The info in this video is good, but I think the video fails to point out that as legitimately terrifying as these newer more sophisticated shahed drones are, the way to interpret this shift in terms of geopolitical power/grand war strategy is that Russia is now having to spend much much much more time and money making shaheds. Before they could get away with much cheaper drones.

This is also a moment where the news about Russian electronics in their weapon systems being made up of tons of components made in countries that are supposedly against this war should make us pause and consider while we watch the images of the guts of these shaheds and the advanced electronics inside them. I am sure those weapons can be made with entirely Iranian or Russian components… but the fact that Russia can reliably keep sticking western electronics in their strategically essential fighter jets means that they have more strategic lattitude to devote to creating a domestic capacity for vertically integrated shahed production.

Another point the video fails to make, if the idea that the counter Russia thinks it must make against WW2 large caliber machine guns like the browning M2 (in truth, it is a very modern capable system but my point stands) being used in a saturated backline air defense by Ukrainian defense forces… is to make their shaheds fly higher, if that scares you remember a basic aspect of spheres and geometry from grade school. The higher a weapon system must fly, the easier it is to spot with modern sensor platforms, the increased difficulty in shooting down a weapon system that now must fly higher is equally experienced by the creator of the weapon system that must now engineer it to fly higher in the first place… and then try to hide better because it is now flying higher and is thus… from a basic comparison of geometry and spheres MUCH more visible.**

Yes, shaheds flying higher is scary but what was it about attack helicopters everyone was saying that made them so obsolete in modern warfare like in Ukraine? Wasn’t it that helicopters inherently have to stick very low to the ground or they will be inveitably targeted by one of a million sophisticated air defense systems on the modern battlefield? The same principle here applies, yes there will be a difficulty to developing cost efficient means to shoot down higher flying, maximally cheap flying bombs like the shahed, but those solutions will be similarly strategically as decisive as Ukraine’s deployment of large caliber machine guns to effectively deny the low level airspace in their backline from Russia at a strategic level that this shift in shahed tactics is a direct admission of.

By the way, my recent post about Poland getting its first delivery of Apache helicopters connects to this naturally as well. Apache helicopters were designed for something like this kind of situation, even if the designers of the Longbow system hadn’t been able to forsee how numerous and small a mass armored attack from the air or ground by Russian forces could be they understood the principle behind launching such an attack against a more sophisticated and lethal western adversary, and thus understood the best way to counter it would be developing a system you could throw on top of a heavy attack helicopter that could identify targets, coordinate between friendly forces and in a matter of seconds identify that 3 friendly machine guns could knock out the first 3 shaheds, the next 4 could be given to an F-16 in the area and the remaining 3 could be handled by the Apache itself. The whole system is meant to protect by integrating, communicating, sensing and lifting heavy munitions with the idea of applying them very accurately which if it sounds like I am talking metaphorically here well…

Edit A connection to another one of my posts about the aero shark ultralight aircraft recently as well, while it is likely that electronics warfare systems Ukraine employs will likely be a priority focus for Russia to counter (the propaganda being existentially important for Russia to continue the war according to the metabolism of its internal politics whatever they are) as a platform the shark is beautifully well suited to counter this kind of high altitude mass drone waves. The shark is sold on the private aircraft market as being extremely efficient and uses as small and easy to maintain motor as possible (that crucially also isn’t extremely picky about fuel), it is designed to take off from smaller runways and fly acrobatically, climb quickly and efficiently to high altitudes and have long range or endurance if needed. Also of interest to potential pilots (human or robot) it has a parachute system which no helicopters except the ka-52 have. It seems to me Ukraine should pursue this type of platform for electronics warfare countermeasures. This isn’t a great plane to mount a weapons system on, but I think in order to win a war you don’t want the main defensive plane flying over your home to have to be armed to the teeth… that means you are still at war right? There is a capacity in an ultralight perhaps optionally? manned aircraft like the Shark to at scale counter large flying bomb shahed style attacks independent of a discussion on the type of countermeasures the ultralight aircraft carries.

This video points out the potential of the Super Tucano, and it is in my opinion arguably criminal Ukraine already hasn’t been given piles of these aircraft… but it seems that for political reasons Ukraine is specifically being denied the plane. I asked an industry expert who formerly worked for a defense contractor for comment and all they said was F35 F35 F35 F35 F35 over and over again I am not sure maybe they were a robot the call quality wasn’t very good. Anyways, I recommend Ukraine get more F35s… what were we talking about?

Well, this makes a plane like the aero shark a wise option for many reasons doesn’t it?