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British military intelligence said on Tuesday that a weekend drone attack on an airfield deep inside Russia which Moscow blamed on Ukraine is highly likely to have destroyed a TU-22M3 supersonic long-range bomber.
Kyiv, which on Monday claimed to have attacked another Russian military airfield, says Russia has used the TU-22M3 to bomb targets across Ukraine. Western military experts believe Russia has around 60 of the aircraft.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Saturday that a military airfield in the Novgorod region where such planes are stationed had been attacked by a Ukrainian drone and one plane had been damaged. It gave no more details.
Reuters could not immediately verify the British assertion about the nature and scale of the damage which, if confirmed, would underscore the vulnerability to drone attack of advanced planes which are a major part of Moscow’s war effort.
