The war in Ukraine has resulted in a Technological competition that transcends aerial drones: the land front has become a improvised laboratory of unmanned vehicles, where both kyiv and Moscow are looking for formulas for Replace deficiencies human and logistics with Mechanical ingenuity. Russia is accelerating its own program with designs ranging from the rudimentary to the unusual, all aimed at gaining time, confusing the enemy and compensating the high wear of personnel in the front. Ukraine has Flamingo.
Improvised prototypes. It We count some time ago. Among the most striking “robotic” examples The “Termit”a four -wheelbound buggy presented by Prorruse channels Like an assault drone. Actually, it does not carry integrated weapons, but a chair in which it can Travel a soldier completely exposed, with additional space to transport water, food or ammunition.
Another design observed on the battlefield proved to be little more than a Open box on wheelsdestined to carry provisions, but destroyed by a Ukrainian drone of first person vision before fulfilling its mission. These models, although rudimentary, reflect an effort to adapt minimal resources to the demands of mechanized war.
Launch rockets without humans. More ambitious is the proposal of a system of Non -manned multiple randomwhose models circulated in specialized media show it capable of firing ten ammunition autonomously.
Inspired by him Soviet coughalthough with a third of its tubes, this prototype suggests an attempt to transfer heavy artillery to the field of robotic systems, eliminating human risk in saturation operations and adding one more layer to the war at a distance.
Themit
Explosive Hoverboards. Perhaps the most unusual facet of this experimentation is the Hoverboards use converted into platforms for Carry explosive loads or anti -tank mines. In April, Russian military bloggers videos They showed Prototypes manufactured with simple consumer scooters, adapted as kamikaze vehicles, smoke systems, observation platforms and even for demining work.
Its low cost and stability provided by gyroscopes make them suitable to be mass producedwhich makes these improvised solutions a threat multiplied by the possibility of deploying hundreds of units simultaneously.
The drone. Another outstanding development is The “dronobus”presented by the state agency TASS, an unmanned vehicle conceived as “nodriza ship” of drones by fiber optic cable, with the capacity to operate two units at the same time with 15 kilometers of reach.
This type of platform points to an integration model, in which unmanned land vehicles do not act in isolation, but as nodes of an autonomous weapons network capable of coordinating on the battlefield.
Russian drone
kyiv’s answer. For its part, Ukraine has revealed the existence of flamingoa land cruise missile with a declared range of 3,000 kilometers and an eyelet of more than one ton, capable of putting under direct threat to Moscow, St. Petersburg and even certain regions of Siberia.
According to initial information disseminated by the Ukrainian press and confirmed visually In videos of launches From mobile ramps, the missile would have already been used in attacks within Russian territory. Its production is in charge of the company Fire Point and is presented as the most ambitious long -range system developed so far by kyiv, with a destructive potential higher than that of any previous weapon in its arsenal.
The enigma of its origins. Flamingo keeps an almost exact similarity with the FP-5, a cruise missile exhibited by the Emiratí Milanion companythat in the past already supplied material to the Ukrainian forces. The FP-5 has sub-seonic speed specifications of up to 950 km/h, a wingspan of six meters and a maximum take-off weight of 6,000 kilos, with an eyelet of a ton.
In addition, it includes mixed guidance systems that combine satellite and inertial navigation with protection against electronic warfare. Although it is not confirmed if flamingo is a direct variant of the FP-5 or an independent development inspired by it, the coincidence in technical parameters and design is difficult to ignore.
Comparisons. Analysts They have compared Flamingo with historical referents such as V-1 flying pump German or the American missile MGM-13 MACEboth cruise systems launched from terrestrial ramps during the cold war. Also remembers in certain aspects the old Soviet Drones Tu-141 and TU-143converted by Ukraine into long -distance attack weapons.
However, what differentiates flamingo is magnitude of its reachwell above the previous Ukrainian alternatives, and its explosive load capacity, which places it in a strategic category similar to that of the Russian Kalibrfrequently used by Moscow from ships and submarines, although with a minor radius.
Strategic impact The appearance of Flamingo gives Ukraine a tool that alters the balance of fire scope against Russia. Its scope covers practically All the heart From the Russian territory and, in theory, it would allow devastating attacks against air bombers, energy infrastructure and key logistics centers.
In addition, being a National Development And not a system delivered by Western allies, Ukraine would have full freedom to use without the political limitations that weigh on weapons Like Storm Shadow, Scalp-EG either Atacms. In other words, it makes the missile an element with great military and diplomatic value, since it demonstrates the Ukrainian capacity to innovate and manufacture strategic weapons on their own.
Mass production A key aspect of flamingo is the possibility of manufacturing it in series at a relatively low cost, According to their developers. If Ukraine managed to produce large quantities, he could launch waves of missiles combined with drone swarms, saturating the Russian aerial defenses that have already demonstrated difficulties in curbing minor attacks.
Although Flamingo lacks rankiness and, being subsonic, it is not immune to interceptionthe volume of fire could overload Moscow’s ability to respond. Plus: The incorporation of lures and other deception tactics would increase its operational lethality.
Perspectives and limits. It remains to be seen How far Ukraine can materialize the potential of Flamingo. Its effectiveness will depend not only on the technical perfection of the system, but above all on the industrial capacity to manufacture it in significant numbers.
If kyiv manages to do so, he will have for the first time a national strategic weapon with power to alter the War depth. If not, Flamingo could be a symbol of technological ingenuity, but of limited impact.
Russian robotization. As for Moscow, the Prototype proliferationfrom vehicles of fortune Even advanced platforms of unmanned artillery, evidence that the war in Ukraine has become the Test field most important for land robotization. Innovation arises from both Moscow engineers and improvisers in the front, with solutions that range between the useful fudge and the embryo of more sophisticated systems.
Thus, what today seem sketches of real machines, can anticipate a future in which armies depend more and more on robotic systems to sustain prolonged war, replacing soldiers exhausted by swarms of machines designed to resist where the human does not arrive.
Image | Ukraine, Telegram, Milrem Robotics, Telegram
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