The UK Ministry of Defence has released a new intelligence update on Ukraine, highlighting Russia’s continued struggle to establish air superiority after three years of conflict.
Despite possessing technological and numerical advantages, Russia’s Aerospace Forces have failed to dominate Ukrainian airspace, leading them to use tactical aircraft like the Su-34 as airborne artillery instead.
The report also details Ukraine’s successful use of uncrewed aerial systems (UAS) in striking Russian military targets and infrastructure within Russian territory. Ukrainian drone strikes have increased in frequency, targeting oil refineries and critical military depots.
“Ukraine has successfully used UAS against military targets and infrastructure in Russia with increased regularity, including multiple recent strikes on Russian oil refineries,” the update stated.
A notable success came in September 2024, when Ukraine struck four Russian strategic ammunition depots, including a facility in Toropets, hundreds of kilometres from Ukraine. The UK MoD report describes this as the largest loss of Russian and North Korean-supplied ammunition during the war.
The assessment highlights Russia’s ongoing vulnerability to Ukrainian strikes, suggesting that Moscow is struggling to protect its strategic sites from attack while maintaining front-line operations.
“Such Ukrainian successes highlight Russia’s continued inability to protect strategic military sites from attack, as well as indicating the challenge confronting Russia to protect its infrastructure balanced against protecting its operations at the front line,” the report noted.
The intelligence update underscores Ukraine’s evolving capability to strike deep into Russian territory, as well as Russia’s failure to adapt to the growing drone threat.
I guess Taïwan, Japan, Philipines and many other countries are taking notes of the tactics used by Ukraine. Rely on home made products before all. Have attritable air assets. These are key takeovers
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Including china, I’m sure they are also taking notes on how useful drones can be.
Russia’s such a super power and threat to the world. It lost a naval battle to a country with no navy and and air war to a country with no Airforce.
Europe could not possibly defend itself from Russia with out the USA.
🤔
100% correct.
It’s very true Jim
When asked by Trump could the UK take Russia on?
The answer should have been probably and if not we would cause them huge disproportionate casualties that they wouldn’t be able to fight anyone else for a long long time.
I look forward to starmer sending the uk military so we can see if you are correct
Multi Account Ulya turns up again. I see through you as I always have. You turned up rather instantly a few weeks ago, it said much at the time. What other names do you post under ? I reckon at least 10 ?
You are far too clever for me Freddie, pick whatever name you like. More importantly, when are you coming to Ukraine? I’m waiting. Looking forward to the excuses
Tell me Stalin, are Ukraine still occurring a good slice of Kursk, they really have made Russia an international laughing stock haven’t they 🤣🤣😂😂
Your government wants to send your military to Ukraine so send them. Boasting while hiding behind the Americans is tedious, time the uk stepped up.
There have been some British in Kursk, they have a new home now. Send more
I see your pretence about being reasonable and rather neutral in the matters of Putin and the military have now ended, regarding this last comment. At least have the nads to admit your a troll who supports what Pooptin is doing.
Happy to have reasonable conversation, maybe someone here could make a full sentence without crying troll and shut down conversation, maybe we could discuss the many ways this war could of been avoided. That will have to be another time, hurry up and wait is over for me for a little time
Could have been avoided if Adolf Putin didn’t decide to invade what is a sovereign nation! Conversation isn’t shit down, but bullshit nonsense is disregarded and called out. Sad to say the internet and many sites where the term Russia or Putin is clocked by the bot squad, draws in the sad trolls!
I dare say comrade Ulya is desperately trying to avoid a grissly death in little big man’s meat grinder war machine Airborne.
He has to keep commenting here, or the alternative is being shot in the back by North Korean defectors in the Kursk region.
Sad, sad little troll.
Oh behave, just because you are China’s bitch these days.
Just embarrassing…
Don’t try it on son.
Ulya is a female from the Tarter region. Well I say that because she said that. I am happy to believe “she” also posts under many different names.
“She” doesn’t appear for years on end until her name is mentioned, then “She” appears instantly.
Tatar region? You mean Tatarstan? If so that is incorrect, I have never claimed that, I am ethical Tatar from Astrakhan Oblast. If you are going to monitor everyone’s accounts at least attempt to get it right otherwise you will lose track of all these multiple accounts that upset you
There was no day 1 SEAD from Russia who were looking for Ukraine to surrender before it became a full blown Ukraine.
Had they done so and taken out infrastructure, the war would’ve been over before it had begun.
Russia are also choosing not to attrit their air force.
I think that this assessment is misleading. Russia gave air superiority, but not air dominance.
