With Cheap Decoy Drones, Russia Baits Ukraine Into Revealing Air Defense Assets

The world’s principal theater of evolving drone warfare has a new angle, as Russia is now using relatively cheaper unarmed drones to force Ukraine into revealing the location of its air defense assets. 

The deceptive new drones, built from cheap materials including plywood and foam plastic, have been used in five Russian strikes over the past two to three weeks, Reuters has reported, citing Ukrainian intelligence official Andriy Cherniak. One version uses a camera and a mobile phone SIM card to send imagery to its operator.

In one of the foremost indicators of Russia’s strengthening military relationship with Iran, a principal weapon in Russia’s Ukraine-war arsenal is the Iranian Shahed kamikaze drone, which dives into ground targets and explodes.

While the new drones are built to duplicate the look of Shaheds, they generally don’t carry explosives, though some are believed to have carried small charges. Unable to distinguish between the duds and the real thing, defending Ukrainian soldiers are compelled to open fire — revealing their positions to the camera-wielding drones, which are typically mixed into swarms of bona fide Shaheds.

“They identify where our mobile groups are positioned, where the machine guns are that can destroy them. They’re trying … to get a picture of where all our air defenses are located,” said Cherniak.