Ukraine has extended the reach of its Light Sport drone program, this time striking 800 miles inside Russia to damage an oil refinery. The Aeroprakt A-22 completed the mission on May 9, and it would appear the program has expanded to include another homegrown design, the Aerosar Nynja. According to Forbes, Friday’s attack was Ukraine’s deepest so far and it likely won’t be the last. It damaged the cracking unit at the refinery, which is one of Russia’s largest.
More details are also coming out about how the aircraft, which retail for less than $100,000, are outfitted to become such a symbolically potent weapon. Simple computers are linked to servos to manipulate the existing controls. Satellite radios stream video from cheap cameras and transmit the control inputs from the remote operator, Forbes reported.
Those Ukrainians are some crafty fellers 🙂
…. and would seem the is the ideal middle finger to the Russians who, as I recall, damaged the Aeroprakt factory in Kyiv in the early days of the war.
The shortest distance between Moscow and Ukraine by air is 523 sm. Moscow is within range. More than just a Piroshki flight to target a refinery.
Indiscriminate killing of civilians is a war crime, right?
You might want to revisit what the Allies did to quite a few areas in WWII, Art. Once you start something, BOHICA … it might come back to bite you.
The concept of “war crime” is just another weapon in the arsenal of warfare.
“War crimes” are only committed by the loosing side since the winners decide what is a crime.
Curtis Lemay was famously quoted as saying he was especially motivated to win WWII as he knew he would have been tried and hung as a war criminal for the fire bombing of Tokyo alone.
“There are no innocent civilians” Curtis Lemay
Putin feels the same.