Once the war is over and they manage to source foreign components, they will rearm very quickly, being in war economy mode. Imagine them pouring these resources into peactime. They manufacture more artillery shells than the West combined for example.
The West isn’t ready to attrit like Ukraine are, which us what people are forgetting. Although, a war with the West would be a completely different dynamic. Airbases and infrastructure are gone from day 1.
The issue now for Russia is sourcing foreign components. To stay in power, Putin deliberately made Russia dependent on Western technology, hence their latest systems like the T-14 (barely exists) and Su-57 (promising so far, but low volume production) are facing serious issues, given the lack of import substitution.
Russia I saw offered Pakistan and now India Su-57 under licence. Other countries will be able to import components, not being on the sanctions list.
One thing for sure is that the West has be rearming right this second. The moment this war ends, Russia are in an enormous remarmament programme.
Russia lacks the manpower to really keep this up in the future. That’s one thing they’re going to have a hard time replacing, especially as they’ve been in a heavy population decline even before the modern trend of decline started to happen in big countries.
Their black sea fleet, still around and bigger than ours, docked just around the cost near Sochi. Their army advancing faster now all the landmines Ukraine had have been removed. We are lied to.
Black sea fleet has been forced to hide as it’s totally ineffective and has suffered heavy losses.
Their advanced are at snail speed and slowing.
Things aren’t too rosy for Russia. Unfortunately not too rosy for Ukraine either.
Jim, I wonder if China has any weapons to help the Russian navy.
I guess the other lesson for the UK is to ensure we have a robust air defence system.
Wedgetails and typhoon outer layer
SAMP/T Aster 30s intermediate layer with ballistic missiles defence capability
Land Ceptor medium-short range
Radar guided guns and direct energy weapons for short range and anti drone work
ECM/ECCM point defence/ MANPADS
We need to get back to a multi layered defence system able to tailor it’s response to a threat. So drones get dealt with by guns or direct energy weapons and missiles are shot down by a suitable interceptor.
Israel are the best example.
Iran sent 180 ballistic missiles (many of them ‘hypersonic’). Not a single casualty.
The Iron dome did its job. It’s the gold standard. If anything, we’ve seen that non-stealth fighters are out of date in contested airspace.
I laugh at when people say that aircraft carriers are defenceless, when proper multi-layered air defences are proven at defending fixed targets.
The real issue for the West are cheap drones.
The Houthis in the Red Sea have blocked 70% of global shipping, which is catastrophic for the global economy. That’s the reason that Europe has austerity; the hollowing out of its naval power.
Iron Dome does not work against ballistic missiles, it is for short range rockets.
David’s sling
You are unfortunatly right. The Iran strike was limited to it would not overwhelm Israel capabilities, to limit ascalation. The area covered by the system is extremely narrow, so ok in Israel, not ok under European circumstances. Israel depleted it’s inventory after one strike. The day after the strike, US announced the deployement of a Thaad battery. Missiles where not very hard to intercept, nothing manouvering. So the system is a step in the right direction, but as no ambition similar to Twister, to intercept hypersonic gliders. Let’s be realistic, Israel is a nice small country, with 10 million people. You have 7 Times more people in UK and we have 54 times more people in Europe. Let’s start to make our stuff and not go back to foolish expectations.
Arrow2/3 took on Iran’s ballistic missiles.
Pretty much every military analyst came to the same conclusion that Iran choose a flight path that maximized Israel chance of success to avoid escalation. How good the system actually is, is still unknown.
I would counter that in the contested air-environment, the lifespan of a non-stealth fighter is governed by the pilot’s training/experience, but also how good the aircraft’s defensive aid system (DAS) is. A lot of the shoot downs of the Russian helicopters for instance, were because they weren’t fitted with any form of DAS, especially the Mil-8/17s. The Mil-24, 28 and Ka-50/52s had DAS, which was either very old or simply not good enough. Mind you against Starstreak, there is currently no DAS system that can protect the platform.
The skill/experience of the pilot has perhaps the biggest bearing on how they can survive in a very high Surface to Air (SAM) environment. This was clearly displayed by a Russian Su34 pilot, who evaded three Patriot missiles, sent to intercept him.
I would say for a non-stealthy aircraft, the mission becomes a lot more risky and is not guaranteed to be successful. Whereas a stealthy aircraft has more opportunity to appraise the situation and make the judgement of either proceeding with the mission or not.
Unsure if uk can have air defence against missiles n drones for the whole country. Hugh level of cost and probably undeliverable. Surely if they bomb us, they know we will bomb them. Merit in protecting some key military sites.
