Ukrainian Military Misleads Russian Army

Ukraine is tricking the Russian army into wasting expensive long-range cruise missiles on dummy targets, The Washington Post reports.

In particular, the Ukrainian military is making wooden decoys of HIMARS rocket launcher systems. Spotters cannot distinguish dummies from real systems through the lens of Russian drones.

After a few weeks in the field, the decoys drew at least 10 Kalibr cruise missiles.

It is noted that an initial success led Ukraine to expand the production of replicas for broader use.

Actually, the destruction of replicas may account for Russia’s unusually boastful battle damage assessments on Western artillery.

“They’ve claimed to have hit more HIMARS than we have even sent,” a US diplomat told reporters.

Nearly every week, the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation announces new successful strikes on Western-supplied rocket systems. However, both the Pentagon and the Armed Forces of Ukraine deny these statements and note that no HIMARS system in Ukraine has been destroyed.

Meanwhile, the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine demonstrated for the first time the use of American AGM-88 HARM anti-radiation missiles, which were installed on MiG-29.

Thanks to these missiles, Ukrainian pilots are successfully coping with Russian air defence systems, admitted even in Russia.

It is telling that HARM missiles are not intended for MiG-29, but Ukrainian specialists modernised them to adapt missiles to Soviet fighters, surprising the Western allies with their ingenuity.

Bohdan Marusyak