Ukraine is facing an invasion from the east. The second biggest country on our continent with an area of nearly 604 thousand square kilometers is being conquered by the Russian army from several directions. The breadbasket of Europe has been turned into a giant warehouse of military equipment of all kinds.
Due to their shared history, both sides are using similar technology from the Soviet era. Howitzers, for example, often face each other, which differ only in the varying degrees of modernization and, most importantly, the much-publicized markings on Russian vehicles.
While Russia (so far) dominates the skies and wins in destructive missile power and quantity, the Ukrainian defences are nevertheless bolstered again by anti-aircraft and anti-tank small arms complexes from the West, Turkish drones and, undoubtedly, by military intel from NATO and the US. Let’s take a look at some of these weapons in the following few chapters.
Ukraine also uses its own drones, but they are only simpler drones for remote battlefield surveillance. Our army has similar ones. In particular, we’re talking about the Leleka-100 model from the Ukrainian engineering studio Ukrspecsystems.
Leleka has a wingspan of 1.98 metres, a length of 1.1 metres and can stay in the air for up to 2.5 hours and at a distance of up to 45 kilometres from the control computer in the form of a military case. Several gimbal models that can carry both conventional and infrared cameras will take care of reconnaissance.
Only slightly more counterbalancing the Leleka is the Russian Orlan-10 reconnaissance drone, which has participated in the fighting for the Donbas, has served in Syria and now in Ukraine. The defence has managed to destroy at least one.
