At the beginning of September he turned on a flame that has not yet turned off. In the War of Ukraine we had seen drones throwing drones To tear down other drones, drone swarms stopping and prisoners To recruits, even drones acting practically on your own Thanks to the AI. But never that a drone lost the course and ended up arriving as far as Estonia.
That is why what has happened now is unusual: they have arrived in Türkiye.
An unexpected finding. The discovery of a Ukrainian naval drone Magura Loaded with explosives in front of the Turkish town of çarşıbaşı, 1,500 km from kyiv territory, it has highlighted both the scope of these weapons and the collateral risks of its employment. The artifact was towed by local fishermen to the port, which had to close while displacing artifiers to neutralize it.
It was a Magura V5 modeleasily identifiable for its electrooptic turret and satellite antennas, but without the additions of some recent prototypes, such as FPV drone pitchers, machine guns or missile rails. The scene illustrates How these mills, initially conceived as naval kamikazes, can become dangerous drifting objects if they lose contact or fail their guidance systems.
The evolution of magura. From his Appearance in 2022the Magura have gone from being simple suicidal boats to versatile platforms. Gur, Ukrainian military intelligence, has experienced aerial drone releasesautomatic armament and even With air-air missiles. In December 2024, a Magura V5 managed to demolish A MI-8 helicopter Russian with an adapted R-73, a world milestone in the use of naval drones.
In May 2025, another V7 variant, equipped with two Sidewinder AIM-9he killed Two SU-30 Flanker fightersdemonstrating that a non -manned surface vehicle could deny airspace. These advances confirm that the border between naval, aerial and land war is blurred in the same modular system.
Strategic impact We have counted before. The Ukrainian campaign with naval drones transformed maritime balance. After The attack on Sebastopol In October 2022, the USV forced Russia to retreat large units of its fleet, limit operations in the northwest of the Black Sea and assume a constant risk even in eastern ports.
Despite not having a conventional navy, Ukraine has managed to contain one of the world’s greatest armed through drone swarms. This has had a direct strategic effect: Crimea, core of the Russian naval presence, has remained More isolated and vulnerableand Moscow has been forced to reinforce coastal defenses, disperse ships and display additional surveillance means.
Captures, losses and a race. Not all magura reach their goals. Some have been recovered intact, such as the one found by Russia in Crimea In November 2023which opens the door to the analysis and the possible reverse engineering. The images of these captured specimens show the rapid evolution of the design, with improvements in optics, antennas and autonomy.
The risk It is double: On the one hand, Russia can learn to interfere with your communications or copy technologies; On the other, propaganda uses these findings to show supposed Ukrainian weaknesses. The drone found in Türkiye, regardless of its characteristics, becomes a symbol of the limits of this new form of war: the sea can return these mills to unexpected places, with unpredictable consequences.
The Naval War of the future. He Turkish episode confirms that naval drones have arrived To stay. Their low cost compared to a war ship, their ability to operate without crew and their flexibility to carry different weapons systems make them a decisive actor. The Ukrainian case demonstrates that a conventional nation can harass and condition a much higher adversary.
At the same time, ask questions about International Maritime Securityneutrality of third countries and technological proliferation. If a fisherman can find an explosive drone in a Turkish port, the line between Combat and Civil Space front becomes increasingly dim, anticipating a future in which the seas will be the scene of wars Invisible Libradas by clear flag machines. Estonia was The first noticeand now they have arrived in Türkiye.
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