“Russia is catching up to Ukraine in drone production thanks to greater financial resources, production lines far from the front lines and especially help from China, a senior Ukrainian official told POLITICO.
“Chinese manufacturers provide them with hardware, electronics, navigation, optical and telemetry systems, engines, microcircuits, processor modules, antenna field systems, control boards, navigation. They use so-called shell companies, change names, do everything to avoid being subject to export control and avoid sanctions for their activities,” said Oleh Aleksandrov, spokesperson for the Ukrainian Foreign Intelligence Service. “Yet officially, China sticks to all the rules. Yet only officially.”
Beijing has repeatedly denied supplying any drones or weapons components to Russia, calling Ukrainian protests “baseless accusations and political manipulation.” But Aleksandrov said Russia has a critical dependency on the supply of Chinese spare parts for both tactical and long-range drones.”
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“Pavlo Palisa, a former top military commander and now deputy head of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office, said in a statement that so far this year, 80 percent of the damage to Russia’s equipment and personnel has been done with drones. In May alone, Ukrainian drones destroyed 89,000 Russian targets.”
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“Kyiv says that its access to new drones has been curtailed by China, while Beijing has placed no such restrictions on Russia.”
Ukraine is hurting, but so is Russia. Russia is offering higher and higher pay for fighters, and will soon have to force more people into the military. They will also run low on equipment. If Ukraine had consistent support from partners, Russia would soon be in a tough position.
Unmanned drone technology is not yet able to replace the capabilities of a crewed plane like the F-35. Swarms of small drones have very limited ranges. Large drones will no longer be cheap and swarms would be too expensive. AI cannot yet fulfill the many tasks that a trained human pilot can.
Most of the “mysterious” drone sightings over New Jersey are not mysterious at all. They are basic things that are often in the sky, like stars, planets, commercial aircraft, police drones, and hobbyists’ legally operated drones.
There could be government red team drones, or corporations could be testing new drones, or even something more interesting, but it’s also possible that all the sightings are normal things.
“Bradleys, like most of Ukraine’s equipment, are targets for Russian drones.
Drones have been used more in this war than in any other conflict in history, with both sides using them to take out equipment and soldiers and to gather intelligence to direct more powerful weaponry.
The prevalence of drones, where sometimes dozens of drones can go after one target, means battlefield tactics constantly have to adapt — including ways to protect high-value tanks and armored vehicles.
That means new types of shielding are being tried and tested in this war, including improvised armor on tanks and nets designed to trap drones.”