Ukraine: Batacchi (Rid), ‘Drones’ kamikaze ‘bad customer for Russians, difficult countermeasures’

“Drones do not change the course of the war, but they are effective and it is difficult to implement countermeasures. The American ‘Switchblade’, the so-called ‘kamikaze drone’, will be a very bad customer for the Russians.” So to Adnkronos Pietro Batacchi, director of the Italian Defense Magazine (Rid), about the role of drones in the war in Ukraine. The Ukrainians already have the Turks in their hands, which are proving to be very effective against the Russians, while the United States has announced that it will also send their ‘Switchblades’, the so-called kamikaze drones’, to the Kiev forces. “These are very different drones, completely different systems – explains Batacchi -, the Turkish drone, the ‘Bayraktar TB2’, is a classic 650 kg UAV that carries bombs, small missiles that are launched against Russian armored vehicles, while the ‘Switchblade’ is a small drone that is launched by a mortar-like system, a drone that circulates for some time and as soon as it locates the target with its camera, it goes towards it. That’s why they call it ‘kamikaze’ (or ‘loitering munition’), because it does not launch any missile, it is itself the missile “. “These – he adds – are very effective systems, we have also seen it in Nagorno Karabakh, where above all the Azeris used Israeli systems, and the Israelis are in fact the masters of these devices, they were the first to use them. Israelis are probably the most popular. In any case, the American ‘Switchblade’ will be a very bad customer for the Russians. But the Russians also have similar systems. ” The major producers “of ‘loitering munition’ – observes Batacchi – are basically the Israelis, now also the Americans, but also the Russians and obviously the Chinese. Among other things, the Israelis recently signed an agreement with a German company for the marketing of these systems in Europe and also in Italy. Let’s say that the ‘loitering munition’ trend is one of the most structured and followed trends of the last two or three years in the military field “. In modern wars “these systems are very effective”, explains Batacchi, “and then they have an advantage, that they allow the mission to be aborted until the last moment. If the operator, who clearly sees on a screen what frames the device, he realizes that it is a civilian target, it can make the bomb go in another direction. ”Finally, as regards the role of drones in a scenario of urban warfare, the director of the Italian Defense Magazine comments: “It is not that with the ‘Switchblade’ the course of the war changes, but these are very effective systems against which it is also difficult to implement countermeasures”.