Ukraine claims it has damaged or destroyed another Russian AWACs plane, this time while it was on the ground. Newsweek is reporting the high value A-50 was hit when Ukraine launched a mass drone attack against a repair facility in Taganrog, just east of the front lines. Russian officials acknowledged the attack, saying they downed 47 drones, but did not confirm that an A-50 was hit. If it was, it’s at least the fourth highly valued command and control plane taken out by Ukraine and the focused assault on that type of aircraft appears to have had the desired effect.
According to Ukrainian news outlet RBC Ukraine, Russia is now down to five flyable A-50s and they are no longer a factor for Ukraine. “They no longer fly near Ukraine,” RBC quoted its security sources as saying. The A-50, based on the Il-76 transport, is said to give eyes and ears to fighters probing Ukraine defenses and that airspace is soon to get more complicated for the Russians. According to multiple reports, the first operational F-16s of the Ukrainian air force will join the fray in July with a suite of more modern weapons, like fire and forget air-to-air missiles, that it has not faced in the theater so far.
