Tag: drones

Belarus Tests Largest Unmanned Helicopter in CIS — Sky-Truck Takes Flight

Belarus has begun flight tests of the Sky-Truck, the largest unmanned helicopter in the CIS, capable of carrying up to 600 kg of cargo over 480 kilometers.

The Minsk-based design bureau Unmanned Helicopters has launched flight trials of the Sky-Truck, a multi-purpose UAV that represents the most advanced unmanned helicopter project in the post-Soviet space. With a flight range of up to 480 km and endurance of four hours, the Sky-Truck can deliver between 500 and 600 kg of cargo to remote or hard-to-reach areas.

The drone is intended for a wide range of uses, from the urgent delivery of medical supplies and food to transportation of military equipment and other critical cargo. Its maximum speed of 180 km/h and take-off weight of over two tons make it the most powerful UAV of its kind in the region.

The Sky-Truck’s massive 12.8-meter rotor is powered by a turboshaft gas-turbine engine running on aviation kerosene. Initially designed around the Russian VK-650 engine, the UAV has also been adapted to accommodate various Rolls-Royce powerplants, giving it flexibility for both domestic and international applications.

Large-scale unmanned helicopters of this size have rarely been showcased in Russia or the wider CIS. The Sky-Truck’s development signals a new level of ambition in Belarus’s aerospace sector, combining heavy-lift capacity with unmanned versatility.

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Ukraine’s battlefield data is being used as LEVERAGE to train the future of military AI

Imagine a drone, no larger than a dinner plate, humming through the skeletal remains of a bombed-out village. It doesn’t hesitate. It doesn’t feel. It simply knows — its artificial brain trained on millions of hours of combat footage, every pixel of destruction meticulously logged, every human movement analyzed like a chessboard. This isn’t science fiction. It’s the future Ukraine is quietly shopping to the highest bidder. Data obtained from the Ukraine-Russia war will soon be used to train military AI to make future war time missions more efficient, more cold and calculated.

For over three and a half years, Ukraine has been more than a battleground — it’s been a lab. A brutal, real-world experiment in how machines learn to kill. Now, as the war grinds on, Kyiv isn’t just fighting for survival. It’s negotiating with its Western allies, dangling something far more valuable than territory or political loyalty: data. Terabytes of it. Footage from first-person-view drones that have stalked Russian tanks like predators. Reconnaissance feeds that map every explosion, every ambush, every death in excruciating detail. And Ukraine’s digital minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, has made one thing clear — this isn’t charity. It’s a transaction. “I think this is one of the ‘cards,’ as our colleagues and partners say, to build win-win relations,” he told Reuters, his words carrying the cold precision of a man who understands leverage. The question isn’t whether this data will be sold. It’s who will wield it — and what happens when they do.

Key points:

  • Ukraine has amassed an unprecedented trove of battlefield data, including drone footage and combat statistics, which is now being positioned as a negotiating tool with Western allies.
  • The data is critical for training military AI, particularly for autonomous drone swarms and target recognition systems, making it a prized asset for defense contractors and governments.
  • Ukraine’s “points system” for confirmed kills has gamified war, incentivizing troops to destroy more Russian targets in exchange for drones and weapons — further feeding the data machine.
  • Experts warn that AI-trained weapons systems could soon operate with full autonomy, raising ethical and existential questions about machine-driven warfare and the risk of uncontrollable kill chains.
  • Historical patterns suggest that warfare technology often escapes its original intent, with civilian casualties rising as automation increases — yet global powers are racing to deploy it.
  • The long-term implications extend beyond Ukraine: this data could accelerate a new arms race, where AI-driven weapons decide who lives and who dies — without human oversight.

The black box of modern war

Fedorov didn’t minced words when he called the data “priceless.” And he’s right. In the hands of defense firms like Palantir — which already works with Ukraine to analyze Russian strikes and disinformation — this isn’t just intelligence. It’s the raw material for the next generation of war. Imagine an AI that doesn’t just assist pilots but replaces them. Drones that don’t just follow orders but make them. Systems that can identify, track, and eliminate targets faster than a human can blink.

