Ukraine has started arming its drones with shotguns to shoot down Russian drones and kill soldiers.
In video footage posted online by pro-Ukraine bloggers, a drone armed with two shotguns flies across a battlefield. The drone fixes on at least three Russian drones carrying grenades, one after the other, and shoots. Each of the Russian drones crashes to the ground.
Next, the drone then spots a single Russian soldier walking along a road. It swoops down and fires, but misses. The drone swings around, pulls back up and dives for a second strike. This time, the soldier falls to the ground.
Online, pro-Ukraine commentators celebrated the success of the shotgun-armed drone.
“This is amazing,” said Sergej Sumlenny, founder of the European Resilience Initiative Center think tank. “This is the first case of a firearm-armed first-person view drone I see which really makes sense.”
The drone footage was reportedly filmed near the city of Kupyansk, in Ukraine’s northwestern Kharkiv region, which Russian forces are trying to capture.
Analysts said that this was the first time that Ukraine has armed its increasingly sophisticated drone fleet with guns. Usually, first-person battlefield drones are either used in kamikaze single-use attacks or drop a grenade on their target.
Cheap first-person view drones have become a vital weapon during the conflict in Ukraine. They are used widely for surveillance and attack missions.
The so-called Winchester shotgun-armed drones now give Ukraine increased flexibility and another form of attack. Winchester is a US shotgun manufacturer established in the 19th century, named after its founder.
Ukraine continuing to develop ‘war technology’
Defense Express, a Ukrainian online military news website, said that the country was considering rolling out shotgun-armed drones across the battlefield.
“It is likely that the Armed Forces of Ukraine are working on scaling up this method of countering Russian drones,” it reported.
Shotguns are considered the most effective anti-drone weapons because the spread of their shot means they have far more chance of hitting their target than a rifle.
One drawback is that a shotgun works more effectively at close range. This means that while hunting down unarmed Russian drones is straightforward, attacking soldiers armed with rifles and grenades is more dangerous.
Russian military bloggers have regularly complained that Ukraine’s drone programme is far more advanced than Russia’s programme and is holding back their force’s advances along the frontline.
Last week, the Two Majors Telegram channel said that Ukraine was continuing to develop its “war technology”.
In response, it urged the Russian Army to “saturate the front with smoothbore weapons [shotguns]” to defend against Ukrainian drones.
And it is not just on land that Ukraine has carved a technological drone advantage. In December, Ukrainian forces also used a maritime drone to shoot down a Russian helicopter with missiles for the first time.
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