It’s unusual for Russian and Ukrainian narratives war to concur. But since Ukraine began its major counteroffensive in June, each countries agree that Russia’s tactical airpower poses a growing problem for Ukraine’s ground forces.
That could seem surprising given the overall arc of the conflict, wherein Russia’s qualitatively and quantitatively superior tactical air force (the VKS) has proven unable or unwilling to execute strikes deep into Ukrainian airspace—largely as a result of Ukraine’s extensive Soviet-era ground-based air defenses, now reinforced by more modern Western weapons.
Indeed, Russian airpower hasn’t prevented Ukraine’s counteroffensive from creeping forward several miles along three or 4 essential axes of advances, with recent victories around Klischivka, Staromaiorske, Robotyne, Kozachi Laheri, and Urozhaine. But anti-tank missiles and glide bombs lobbed by Russian aircraft, combined with dense minefields and field fortifications, have contributed to creating those Ukrainian advances more time-consuming and dear.
Airpower: The Army’s Fire Brigade
Military analysts expected that Russian advances would depend on its airpower edge to blunt Ukraine’s counteroffensive. Aviation assets could be rapidly surged and reallocated across the frontline in response to unexpected threats, serving as a first-responder ‘fire brigade’ to bail out ground forces fighting for survival.
That happened during Ukraine’s surprise Kharkiv counteroffensive last September. Russian warplanes surged to supply cover for fleeing Russian forces, pressing riskier attacks and sustaining higher losses. They couldn’t stop Ukrainian forces from advancing, but they covered the Russian retreat and acquired vital time to determine a brand new line of defense around Svatove.
The Ukrainian forty seventh and thirty third Mechanized Brigade’s failed massed armor attack early in June at Mala Tokmachka highlights one other issue—while manned aviation struggles often struggles to discover ground targets in cover (at the least without help from drone or ground spotters), concentrations of armored vehicles advancing down roads or across open fields make for ideal targets for attack helicopters and ground attack aircraft.
Russian Jets and Helicopters Are Using More Standoff-Range Weapons
A fundamental distinction between Russian and NATO airpower is the that latter is primarily using standoff-range precision-guided weapons by now, and the previous continues to be mostly using unguided rocket and bombs. Russia has actually developed many alternative varieties of such weapons, but doesn’t have anywhere near the needed volume to make use of them routinely, and only a minority of VKS aircraft have the mandatory targeting pods to make use of them effectively.
So, for much of the war, Russian warplanes have mostly been used as fast-reacting rocket artillery, briefly popping up from low altitude to release volleys of unguided 80-millimeter S-8 or 122-millimeter S-13 rockets in an arcing trajectory from afar to reduce exposure to short-range air defense.
Such scattered volleys can disrupt Ukrainian units forming as much as attack, but don’t cause as much attrition because the precision strikes Western air force can deliver at greater depth.
Nevertheless, Russia’s tactical aviation has phased in latest sorts of standoff-range guided weapons during the last 12 months. For the VKS’s Su-34 and Su-35S fighter-bombers (and by mid-2023, older Su-24 bombers, too), that almost all notably includes the UMPK satellite-guided glide bomb, a comparatively low-cost upgrade kit for normal FAB-500 M62 low-drag bombs. Allegedly, a whole lot have been built since production began around October of 2022.
The UMPK mates a jam-resistant Kometa-M satellite-navigation system to fold-out wings, giving the ‘dumb’ bomb a standoff range supposedly as much as 43 miles (but likely lower than that, in accordance with aviation expert Piotr Bukowski). Inspired by—but cruder than—the American JDAM bomb kit, UMPKs haven’t proven especially precise. In addition they appear susceptible to abruptly falling off aircraft, leading to multiple explosions on Russian soil in March and April.
But they could be released by high-flying aircraft a secure distance from air defense on the frontline, or Ukraine’s border. And their large blast radius can still cause much chaos and destruction on Ukrainian border communities, barracks, and forward command posts, in addition to disrupt ground forces massing for an attack.
Russia can be apparently deploying lighter 551-pound class bombs with UMPK kits (see below), and is allegedly developing them for huge 3,307-lb. bombs as well.