Ukraine has already dipped its toes into this future. Fedorov admitted that Kyiv uses AI to scan reconnaissance imagery for targets that would take humans “dozens of hours” to find. They’re testing fully autonomous drones — machines that could soon hunt in swarms, coordinating attacks without a single soldier pulling the trigger. And they’re not alone. The U.S., China, and Russia are all pouring billions into AI-driven warfare, each racing to outpace the others. But Ukraine’s data is different. It’s not simulated. It’s not theoretical. It’s real death, digitized and weaponized.

The problem? We’ve seen this movie before. Every major leap in military technology — from machine guns to atomic bombs — has been sold as a way to end war faster. Instead, it’s made war more efficient, more distant, and more devastating. When the first autonomous drone swarm is unleashed, will it distinguish between a soldier and a civilian? Will it care? Or will it simply follow the patterns it’s been trained on — patterns built on Ukraine’s kill zones, where the line between combatant and bystander has already blurred?

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Russia Launches Mass Drone and Missile Strike on Southern Ukraine

Russia launched a mass attack on southern Ukraine, local officials said, two days after a rare airstrike on central Kyiv killed 23 and damaged European Union diplomatic offices as U.S.-led efforts to end Moscow’s three-year war on its neighbor staggered.

The assault overnight into Saturday killed at least one civilian and wounded 28 people, including children, in the Zaporizhzhia region, Gov. Ivan Fedorov reported, where a five-storey residential building was struck.

Russia launched 537 strike drones and decoys, as well as 45 missiles, according to Ukraine’s Air Force. Ukrainian forces shot down or neutralized 510 drones and decoys, and 38 missiles, the force reported.

The Kremlin on Thursday said Russia remained interested in continuing peace talks, despite the air attack on Kyiv that day that was one of the largest and deadliest since Moscow’s full-scale invasion in 2022.

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Israeli Drones Attack Metro Damascus, Killing at Least Eight Syrian Soldiers

Military tensions between Israel and Syria continue to grow precipitously, with a new flurry of Israeli drone strikes against the Kiswah, a suburb of the capital city of Damascus. The strikes killed at least eight Syrian soldiers and wounded others.

The attack, according to Syrian state media, targeted buildings belonging to the Syrian Army, and killed members of the 44th Division. The IDF has not commented about why they attacked Syria, which will doubtless further complicate ongoing security talks between the two nations.

Syria’s Foreign Ministry condemned today’s strikes as a “grave violation of international law” and a threat to Syrian sovereignty. It is just the latest violation in the area, as Israel also invaded the village of Beit Jinn just down the road earlier this week, capturing a number of Syrian civilians.

Though they never really offered a pretext for why they invaded Beit Jinn, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz issued a statement thereafter declaring Israel intends to remain in the occupied territory within that area to defend the settlements inside the occupied Golan Heights.

The current Hayat Tahrir al-Sham-led government of Syria took power in December, and Israel invaded southwestern Syria almost immediately thereafter, seizing an ever-increasing amount of territory. Israel has at least nine military posts they’ve established in Syrian territory since then, and have imposed a full ban on the Syrian military being in any of the governorates south of Damascus.

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The US Is Unprepared for the Next War

Earlier this year, speaking at a press conference in Qatar, President Donald Trump categorically declared that “nobody can beat us.” He continued, “We have the strongest military in the world, by far. Not China, not Russia, not anybody!”

We do have a strong military, but we are woefully unprepared to fight a modern war. That’s because, despite all of the major technological advances in warfighting in recent years, manpower is still absolutely critical, and understanding how those boots on the ground interact with emerging drone warfare is still in its infancy in the U.S. military.

Ground warfare has evolved over the past three and a half years since Russia invaded Ukraine. I’ve spent considerable time studying this conflict from strategic, operational and tactical angles, and I’ve conducted multiple interviews with combatants on both the Russian and Ukrainian sides. The picture that emerges explains not only why Russia’s progress is slow and Ukraine is gradually losing ground, but also why the U.S. would face serious challenges if forced into a similar fight today.

Some have argued that Russia has failed to completely conquer Ukraine because Russian generals and soldiers are of poor quality. That conclusion ignores the genuinely game-changing nature of drones on the conduct of land warfare.

