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Russia Imitates Ukraine’s Drone-Killer Tactics, Claims to Down Dozens of UAVs
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![Photo of Roman Kohanets]( "Photo of Roman Kohanets")
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Russian forces have significantly increased the downing of Ukrainian reconnaissance drones, a development attributed to the proliferation of anti-drone tactics initially pioneered by Ukrainian military and soon imitated by the Russian ”Rubicon” unit, according to the prominent Ukrainian warfare specialist Sergii “Flash” Beskrestnov report published on July 21.
Rubicon was the first to deploy effective interception strategies and is now reportedly training other units, Flash said in a statement shared on Telegram. “The enemy is increasingly targeting our reconnaissance wings. The most affected are Leleka, Horlytsia, Shark, and FlyEye systems,” he noted.
According to Flash, the Ukrainian side has anticipated this evolution, however he criticized the lack of timely countermeasures, saying, “We’ve shown them how effective this path is. Unfortunately, in the year they were catching up, we didn’t develop or implement effective countermeasures against anti-aircraft drones.”
Flash outlined current counter-drone tactics available to Ukrainian forces:
Electronic warfare (EW) in general, directed at the drone’s control channel is “questionable” due to unknown operating frequencies. “Suppressing all possible bands is unrealistic.”
EW systems like ‘Zerkaltse’ remain effective against analog video channels, but the enemy has now adopted digital feeds, minimizing this advantage.
The ‘Ukhylyant’ system, installed on Ukrainian drones, offers partial evasion capability—less than 70% effectiveness—but is “better than nothing.”
Locating enemy drone pilots has limited utility due to operational constraints.
Radar detection remains the most promising countermeasure. Flash emphasized that “without compact 3D radars, targeting our drones was not feasible. Their sudden success suggests such radars are now widely deployed.”
Flash expressed suspicion that the Russian anti-UAVs systems are likely of Chinese origin and called for active efforts to identify radar types used by Russian forces and locate them across the front.
He added that Russia has also responded to Ukrainian successes with anti-aircraft drones by ramping up production of its own reconnaissance UAVs. “Just as air defenses shoot down a high percentage of missiles, the answer is to launch more of them. They are applying the same logic to drones.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasized the importance of accelerating the development of anti-drone defense systems, calling for 100% coverage of the Air Force’s needs in this area.
Earlier, it was reported that Ukraine showcased a domestic interceptor drone capable of downing Shahed and other reconnaissance UAVs—claiming over 20 Shaheds and 10 recon drones eliminated since April 8.
