The Bayraktar TB2 has become a rallying symbol for Ukrainians, who are singing songs about them and posting videos of their success.
Ukraine’s most sophisticated attack drone is about as stealthy as a crop duster: slow, low-flying and completely defenseless. So when the Russian invasion began, many experts expected the few drones that the Ukrainian forces managed to get off the ground would be shot down in hours. But more than two weeks into the conflict, Ukraine’s drones — Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 models that buzz along at about half the speed of a Cessna — are not only still flying, they also shoot guided missiles at Russian missile launchers, tanks and supply trains, according to Pentagon officials. The drones have become a sort of lumbering canary in the war’s coal mine, a sign of the astonishing resiliency of the Ukrainian defense forces and the larger problems that the Russians have encountered. “The performance of the Russian military has been shocking,” said David A. Deptula, a retired three-star Air Force general who planned the U.S. air campaigns in Afghanistan in 2001 and the Persian Gulf in 1991. “Their failure to secure air superiority has been reflected by their slow and ponderous actions on the ground. Conversely, the Ukrainian air force performing better than expected has been a big boost to the morale of the entire country.” The people of Ukraine are singing songs about the Bayraktar drone and repeatedly posting online footage of destroyed Russian armor. They have given the name Bayraktar to a lemur born last week at the zoo in Kyiv, the capital. A senior Pentagon official confirmed that Ukrainian forces had successfully used armed Bayraktars to carry out several attacks on the huge Russian military convoy that has been making its way toward Kyiv. The drones have also been used for reconnaissance, hunting for targets for Ukrainian ground troops. The Pentagon official said he could not confirm the authenticity of videos posted online that purported to show Bayraktar airstrikes. Before Russia invaded Ukraine, Bayraktar TB2s were already punching above their weight. The drones, with a 39-foot wingspan, are assembled in Turkey but rely extensively on electronics made in the United States and Canada. A growing number of countries in Africa, the Middle East and Europe have bought them because, at about $2 million apiece, they are much cheaper than manned combat aircraft. In recent years, TB2s have been used to attack targets in Syria, Libya and Nagorno-Karabakh — each time against opponents armed with Russian-made tanks and antiaircraft systems, and each time landing devastating blows on enemy ground forces. But military planners and civilian experts cautioned that the drones — which have no self-defense systems, are easily spotted by radar and cruise at only about 80 miles an hour — would be sitting ducks for Russia’s many-layered air defense system.
