Russia using Iranian Shahed drones to attack Ukraine

Odessa, Sept 29: Ukraine is in a spot since Russia started using Iran-made ‘kamikaze’ drones to counter its recent battlefield losses, as per media reports.

 

 

 

On 23 September 2022, the air raid occurred in the port city of Odesa in southern Ukraine in which at least eight Iran-made ‘Shahed-136’ kamikaze drones were deployed to bomb Odesa, AeroTime Hub reports.

 

 

 

Ukraine’s ministry of defence said that it intercepted six drones while the two damaged an administrative building. A civilian was also killed in the strike. Hennadii Trukhanov, the Mayor of Odesa, said the ‘loitering munitions’ targeted the city again two days later. While one of the drones was blocked, an administrative building was struck thrice, reports AeroTime Hub. On 26 September, the Russian forces reportedly used two Shahed-136 drones to hit military objects, a Ukrainian command post said. “A drone destroyed by air defense forces. Two hit military infrastructure,” Ukraine’s Operational Command South said in a statement. The drone attack on the military facility triggered a major blaze, however, no fatalities were reported. “As a result of a large-scale fire and the detonation of ammunition, the evacuation of the civilian population was organised. Preliminarily, there have been no casualties”, Reuters quoted the command as saying. Sergey Bratchuk, the spokesman of the Odesa regional military administration, also confirmed the attacks by Russian forces on Telegram. “After the previous night’s enemy attack by kamikaze drones of the “Shahed-136″ type, the dark time of the day passed without shelling,” Bratchuk was quoted as saying by ThePrint.

What are the Iran-made kamikaze drones and why have they become a cause of concern for Ukraine? Let’s take a closer look. Low-flying and relatively small, Iran’s kamikaze drones are built to attack ground targets. These delta-winged unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) usually fly in pairs and slam into their targets. Justin Bronk, a senior fellow at British think-tank Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), said “the Shahed-136 offer a relatively cheap way for states and some non-state groups to mount long-range attacks on fixed targets (using GPS/INS navigation) or radars (using an anti-radiation seeker).” Noting the limitations of Shahed, Bronk said the drone’s attack can be foiled if the GPS system is jammed, blocked, or turned off.

 

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Further, its limited warhead capability also poses a constraint. He tweeted the “warhead capacity is small (typically 5-30kg) which limits damage and viable target sets compared to regular bombs, missiles or artillery.” Iran’s kamikaze-style Shaheds had made headlines earlier when the US had accused the Islamic nation of using these weapons to launch a coordinated attack on Saudi Arabia’s oil industry.