There isn’t one category or type of drone that is game-changing by itself, but rather the categories of drones and the ways they can be employed in concert with other drones and legacy platforms and soldiers. There are primarily four main classes of drones: first-person view (FPV) drones that fly explosive charges directly into vehicles or soldiers, bomber drones that fly over a target and release bombs, missile-carrying drones, and reconnaissance drones.

Despite endless talk about game-changing weapons, only the widespread deployment of drones has truly altered the nature of this war. Armored vehicles remain essential for transporting infantry to the front, but they can’t move in large numbers without suffering catastrophic losses. Traditional armored charges – such as the type I participated in during Desert Storm’s Battle of 73 Easting – are deadly in today’s battlefield conditions. Russia has increasingly turned to motorcycles to improve frontline mobility – not because they offer protection, but because their speed and maneuverability improve their chances of defeating drone attacks. No armored vehicle can dodge an FPV or fiber optic-guided drone, but a motorcycle might.

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Armed drones designed to neutralize school shooters in seconds are being tested in several Florida districts

Three districts in Florida will be testing out a series of new drones armed with pepper spray pellets that are specifically designed to thwart school shootings.

Campus Guardian Angel, a Texas-based company that engineered the drone tech system, said that the exact districts will be selected by Florida’s Department of Education.

Miami-Dade County Public Schools, the largest district in the state, has already shown interest in participating and held test runs at a campus in July, CBS News reported.

The drones, kept in secure charging boxes on participating campuses, will be operated by FAA-certified pilots located in Texas.

But each drone can be activated by school officials on-site through a silent alarm or “other mechanisms,” according to Campus Guardian Angel.

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Russian Nuclear Power Plant Damaged In Ukrainian Drone Attack, IAEA Monitors Radiation

In another dangerous escalation, Russia has accused Ukraine of launching a drone strike on the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant, which sparked a fire and damaged an auxiliary transformer, resulting in a 50% reduction in the output of reactor number three.

Several other energy facilities were also reportedly targeted during the overnight strikes, involving likely hundreds of drones. Russia’s military said that it intercepted nearly one hundred of them across various locations in the south.

Kursk Nuclear Power Plant’s news service reported that the fire was quickly brought under control and with no injuries. Radiation levels remained normal, according to local reports.

However, the press service also noted that two other reactors are currently not generating power, though one of them is undergoing scheduled maintenance. Reuters additionally details, “Ukraine launched a drone attack on Russia on Sunday, forcing a sharp fall in the capacity of a reactor at one of Russia’s biggest nuclear power plants and sparking a huge blaze at the major Ust-Luga fuel export terminal, Russian officials said.”

Kursk region’s acting governor, Alexander Khinshtein, swiftly condemned the “threat to nuclear safety and a violation of all international conventions.” The site lies some 40 miles from the Ukrainian border.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) weighed in on the Sunday attack, saying the agency is monitoring the situation and that radiation levels around the Kursk plant remain normal.

The IAEA statement, however, did not mention expressly that the damage was due to a Ukrainian drone attack. It only said it “is aware of media reports that a transformer at the Kursk NPP in Russia has caught fire due to military activity. While the IAEA has no independent confirmation of these reports, [Director General] Rafael Grossi stresses that ‘every nuclear facility must be protected at all times.'”

In a separate incident, a fire broke out at the port of Ust-Luga in Russia’s Leningrad region, where a major fuel export terminal is located – after some 10 Ukrainian drones that were shot down in the area, resulting in dangerous falling debris.

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Ukraine Claims Drone Strike On 5 Russian Fighter Jets At Crimean Base

Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) announced it conducted a successful drone assault on a Russian airbase in Saky, a city in Crimea, in the overnight hours. This comes after weekend attacks deep inside Russia which hit oil refineries and a military-linked electronics factory.

The SBU claimed direct hits on five Russian military aircraft at the base, which reportedly destroyed one Su-30SM fighter jet and damaged another. Ukraine also said its drones hit three additional Su-24 bombers, along with an attack on a depot storing aviation munitions.

The Saky airfield has long been a key hub for Russian military activity in the Black Sea region. The SBU hailed the strike as “significant” – given that a single Su-30SM jet is worth up to around $50 million.

“The successful special operation carried out by the SBU in Saky marks another step toward weakening the enemy’s capacity to wage its war of aggression against Ukraine,” the SBU said.

