Ukraine's increasingly bold drone war inside Russia

Ukraine’s growing armed drone campaign deep inside Russia has claimed its biggest success, destroying a strategic bomber at a base more than 400 miles from the Ukrainian border. New images have shown a Tupolev Tu-22M3 swing-wing Backfire bomber shrouded in flames and black smoke at the Soltsy-2 airbase which is about 315 miles west of Moscow. The Soltsy-2 base is home to Russia’s supersonic nuclear-capable Backfire bombers which have been used extensively to launch Kh-22 cruise missiles against targets in Ukraine. Kyiv’s increasing use of domestically-produced long-range drones to attack military targets inside Russia is becoming a game-changing tactic in the war which has now lasted more than 540 days. The US has declined to give Ukraine long-range armed drones, such as the MQ-9 Reaper which has an operational capability of 1,150 miles because of the Biden administration’s reluctance to include weapons that can be used to hit targets inside Russia. Washington wants to avoid escalating the war to a point where Russia and Nato could come into direct confrontation. As a result, Ukraine has developed its own longer-range drones, based on old Soviet designs, and there have been numerous attacks in recent months, some of them reaching Moscow itself. On Sunday Ukrainian drones hit a number of targets in Russian regions bordering Ukraine. The defence ministry in Moscow claimed a drone strike in the Moscow region was jammed, causing it to crash. The destruction of a Backfire bomber, however, will serve as a warning to Moscow that Ukraine has an improving capability which will pose an increasing challenge to Russia’s air defence systems. The attack on the Soltsy-2 airbase involved a “copter-type UAV [unarmed aerial vehicle]”, according to the Russian defence ministry. It claimed an aircraft was “damaged” , but the latest images show the bomber engulfed in flames. The base has been hit by Ukrainian drones before, causing structural damage to aircraft. But the latest attack is believed to be the first to have destroyed a strategic Backfire bomber. The challenge posed by Ukraine’s long-range drones was emphasised in the defence ministry’s statement, with the admission that after it was detected approaching the base in Novgorod region it was only targeted with “small arms fire”. The Kyiv government is working with more than 80 Ukraine-based drone manufacturers to produce several thousand a year. Longer-range models are a priority. One new model is the UJ-22 developed by the UKRJET company in Ukraine which has a reported range of up 500 miles, although it can only carry a small payload at that distance. With a maximum 20 kilogram warhead it can reach Moscow but not cause significant damage. President Zelensky hinted in July that Russia would suffer more attacks at home. “Gradually, the war is returning to the territory of Russia, to its symbolic centres and military bases, and this is an inevitable, natural and absolutely fair process,” he said. Russia has for months been engaged in launching long-range drone attacks on Ukrainian cities, using Iran-supplied kamikaze Shahed-136 unmanned aerial vehicles.