I really don’t see much adaptation within Russian systems, any time soon! Russia is a fairly ossified, systemically, at this point.
The War in the Ukraine
- Thread starter SampanViking
- Start date
Lack of money may has something to do with it.
Well there has to be more reason than that considering Javelins have been around for decades.
Something, yes; but, the main thing, I think not!
One would, certainly, think, that after the (back to back) shellacking of two of its clients at the hands of (Turksh) drone-operating adversaries, Russia would’ve, quickly, observed the efficacies of this “new” platform, and, then, would’ve integrated both concepts for its implementation and plans for its production, into Russian military policy. Russia should’ve been able to overwhelm Ukraine by massive drone swarms, alone!
Didn’t happen!
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I'd say a lot of old fashioned views as well. Until this war, Russia wasn't big on drones despite having been an early adopter during the Cold War. Now they are scrambling to drone-ify everything.
Lancets? DJIs?
The Javelin requires cooling of the IR sensor to operate. The cooling is done with gases, each time you engage the sensor to aim at something, you expend some of the gases. In a lot of cases in Ukraine the Javelin was non-functional after just aiming for some time at difficult to aim targets. In some cases, if they aren't inspected properly after storage, the gases might have evaporated. Each system is also hugely expensive. A lot of countries consider this "feature" to be more trouble than it's worth. For example the French skipped cooled IR sensors altogether and their MMP ATGM has a more modern IR sensor which does not require cooled gases. It is also quite likely the Russians will skip that generation as represented by the Javelin much like the French did.
In the end the Javelin has not proven more effective against targets in the Ukraine than the Kornet. So I wouldn't say the Russians have any particular issue with ATGMs. And the NLAW has proven to be somewhat ineffective against latest Russian tanks with Kontakt-5 or better. With multiple shots required to destroy a target. The warhead is just too small. What the Russians have missed in actual combat, I think, is remote operation like the Ukrainians can do with the Stugna. So the operator can work safely from prepared positions.
As if Russia hasn't been attacked by drones all the time in Syria. They knew perfectly well of the problem. Which is why they have bothered making recon systems like the Orlan, and even the Lancet was originally developed in the Syrian conflict and tested there. What they lacked was substantial production. Russia also arguably has the most advanced counter drone technologies at the moment. As for what happened in Nagorno-Karabakh, they mostly had obsolete Soviet era Strela systems against the TB-2s. The Strela has 5 km range vs 8 km range of the missiles the TB-2 can carry. Russia has the Tor with 12 km range, so once they started actually using them a couple days into the conflict the TB-2 was no more.
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PARP (Persistent Anti-Radiation Platform)? For SEAD? For DEAD?
Why, again, is is that Russia’s Air Force has not been a decisive factor, either tactically or strategically?
An inability to accomplish either SEAD or DEAD?
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And, production, specifically of newly developed platforms, is, precisely, one of the systems that is ossified!
As for, Nagorno-Karabakh, did this switch to the Tor materially affect either the military, or political, outcome?
And, the Su-57(22+35) was “tested” in Syria, too! How’s that figuring into operational capabilities?
And, how’s about that Armata? That’s been a resounding production success, and battlefield game-changer, huh?
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Has PARP ever done anything?
Russian Air Force has won every air to air engagement and has been dropping 1000 kg bombs on Ukrainian positions while Ukrainian strikes on Russia have been sporadic with 50 kg payloads.