However, Russia has yet to confirm or deny the Crimea airbase strike, or the jet losses – and is not likely to. If accurate, the aircraft destruction would mark the biggest such assault since Operation Spiderweb on June 1st, which targeted four airbases deep inside Russian territory.

Ukraine claimed it took out 41 Russian military aircraft in that operation, but Moscow consistently said this figure was exaggerated – but never disclosed a precise damage assessment.

The Su-30SM is a two-seat, twin-engine multirole fighter aircraft introduced by Russia early last decade, while the Su-24 is a twin-engine, supersonic strike aircraft developed by the Soviet Union – both of which are frequently used for combat missions in Ukraine.

Soon after Operation Spider’s Web, Ukraine’s military vowed there would be more such attacks to come. Russia has of late been pummeling Ukrainian cities with drone and missile strikes, so it appears Kiev is mounting more and more cross-border revenge attacks over the last several days.

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Ukraine’s Anti-Graft Agencies Say They Uncovered Major Drone Procurement Bribery Case

Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies said on Aug. 2 they had uncovered a large-scale bribery scheme involving the procurement of military drones and electronic warfare equipment.

This came just days after the agencies’ independence was restored following mass protests over government efforts to curb their powers.

The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) said in a statement on Saturday that the alleged plot involved a sitting lawmaker, current and former regional officials, National Guard personnel, and a company executive.

Investigators alleged that those involved had refined a scheme over the past two years to systematically siphon off budget funds allocated by local authorities for defense needs, and to secure “unfair benefits in particularly large quantities.”

Ukrainian media outlet Ukrainska Pravda, citing unnamed law enforcement sources, identified the accused lawmaker as Oleksii Kuznetsov of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s Servant of the People party.

Party leader Davyd Arakhamiia later said on Telegram that Kuznetsov’s membership in the parliamentary faction would be suspended while the investigation is underway, and that a disciplinary panel was weighing his expulsion.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the Ukrainian parliament’s press office with a request to forward a comment request to Kuznetsov.

In a separate statement, the party said it supported the work of NABU and SAPO, and stressed that responsibility for corrupt acts “must be borne by everyone, regardless of position, status or political affiliation.”

It said the recently passed law restoring the agencies’ independence “created additional guarantees for their work,” for them to act decisively and professionally in combating corruption.

Zelenskyy said in a statement posted on X on Saturday that he had been briefed on the investigation by the heads of NABU and SAPO, confirming that a lawmaker, local officials, and several National Guard servicemembers had been “exposed for bribery.”

“I am grateful to the anti-corruption agencies for their work,” he wrote. “There can only be zero tolerance for corruption, clear teamwork in uncovering it, and ultimately, a fair sentence. It is important that anti-corruption institutions operate independently, and the law passed on Thursday guarantees them all the tools necessary for a real fight against corruption.”

The law he referred to marked a dramatic about-face for his administration.

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Russian Drone Found At Military Base In Lithuania Which Hosts NATO Troops

A suspected errant Russian drone has breached a NATO country’s airspace this week – though certainly not for the first time, and is setting off the proverbial alarm within Lithuania’s military

The drone was discovered crashed at a Lithuanian military training area after entering the country’s airspace from Belarus, after first being spotted early Monday morning, Lithuania’s army reported on Friday. The military first tracked in on radar over Belarusian airspace, near the border.

Several area residents actually captured footage of it flying over Vilnius before it vanished, and later was found on the ground at the military training base.

“It’s likely the same drone that breached our airspace on Monday. Initial analysis suggests it may be a Gerbera model, though this is still being confirmed,” the Lithuanian military said in the statement.

At least one Lithuanian lawmaker has portrayed the drone breach incident as intentional, also given it ended up at a military site.

“This looks like a provocation,” said Mindaugas Sinkevičius, interim leader of Lithuania’s ruling Social Democratic Party, while describing that the sensitive area where it was found leads to the conclusion that the breach was on purpose or a test of sorts.

It has been identified as a Gerbera drone, a type which Russia’s military often utilizes as a decoy to mislead or distract air defense systems in Ukraine.

Interestingly, the Gaižiūnai training grounds near Rukla – where it was recovered – actually hosts a NATO multinational battalion, regional reports say.

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