Don's Weekly, 12 August 2024: Part 4

by Donald Hill

(…continued from Part 3…)

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Ukraine

After some of its personnel were partially surrounded in the city or completely surrounded in the forest north of the city, the 225th Separate Assault Battalion is recruiting to replace its losses. Women can be drone operators but can’t apply for any other combat position.

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Diplomacy

Bulgaria agreed to send 50 troops to help train Ukrainian troops, calling it a clear symbol of their support. In 2022, Bulgaria provided Ukraine with a third of its ammo and 40% of its fuel in secret due to its internal political divisions. Meanwhile, Poland and Ukraine agreed to form a brigade from the 650,000 military-aged men that left Ukraine after Russia’s open invasion. While there are many reasons why some have ont joined the military, insufficient training before being sent to combat is one of them. The plan is to conduct 4-5 months of training in the hopes that it will increase proficiency and reduce casualties. The source of equipment is unknown but its possible Czechia and Germany may join the effort.

Reuters is reporting, once again, that Iran is selling 400 ballistic missiles with a 120 km range to Russia. They are more reliable and accurate than North Korean missiles and will be used for short-ranged targets, preserving Russian missiles for long-ranged targets.

Considering all such earlier reports have proven completely wrong, this is to enjoy with at least a pinch of salt. Relations between Moscow and Tehran are anything else than ‘cordial’, as usually reported. On the contrary, they are ‘complex’ - primarily because the Iranians are conditioning deliveries of their armament and ammunition on the Russians supplying not only specific types of armament and ammunition, but also the entire support infrastructure necessary to maintain and produce spares for them. ….which, Russia is refusing to do. In other cases: it’s outright unable to do.

Therefore, this saga is likely to continue for a while longer.

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Equipment

Samjiyon experiences rolling blackouts in North Korea but the Hyesan Forestry Machinery Branch Factory nearby was not part of those blackouts. After Kim Jong Un’s visit to Russia last September, it started to change from producing mortar shells to 152 mm shells. It began production in January with a target of 6,000 shells per month but it has not reached that goal yet due to periodic shortages in raw materials that arrive from China. The 915 Factory also began producing 152 mm shells this year. When the Forestry and 915 factories turn out their shells they are then sent to an agricultural machinery factory to finish the products. As of July 15, North Korea sent 5.2 million 152 mm rounds and dozens of ballistic missiles.

500 PAC-3 missiles are produced annually but they plan to increase that to 750. A total of 5,000 have been produced throughout the year. The U.S. Ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel, described a shrunken U.S. military industrial complex as a "weak link" that had been exposed by the Ukraine war and the Middle East conflict.

Ukraine is testing a quadcopter that uses fiber optic cable to relay controller instructions to the drone and send the video signals back to the operator. Since radio waves are not being used it cannot be jammed. The cable is spooled out to the ground as it flies and is rewound when it returns. One spool with 10 km of cable weighs 1.3 kg and a 20 km spool weighs 2.2 kg. The drone has a 5 kg payload which allows it to carry a camera with 10x optical zoom and a thermal imager. With a small payload, this drone can fulfill the reconnaissance role and keep the location of the operator safe. Terrain would not block signals but a broken cable is a risk that needs to be evaluated.

Ukraine has a booby trap drone that can land on the ground and remain dormant for up to three days. There are three fuses that can detonate it. One is a contact fuse, another is a microphone that detects noise and the third is a gyroscope that can detect if the drone is flipped over when handled. It can carry 4.5 kg of explosives for 45 km, but if you remove the main explosive there is still an 80 gram explosive hidden in the frame. This one was recovered because it was on the ground for more than three days.

Each sector has a different EW environment depending on the EW assets that are present and how they are used. In one sector, it seems, Ukrainian jamming is severely interfering with Russian drone operations. They are trying to overcome that with phased array antennas which can provide a narrow and more powerful radio signal that is harder to jam. It can be steered electronically with any mechanical movement, and the larger the antenna, the more resistant it is to jamming. Of course, the larger the antenna, the larger the drone has to be. So these antennas are for the larger reconnaissance drones, not the smaller FPV drones.

A Russian uses a rifle with a thermal sight to engage a Ukrainian drone.

While the soldiers at the front continue to create improvised munitions, such as this drone-dropped anti-personnel mine, the Ukrainian government is producing standardized drone munitions now. Both Ukrainians and Russians create or seek defensive positions to protect themselves from drones, but this Ukrainian unit uses a high explosive drone first to remove any curtains or obstruction and then fly in a second fragmentation drone.

A reminder that the Conflict Intelligence Group estimates that the failure rate of UMPK bombs is 4-6%. Most failures land in Ukraine but over 40 landed in Russia. Most of them have not exploded, suggesting the possibility of a fail safe mechanism, but dozens of Russian citizens have been killed by the bombs that did detonate.

The company Thales Australia was supposed to build M795 155 mm shells in 2022 but that hasn’t happened yet. They will supposedly start assembling rockets for HIMARS/MLRS next year and work towards building all the subcomponents of the rocket as time goes by. Rheinmetall’s company in Australia has been producing 155 mm shells since August 2022.