Soviet bombs equipped with wings and satellite navigation or their laser-guided version give Russia air supremacy in the Donbass region, British media reports.
FAB-1500-M54 bomb dropped in Belgorod region PHOTO via X/Ukrainian Front
“Essentially they are blind bombs with smart fins added to attack fixed targets with some degree of accuracy.” said John Foreman, the former British defense attaché in Moscow, explaining that Ukraine also has similar US JDAM bombs, but in much smaller quantities.
Lacking air capabilities such as F-16 jets, Russia’s new weapons are leaving Ukrainian soldiers in the trenches exposed, The Times reported, citing soldier testimony.
“It’s just a matter of luck. There is no defense”said “Drongo,” a National Guard infantryman.
“You feel your organs shaking. I started bleeding from my ears and nose. I threw up. I struggled to speak for two days because of the shock,” he said.
A Ukrainian soldier from the 46th Separate Airborne Brigade, which is fighting in the Donetsk region, described the effect of the bombs as “infernal”.
“The damage caused by this is extremely serious. If you survive, you’re guaranteed a concussion. It puts a lot of pressure on the soldiers’ morale”he told CNN.
In six days, Moscow launched 700 such bombs, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
KAB (laser-guided) and FAB bombs can be air-launched about 60 km from the front line and strike within minutes, making them difficult to shoot down by Ukrainian anti-aircraft systems designed to follow a predictable trajectory.
“Putting them down outright is not a sustainable strategy”says Justin Bronk of the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi), citing the rapid depletion of ammunition for Ukraine’s surface-to-air missile (SAM) systems.
The recent FAB-1500 version weighs 1.5 tons of which 675kg is explosive and has a destruction radius of 200 meters.
The Russians have a very large stockpile of iron bombs and can intensify attacks closer to the front line and increase accuracy with greater impact as Ukraine depletes its anti-aircraft munitions, said Jack Watling, a researcher at the Royal United Services Institute.
Oleksii Tarasenko, deputy commander of the 5th Assault Brigade in Ceasiv Iar, a town located near Bahmut, says he did not see these bombs hit a headquarters or a supply route; instead, the psychological impact is great. The 27-year-old officer is responsible for the lives of 750 Ukrainians defending in Ceasiv Iar.
“The power of these explosions scares people. We are professionals, so we try to do our job. We tell ourselves that there’s no point in paying attention to the bombs, because there’s nothing we can do anyway.”he told The Times.
At the height of the battle for the city of Avdiivka (Donetsk), the Russian Air Force dropped as many such bombs daily as Mariupol, ten times larger. The Russian press then wrote about the “triumph of the glider bombs”.
Worryingly, Russia is currently producing the FAB-3000 model, which weighs three tonnes, and will start production of the ‘Drill’ model, which carries cluster munitions, later this year.
Russian engineers could even add a jet engine and fuel tank to the glide bombs, according to Kremlin-linked military bloggers, increasing their range to about 88 km and thus turning them into a missile basic cruiser V1s used by the Nazis in World War II.
The first rumors about the Fab-1500 began to emerge in late September, when a Kremlin-approved military blogger named Fighterbomber, believed to be a Russian Air Force pilot, tweeted that testing of these bombs was almost complete .
Two months later, the head of the Ukrainian Air Force, Mikola Olesciuk, warned that there were “signs of preparation for the mass deployment of 1,500 kg FABs”.
Russian forces appeared to confirm their use against the defenders of Avdiivka when another Kremlin-approved blogger, Military Informant, wrote that it had “significantly increased the rate of use of aerial bombs” in early March.
“This literally makes the Ukrainian armed forces unsurvivable and leads to significant losses of troops and territory.” he claimed.
