Russia’s Glide Bombs: Cheap, Deadly and Almost Unstoppable | WSJ Equipped

Russia’s Glide Bombs: Cheap, Deadly and Almost Unstoppable | WSJ Equipped

this is a Russian Glide bomb Moscow has been launching thousands of them at Ukraine in recent months putting further strains on the Ukrainian Army and helping Russia make some territorial gains Glide bombs are cheap highly destructive incredibly hard to stop and are predominantly made from retrofitted sovieter explosives here’s how Russia is giving old bombs the functionality of a modern cruise missile at a fraction of the cost Russia is able to produce large numbers of Glide bombs quickly and cheaply and that’s mainly because they aren’t new weapons most of them start out as general purpose bombs from the Soviet era known by their Russian acronym Fab which means high explosive Aviation bomb something that Russia has huge stockpiles of they’re very simple munition Soviet era so-called dumb bombs um to be dropped from aircraft and the main characteristic of them is that they are massive there are three sizes of Fab bomb reportedly being used the Fab 250 Fab 500 and the Fab 1500 the higher the weight of the bomb the more explosives it carries the largest the Fab 1500 weighs 1.5 tons and contains around 1500 lb of explosives making it capable of leveling buildings for comparison a standard Russian 152 2 mm Howitzer artillery shell contains around 17 lound of explosives they are very effective at um obliterating Ukrainian positions so ukrainians if they’re in cities will often take up positions in basements places that would give them some shelter from most artillery rounds but the destructive power of these bombs is such that they can bring down buildings um above these Soldiers by fitting them with a universal planning and correction module known by its Russian acronym umpk these dumb bombs effectively become guided missiles this piece of Kit contains a satellite navigation system that can be programmed to hit targets roders are attached to the tail to Aid steering and to stabilize the bomb in Flight while the pop out Wings help the bomb literally Glide to its Target making it more accurate over longer distances and with a range of just under 40 m the Russian Air Force can launch launch them at Ukraine without ever leaving its own airspace retrofitting the FB bombs only cost tens of thousands of dollars a fraction of the cost of a purpose-built guided weapon and they are also easier and quicker to manufacture we’ve heard a lot about Russia’s Wonder Weapons it’s modern weapons like the Hypersonic kinal missile but the beauty of these Glide bombs as far as Russia is concerned is that they have a lot of them they can quickly make it into an effect effective weapon that they can use and we’re at a stage of the war where the economics matter Jets like the Su 34 bomber allow Russia to launch multiple Glide bombs at once in a bid to overwhelm Ukraine’s air defense systems and that’s not their only Advantage the weapons themselves are very hard to shoot down well they give off a very small signature they’re relatively small in size they only show up as small dots on a radar and so the ukrainians don’t necessarily see them coming one of the Glide bomb’s limitations is they can’t hit moving targets making them less effective on mobile battlefields however Russia has been able to use them to Target cities and to break down Ukrainian fortifications with the Ukrainian military estimating that Russia has dropped 16 times more Glide bombs this year than last and Moscow has been using Glide bombs against Ukraine’s second largest city har which is around 25 mil from the Russian border on May the 25th two Russian Glide bombs hit a Ukrainian Home Improvement store called epicenter it’s like um the Ukrainian version of Home Depot this is actually causing damage and destruction not only on the front lines but it’s terrorizing the civilian population as well Russia also used Glide bombs in its assault on the eastern city of of Diva earlier this year with some military analysts saying the weapons were key in enabling Moscow to capture the city Russia began dropping so many bombs on the city that it became simply impossible for the ukrainians to hold on this is the first time that Russia has really used them in such a concentrated fashion to blast Ukrainian Defenders out of a city Moscow says it is now scaling up production of its Glide bombs and analysts warn there is evidence Russia is working on creating bigger more explosive versions including one that weighs 3 tons as well as experimenting with different kinds of warheads with glide bombs helping Russia replenish its weapon stocks quickly and cheaply Ukraine is looking for its own Solutions Ukraine wants F-16 fighter jets these can be used to strike down the Russian planes before they’re able to release the bombs however some analysts say because f16s face the risk of being shot down by the Russians Ukraine should instead focus on electronic Warfare tactics electronic jamming is a potential way to stop these bombs because they rely on guidance systems there’s a big question as to whether Ukraine has electronic warfare systems that are powerful enough and numerous enough to counter this threat analysts also say more advanced air defense systems like us- made Patriots would allow Ukraine to shoot down Russian fighter bombers but that’s only if they can be located close to the front line the Russians have very strong surveillance from drones and they can then try to strike the Patriot batteries if they’re brought close to the front so the question for the ukrainians is how to balance um the need to protect civilians to protect cities and the risk um of taking them to the front lines to try to intercept Russian aircraft because Glide bombs are affordable and can be quickly replenished analysts believe they will continue to play as significant role in Russian attacks in the coming months Glide bombs have been a very effective way to smash Ukrainian positions to kill Defenders to break defenses and to get through and take more Ukrainian territory if the ukrainians are able to stop that they’ll have a much better chance of holding their positions against the Russians [Music]

Russia is using cheap, highly-explosive glide bombs to devastating effect in Ukraine. Moscow has been launching thousands of these massive retrofitted Soviet-era explosives at Ukraine, putting further strains on their military. These weapons were used against Ukraine’s second largest city Kharkiv and the assault on the eastern city of Avdiivka. So what can Ukraine do?

WSJ explains how these bombs work and why they are so hard for Kyiv to counter.

Chapters:
0:00 Russia’s cheap explosives
0:32 Glide bombs, explained
3:30 How Russia is using glide bombs
5:05 What can Ukraine do?

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