At lower altitude, Russian helicopters are employing the brand new izdeliye 305 LMUR guided anti-tank missiles on single or double launcher-rails. The heavy 231-pound missile (including an unusually powerful 130-pound warhead), has a standoff range of 8.7 miles and may either be utilized in fire-and-forget mode (for closer targets using an optical/infrared seeker), or less precisely towards distant targets (using inertial and satellite guidance). On this maximum range mode, the missile transmits a video feed to a datalink attached to the helicopter, allowing the gunner to eventually designate a particular goal once the missile is close enough to identify one.
Since June of 2022, dozens of videos show combat tests of LMUR by Russian Ka-52 and Mi-28NM attack helicopters, and specialized marks of the Mi-8 transport helicopter (the Mi-8MNP-2 and Mi-8AMTSh-VN special ops helicopters). Roughly 80% of those tests targeted static targets like buildings or bridges.
Using the LMUR’s maximum range requires some powerful eyes, either in the shape of advanced sensors or spotters closer to the goal. Russia’s latest Ka-52M model attack helicopter appears to incorporate an improved GOES-451M electro-optical sensor turret that may detect tanks as much as 9.3 miles away, or 7.5 miles using the thermal channel. Nevertheless, older models may struggle to completely leverage LMUR’s maximum range.
Alongside LMUR, Russian helicopters used the older 9M120 Ataka (AT-9 Spiral II) missile, radio-controlled missile (range 3.7 miles), and 9K121 Vikhr laser-beam riding guided missile (6-7.5 miles).
Meanwhile, for precision strikes at deeper targets like artillery and air defense, Russia is doubling down on one in every of its few undeniably successful latest platforms—the Lancet-3 kamikaze drone—with acquisition of the goal typically first performed by a longer-endurance Orlan-10 surveillance drone.
Despite maintaining a considerable miss rate and sometimes failing to destroy targets hit, footage of Lancet strikes confirms that they’ve destroyed or damaged dozens of artillery systems—including many Western ones delivered by NATO—in addition to air defenses.
A May report states that Lancets have turn out to be Russia’s preferred weapon for counter-battery attacks against Ukrainian artillery.
Attacking Beyond the Air Defense Umbrella
One other problem for Ukrainian forces is that, once they lunge towards Russian lines, they’re unavoidably distancing themselves from their very own air defense umbrella.
Medium- and long-range air defense systems are high-value targets (each in a military and financial sense). Thus, either side keep them miles behind the frontline to limit vulnerability to artillery and drones. And while long-range systems can threaten high-flying aircraft dozens of miles away, their radars are only more likely to acquire low-flying helicopters and tactical jets at much shorter distances.
A lot of these systems—especially the heavier, trailer-based ones just like the Soviet S-300PT and American Patriot—takes substantial time to redeploy, during which period they’re each vulnerable to attack and unavailable to guard ground forces. Even many mobile systems cannot fire on the move, often requiring just a few minutes to establish and fire. Because of this—save for probably the most mobile short-range systems—the medium-range/altitude air defense umbrella doesn’t creep forward to guard attacking units until after the territory has been secured.
What About Ukraine’s Jets?
Recently, Ukraine’s manned aviation has been most prominently delivering strikes by Storm Shadow stealth cruise missiles furnished by the UK. But they’re hemmed in by Russian interceptors and ground-based defenses relating to frontline operations.
Though Ukraine’s MiG-29 and Su-27 jets can attempt to dart towards the frontline to extend risks to Russian tactical aviation, patrols by overwatching Russian Su-35S and MiG-31BM jets armed with long-range R-37M missiles likely make such attempts excessively dangerous. Ukraine’s air force may prioritize preserving its corps of experienced fighter pilots while it awaits integration of F-16 jets armed with long-range AIM-120 air-to-air missiles.
Ukraine Doesn’t Have Enough Short-Range Air Defenses
Short-range air defense (SHORAD) could be further divided between ‘short range’ and ‘very short range’ (VSHORAD)—the latter constituting man-portable air defense missiles (or MANPADS) with a reach of 3-5 miles, in addition to lighter MANPADS-armed vehicles just like the Avenger Humvee and Stormer fighting vehicles donated to Ukraine. VSHORAD also covers self-propelled anti-aircraft guns just like the German-built Gepard and Ukraine’s Soviet ZSU-23-4 Shilka and 2S6 Tunguska.
