The Russian military’s anti-drone radio jammers don’t work very well. Its air-defense systems are spread thin defending against Ukrainian drones targeting bases, factories and oil refineries hundreds of miles behind the front line. So what’s a Russian infantryman to do to protect himself from the roughly 100,000 explosive first-person-view drones Ukrainian operators fling at Russian positions every month?.....See Full Story>>.....See Full Story>>
A shotgun firing buckshot is a decent defensive weapon. After all, a two-pound FPV drone is around the size and speed of a bird. A fast shooter could hunt an FPV drone like a duck.
The Russian armed forces issue a few shotguns for drone-defense duty—but not nearly enough to protect the whole 400,000-strong force in Ukraine. So at least one soldier has asked civilians to buy a shotgun for him—and mail it to the front line.
“Please help us with pump-action shotguns,” the shell-shocked Russian soldier said in a video message to his supporters back home. “Any shit will do.”
That the soldier has to beg for his friends to ship him a shotgun underscores the Kremlin’s struggle to acquire large numbers of shotguns through military channels and equip enough front-line units to provide a reliable defense against drones.
It seems that, as a last resort, at least one Russian unit is training its troopers to run in circles in an effort to dodge incoming FPV drones.
A video Ukrainian drone expert Serhii Beskrestnov acquired and posted online depicts the training—in part from the point of view of a drone. The “great-grandsons” of World War II soldiers “are mastering the course of dodging Ukrainian FPVs,” Beskrestnov joked.
The problem for the Russians is that we’ve seen alotof videos from Ukrainian operators depicting Russian troops trying, and failing, to leap out of the way of a drone in the instant before it explodes.
Dodging just doesn’t work when a drone typically hauls at least a pound of explosives. “Once an FPV explodes in near proximity, it can still injure and maim even if the initial drone strike misses,” explained Samuel Bendett, a drone expert with the Virginia-based think tank CNA.
“They’re simply burning us,” the shotgun-begging soldier said of the Ukrainian drones. Just one exploding drone “tears you apart.”