The Ministry of Defense shared the details of an unsuccessful terrorist drone attack in Syria. At the precise moment of the attack, a Poseidon, a US surveillance aircraft, was patrolling the area over the Mediterranean Sea between Tartus and Khmeimim. It's worth mentioning that the terrorists used high-tech drones.
The Russian military pointed out that they purposely didn't blame a certain side for handing over the drones to the terrorists despite the fact that the state-of-the-art technology is not freely available and the country that helped the militants assemble these combat drones possesses a high level of engineering expertise. Moreover, the attack was coordinated via satellite imagery in accordance with the US GPS system.
This is how the Ministry responded to the Pentagon's rash statements that the technology used by the terrorists could be bought in the free market. What kind of weapons did these drones carry and how dangerous are they in the hands of terrorists?
Georgy Podgorny with the details.
Barometric sensors, servo control units, and a flight range of about 100 km. These are the battle characteristics of the 13 strike drones which were used by the terrorists. The DIY-drones tried to attack Khmeimim Air Base and the logistics elements of the Russian Navy in Tartus. The Ministry of Defense is sure that the terrorists couldn't stumble upon such technology by chance.
"The designs used by the terrorists could only be acquired from a country which possesses high-tech capabilities such as the use of GPS-assisted, remotely controlled drones that can deploy professionally-assembled IEDs to a specific set of coordinates".
But the fact that drones were used means that such attacks could happen anywhere. Of course, drones aren't a military novelty. For example, quadcopters were used in Mosul, Iraq. Those could hardly lift a grenade. The current ones possess firepower capable of inflicting significant damage. Militants have never used anything like that. The question is: Who supplied such cutting-edge technology to the terrorists?
Viktor Murakhovsky, editor in chief of Arsenal Otechestva: "Only 15-20 countries in the world possess such technology. Some of them are especially advanced, including the US and Israel. It's possible that some of these drones or even all of them carried military chips that could decipher military GPS signals. This technology belongs to the government structures of the USA and some of their NATO allies".
The Pentagon responded immediately, claiming anyone could have acquired these drones. Terrorists have been trying to develop their underground production. They've built car bombs, mines, and now — modified drones.
As a result, seven DIY unmanned aerial vehicles were destroyed by Pantsir-S air defense systems. The remaining six weren't worth wasting ammo on. They were hacked and simply landed. There was no damage, and no one got hurt.
Ivan Konovalov, Director of the Center for Strategic Trends Studies: "It's too expensive to waste missiles on such drones. Besides anti-air missiles, Pantsir has autocannon guns that are effective at low altitudes. It makes the system unique. Of course, they just shot these drones out of the sky without wasting too much ammo. Americans don't count money when firing missiles, although they've started counting now because they had wasted so much".
For now, experts speculate who handed over the secret technology and who received them. Experts from the Ministry of Defense are investigating the supply chains and the origin of the explosives.
Georgy Podgorny, Anna Redkina and Olga Olvukhina Vesti
