- Ukraine claims Russian forces were deceived into striking fictitious models of military targets.
- Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk said Russia attacked the models with Iskander-M missiles.
- The Iskander-M is a short-range ballistic missile with a range of up to 500 km (about 310 miles).
Ukrainian forces claim to have tricked Russia into striking model aircraft and air defense systems with Iskander-M missiles.
Mykola Oleshchuk, the commander of the Ukrainian Air Force, posted about this clever tactic on Telegram.
He shared footage that he said showed recent enemy strikes with Iskander-Ms on the models, which he said were placed at an airfield near the city of Kryvyi Rih in central Ukraine and in the Yuzhne region, near the Black Sea port of Odessa.
He said the footage was captured by Russian reconnaissance drones.
“The Air Force servicemen have successfully carried out passive defense measures!” Oleshchuk wrote in his message.
“Thanks to everyone who helps us with high-quality models of aircraft and air defense systems. The enemy has fewer Iskanders and more models will be delivered,” he added.
This would not be the first time Ukraine has used “fake” military targets since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Photos and videos circulating on social media in February showed what appeared to be highly realistic decoy versions of radars and air defense systems.
Russia also employed such tactics during the war, painting silhouettes of warships on land in an attempt to deceive Ukraine, the British Ministry of Defense said in an update on the conflict in March.
Business Insider has reached out to the Ukrainian Air Force for comment.
The Iskander-M missile
The Iskander-M is a “Russian road-mobile short-range ballistic missile (SRBM) with a range of up to 500 km” (about 310 miles), according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies Missile Defense Project.
The missile has a launch weight of up to nearly 8,900 pounds and was first used in combat by Russian forces against Georgia in 2008, according to the missile defense project.
Moscow has said the missile will not face competition from Western rivals until 2025.
“According to the designers, foreign states will not be able to create their counterpart before 2025,” said the commander-in-chief of the Russian Ground Forces, Colonel-General Oleg Salyukov.
