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Missiles and UAVs in the Battle of Ukraine: Preliminary Lessons for Israel

(Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security) Dr. Uzi Rubin - Russia's "Special Military Operation" in Ukraine is indistinguishable from a high intensity, full-scale war between unequal contenders. A careful perusal of videos from the war uploaded to social media yields some preliminary impressions on the impact of precision missiles and Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs) in the fighting (as of April 2022). The invasion was preceded by a preemptive air strike on Ukraine Air Force airbases and air defense bases with 100 cruise missiles launched from Russian bombers flying over Russian territory. Indications are that while the Russian missile strike degraded the UAF's operational capabilities, it failed to extinguish them entirely. According to a source in the U.S. Air Force, many Russian cruise missiles "failed to launch, missed or failed to explode after impact." One satellite photo showed a Ukrainian runway with three fresh craters in the surrounding terrain, while the runway itself is untouched. The air-launched hypersonic Kinzahl precision missile made its world debut. The 2,000-km.-range Kinzahl, launched from MiG-31 heavy combat aircraft, has tremendous maneuvering capability. It can curve at the last minute into the target, preventing the defender from predicting its final trajectory and rendering all existing missile defense systems impotent against this type of threat. It seems the ground attacks by armed UAVs of both sides did not have any discernable effect on the course of the battle, and that the most significant impact of UAVs was in providing real-time battlefield reconnaissance, presenting "the transparent battlefield" where nothing can be hidden. Compared to the land-based firepower from artillery and anti-tank weapons, the level of firepower provided by armed UAVs is negligible. It seems that the Russians managed to shoot down most of Ukraine's 20 Turkish Bayraktar armed UAVs during the first three weeks of the war. The writer was founding director of the Israel Missile Defense Organization, which managed the Arrow program.
2022-06-13 00:00:00
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