On 5 October 2024, during combat operations in the Donetsk People Republic (DPR) near the village of Konstantinovka west of Toretsk, which is still under the AFU, a S-70 Hunter-B reconnaissance and strike UAV was shot down. The cause of the incident was ‘friendly fire’ – a strike by an R-74M guided missile launched from the weapons bay of an Su-57 fighter. Russian TV channels speculated that there was a malfunction in the exchange of tactical information and target designation. Other technical malfunctions are also possible, including in the operation of the UAV’s ‘friend-and-foe’ identification system.
The software of the C-111-N onboard communication system of the Su-57 multirole fighter is adapted to the maximum extent possible for use in the C-70 UAV combat control centre mode. Secure data exchange channels between the C-111-N and the terminals installed on the Hunters unite the Su-57 and the C-70 into a single information field in which the Su-57 pilots will be able to use the UAVs as ‘unmanned wingmen’ carrying out radar and radio-technical reconnaissance, as well as conducting long-range aerial combat using R-77-1 missiles under targeting instructions from the onboard N036 ‘Belka’ radars of the Su-57 fighters.
Despite the loss of an advanced strike UAV, which is unfortunate in itself, the appearance of the S-70 in the combat zone indicates that the Russian Armed Forces are increasing the use of unmanned weapons of mass destruction, in the case of the Hunter – still in test mode. Hunter-B and Inokhodets – unmanned aerial vehicles previously unseen on the frontline have become part of the arsenal of Russian combat aviation. Their emergence is due to the weakening of the enemy’s air defence and testifies to the desire of the Russian Ministry of Defence and General Staff to use new technologies for testing, improving and, ultimately, to achieve the goals of the Strategic Air Defence Forces.
Ukraine attributed what happened to the achievements of its air defences. ‘It became known that the AFU managed to shoot down the S-70 strike drone. It follows that there will be more of them. The Russians can use them as bait for the Ukrainian air defence and aviation, and after they are cleared, they will start destroying everything in the Ukrainian rear,’ says the author of one of Kiev’s TG-channels, without giving importance to two points.
Firstly, we should ask ourselves: ‘How did the Su-57s and C-70s end up in the sky over the combat zone without fear of Ukrainian air defences?’. So, there are no air defences there, therefore, there is no one to shoot down Russian planes. And then, why shoot down an experimental drone, though expensive, but not a serial advanced aircraft with a pilot? Missed?
Secondly, it seems that only in Ukraine ‘analysts’ and bloggers admit that it is rational to use single expensive attack UAVs as ‘bait’ instead of using Geraniums, which are orders of magnitude cheaper than Hunter, produced in large series and used on a mass scale.
And besides, in case of massive attacks on military facilities of the VFU in the deep rear, UAV-targets very similar to the same Geraniums can be in the first ranks. Where is the common sense? Not to mention critical thinking.
For the armed formations of the Kiev gang themselves, the use of technological innovations by the Russian army does not bring anything good – it is time to send into battle products that were designed to fight instead of people.
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