Each new War brings new tactics, Russia’s Black Sea fleet found them selves cut off with no escape or re-enforcements, whilst many minds were focussing on how to neutralise their threat. The Russian Airforce was never prepared to face the massive support given by the west. The Russian Army was led by really inferior generals with outdated tactics and even more outdated weapons yet, here we are 3 years later and Russia has much new territory and a powerful ally in North America. As a witness to events in the White House yesterday, I would say that Russia has been given the all clear to carry on and also expand their land grab all because Trump wanted Minerals and the wealth they could provide.
What a mess.
The minerals deal was agreed under Biden. Trump just took credit for it. It’s obvious that this is meant as a kick up the arse for Europe who (excluding the UK, Nordics and Baltics) truly wanted Ukraine to finish the war early.
Any peace agreement is going to be backed by American logistics. The fact that Starmer and Macron are negotiating an occuptation force with Trump says it all.
Trump is backing nothing. His only proposal is to take control of Ukraine’s Wealth and there is not one piece of evidence that his great friend Putin will cease his Egotistical war against them. This is a sell out, a grand deception just like all his other lies and disgusting history. Adulterer, Porn Actress Shagger, Liar countless times, Dodgy dealings, more lies, the list is endless.
America needs to wake up sooner that later.
Starmer and Macron are negotiating because they know that #47 loves the attention and it’s a more credible peace without #47 clarity on Article 5 denial. Ambiguity would be sufficient…
Who is the occupying force in Ukraine?
But it has achieved geo-political and diplomatic superiority over America. In a month.
Not really in a month. The #45 FSB kompromat was in since 2015, possibly earlier.
Eric is on record that TO doesn’t depend on Wall Street finance as the RF banks are supporting TO.
That’s before you look at his various spouses and their motivations or actions. Which of them are RF sleeper agents cannot be known…
It’s well known that narcissistic sociopaths can be manipulated by stroking the massive ego which a spouse is well positioned to do, pun intended.
WE will find out soon enough. Eventually that orange skinned cretin and his thug JD will realise that map of mineral riches mean nothing as very little of it is proven. Now their true colours are shown, they are now the enemy as much as Russia so war will come to Europe soon enough. The Yanks will never honour Article 3 in Europe and when China attacks them we should not answer the phone
Russia has mostly used its airforce for standoff missile attacks.
Again standoff use of glide bombs helped the break-through at Adiivka.
Other than that, there has not been much air combat/ fixed-wing airstrikes over UKR
Russia never invested in SEAD/DEAD/stealth capabilities to penetrate airspaces with modern AA systems – the US did.
Does anyone know what, if anything, Ukraine is doing with it’s F16 jets ?
I haven’t heard much.
Do we know how many they currently have, and how many trained pilots? I’d hope that there would be an increase by now from the initial 6.
Keeping them safe from GBAD and MANPADs while they build experience and numbers. Given those threats there is little risk of A2A fight, and RF air prefers to lob FAB glide bombs from within RF airspace.
The CAS mission is provided by the excellent AFU UAV specialists who routinely air patrol for ISTAR and kill with FPV UAV, which are being produced so massively that not just MBT and AFV are targets, but individual orcs.
It’s now possible to see clips of RF surrendering to FPV UAVs and their operators accepting. Cluster munitions for norks who refuse to surrender. They probably realise that dear leader doesn’t care or want them home..
Missile and drone interception was what they were being used for, from the last thing I read on the subject anyway.
While RF scale is imagined a strength “quantity has a quality” the reality is that GBAD S200,S300,S400 are expensive and in short supply, especially after HARM DEAD missions.
Thus the number of military and critical infrastructure locations over vast distances is not feasible to protect with the limited GBAD they have.
The AFU heroes have understood this reality and how weak the RF logistics and supply chain are so burned the military and critical infrastructure to great effect with layered mission packages of decoys, attritable UAV and kamikaze UAV.
With superior ISTAR it has been possible both to recon patrol routinely and to identify concentrations of people both Infantry and their head shed, with devastating results.
RF logistics are now donkeys, literally not figuratively.
It’s clear that increased sanctions and compliance is the best non-military way to bring RF to the realisation that they are defeated. AFU sanctions as drone strikes on oil refinery and storage, with Western sanctions on the shadow fleet to destroy their hydrocarbon economy revenue.
While #47 is busy burning NATO and US alliances, he’s not yet suspended sanctions and even when he gets round to that, EU and UK will not suspend their sanctions because they know it’s much cheaper than military support and more effective to make RF regime capabilities and support crumble.
#vpdfo