cannot replace them, as the TU-22 and TU-95 are no longer produced for a long time.
Why?
There are no longer production lines, people who could do it are retired … Only the last Tu-60 is produced. But they only produce about one aircraft per year …
They have tires stacked in the shots, especially on the wings. What is it for?
The Russians put it there a long time. Especially to some extent to break the visual image of the drones, simply to complicate any automatic guidance of attacking drones.
Tires could also function as a form of armor, as the intervention in them would not necessarily activate the drone charge.
But it failed …
The Ukrainians knew very well where to attack. For example, in the case of those TU -95, we saw photographs of the Ukrainian intelligence commander who looked at photos of these aircraft from above, and there are red crosses – actually a deliberate point on the edge between the torso and the internal engine on the wing.
There is a fuel tank and the main wing beam, so if even a small unmanned aircraft hits this place, it will cause it essentially irreparable damage.
Ukrainians could also train on machines of this type that they have in their Aviation Museum in Poltava, if I am not mistaken …
Yes, the photos that were seen on the table are photos from the Museum in Poltava, where the Ukrainians have these machines.
How were unmanned aircraft controlled?
We don’t know for sure. There have already been some rumors that they could be controlled by some autopilot software. That it was a combination of automatic guidance and remote control, because the attack was allegedly managed from Ukraine using Russian mobile networks.
We know that Russians use Ukrainian mobile networks in some drone strikes, because some Shahids (Russian suicide drones originally Iranian origin) have SIM cards, operate as modems and use Ukrainian mobile networks to send data from Shahids.
It seems that the Ukrainians basically rewarded them by using Russian mobile networks. But they are very delayed, because it really takes a while to get the commands to the drones … So I think there was probably some software autopilot that kept those drones in a certain direction.
And Ukrainian operators supervised it at a distance, or they did some corrections.
Does this operation mean, in which a few ridiculously cheap drones destroyed machines for hundreds of millions of dollars, something like twilight conventional aviation?
No, I don’t think so. It was asymmetrical, I would say an almost guerrilla operation. It was a news operation.
These unmanned aircraft have a relatively short range. Such drones cannot carry beats at a distance of hundreds or thousands of kilometers, capable of conventional aviation.
Of course, drones will play a big role in the Air War – and they are already playing it. And this task will undoubtedly increase. But those drones that will be introduced in the aviation are machines that are already in size comparable to piloted aircraft. They must have the range and capacity of weapons comparable to those piloted machines, so they must be similar in size.
Drones will be used in combination with piloted machines, which will also concern the F-35 aircraft, which will be used by the Czech army. There is assumed their deployment in combination with large unmanned aircraft, which will serve as their accompaniment and support.
And then there are small unmanned aircraft, which we often see on the front in Ukraine. It simply becomes the standard that each infantry unit will have them, as every plate of machine gun today.
However, they have a range of 10 to 20 kilometers. They will complement mortars or anti -tank -controlled missiles, but cannot replace conventional artillery, which has a much larger range. And they cannot replace the aviation, which has a much greater ability to hit really long distances …
Can terrorists use unmanned aircraft?
Yes, I am afraid that this is a potentially extremely effective tool for terrorist attacks.
Yes, I can very well imagine how a container from which dozens or hundreds of drones will fly, use on some really terrible terrorist attack.
Did he have a Sunday attack on the air base psychological effect on the Russians?
Here is one very interesting effect – why the Ukrainians say so much about how they did the attack? Why do they inform about it in detail? I think they have thought it.
The Russians would find it all in a few days. It’s not something that can be completely concealed. But the Ukrainians themselves presented the whole thing for just one simple reason.
We have to realize that drones have been released from civil -looking containers, something completely innocent. Thousands and thousands of such cargo containers are transported daily throughout Russia And they carry a variety of goods.
And the Ukrainians have probably also used the fact that various things from different post -Soviet countries are often smuggled to Russia, for example to circumvent sanctions. It is quite possible that, for example, drones smuggled through Kazakhstan.
So far, no one has thought of checking all the containers, but it is quite possible that someone will do it now. The attack will undoubtedly support the paranoia and fear among the Russians, because every container suddenly becomes suspicious. Greater controls on the border and inland will begin. And so the Russians will slow down the flow of goods.
But they are responsible for it.
What do you mean?
A few years ago, the Russians introduced a system that used these cargo containers as a platform to launch counter -antisual and anti -road missiles.
They presented it as a weapon that could be easily hidden and easily transported on a train, a truck or a boat.
And now suddenly they themselves have been the target of the attack of weapons that started from the containers.