Unfortunately, VSHORAD often lacks the reach to have interaction Russian helicopters using long-distance missiles. And Ukraine has received little in the best way of longer-reaching mobile SHORAD systems, as they’re relatively rare in Western ground armies.
Ukrainians have successfully resorted to using longer-range anti-tank missiles against helicopters, notably the infrared-guided Javelin and laser-guided Stugna-P. Russian helicopters, satirically, turn out to be vulnerable to such attacks when compelled to hover in place for a very long time while guiding their very own long-distance anti-tank missiles to focus on.
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Nevertheless, anti-tank missiles are less more likely to hit a helicopter performing evasive maneuvers, and introduction of higher Missile Approach Warning systems on latest Ka-52M helicopters may improve the chances that Russian pilots will turn out to be aware of the approaching threats in time to evade. Moreover, the brand new LMUR missiles still far outrange even the anti-tank missiles.
A final issue is that Ukraine has committed lots of its short-range systems to the defense of Kyiv and other major cities, as a result of Russia’s continual strategic terror attacks using low-flying missiles and kamikaze drones. Shifting Gepards and NASAMSs closer to the frontline would unavoidably involve a tradeoff leading to less protection for Ukrainian civilians, and further expose those systems to enemy fire.
This has forced Ukraine to mostly depend on its Soviet legacy systems. These include the Seventies-vintage 9K33 Osa-AK and Osa-AKM (NATO codename SA-8B Gecko) with maximum ranges of 6 and 9 miles respectively, in addition to just a few restored first-generation 9K330 Tor systems (SA-15 Gauntlet and 2K12 Kub (SA-6 Gainful) low-to-medium range tracked SAMs, with ranges of 6-9 and 14 miles respectively. Up to now, Russian attacks have destroyed or captured 15 Ukrainian SA-8s.
What Can Ukraine Do About Russian Airpower?
Mitigating the effectiveness of Russian airpower is crucial for Ukraine. But actively whittling down Russian aviation is difficult, as aircraft can pick and select their fights in a way that ground-based air defenses can’t.
Still, there are ploys, comparable to sneakily redeploying long-range air defenses closer to perform surprise ambushes of Russian warplanes cruising in airspace formerly considered secure. Ukraine pulled off such an ambush on May 13 by moving one in every of its newly-acquired Patriot air defense launchers near the border and downing 4 VKS aircraft over Russian soil in a matter of minutes.
While even a successful air defense ambush may ‘only’ knock out a handful of helpful aircraft, they might significantly shape operations going forward, as Russian mission planners plan more conservatively to account for risk of future frontline ambushes. But this can be a dangerous tactic that exposes helpful air defense to counter attacks, and Ukraine hasn’t tried this ploy again … to this point.
Western military aid, meanwhile, should concentrate on mobile SHORAD systems, particularly those with longer reach than more abundant man-portable missile systems. Amongst the few example of such systems given to Ukraine are two Crotale-NG mobile batteries France supplied to Ukraine, effective out to eight miles, twelve mobile IRIS-T SLS launchers Germany plans to donate, and ASRAAM air-to-air missiles mounted on Supacat trucks suppliked by the UK which could have an efficient range between 9-14 miles as profiled in an earlier article.
Poland has also provided some Osa-AKs, including their custom improved Osa-AKM ‘Sting’ variant with modernized electrooptical sensors (to help in drone detection) and digital systems. Slovakia and the Czech Republic plan to deliver 4 Kub-M2 batteries, each with a variety of 14 miles.
Nevertheless, executing such an ambush involves substantial risks for Ukraine too, because it involves placing helpful systems like Patriot, IRIST-T, or NASAMS in forward positions where they’re way more vulnerable to detection and destruction.
Ukraine must also look to deploying mobile assets that may cost-effectively shoot down Russia’s quite a few medium-range Orlan-10 surveillance drones, that are low-cost and deadly effective at calling in Russian artillery and Lancet kamikaze strikes on targets behind Ukrainian lines. A minimum of three Orlan-10s were orbiting overhead throughout the battle of Mala Tomachka, which Ukrainian forces lacked the means to take care of.