Russia’s secret weapon is so powerful it can crush eyes and tear apart walls | World News

As part of its war against Ukraine, Russia has silently produced hundreds of thermobaric drones capable of collapsing lungs, crushing eyeballs and causing brain damage.

Also known as vacuum bombs, they suck up all the oxygen in their path, creating a vortex of high pressure and heat that can penetrate thick walls and inflict injury far beyond the site of the explosion .

From a military point of view, warheads are ideal for hitting targets located either inside fortified buildings or at depth.

They are particularly destructive when they hit buildings because they are loaded with ball bearings to cause maximum damage, said David Albright of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security.

Serhii Beskrestnov, a Ukrainian electronics expert, said drones were first used over the summer and estimates they now make up between 3 and 5 percent of all drones.

Mr. Beskrestnov told the Associated Press: “This type of warhead has the possibility of destroying a huge building, especially apartment buildings.

“And it is very effective if the Russian Federation tries to attack our power plants.”

They have a fearsome reputation because of their physical effects, even on people captured outside the initial blast site, said Arthur van Coller, an international humanitarian law expert at the University of Fort Hare in South Africa. South.

“With a thermobaric explosion, because of the cloud it would create, everything within its radius would be affected,” he said.

“This is creating massive fear among the civilian population. Thermobaric weapons have created the idea that they are truly horrible weapons and that creates fear.

They are being built alongside hundreds of decoy drones intended to overwhelm Ukraine’s defenses, according to an Associated Press investigation.

Russia developed this decoy plan in late 2022 and called it Operation False Target, according to a person familiar with Russian drone production who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The idea was to launch armed drones accompanied by dozens of decoys, sometimes stuffed with rags or foam, and impossible to distinguish on radar from those carrying real bombs.

Ukrainian forces must then make split-second decisions about how to spend their scarce resources to save lives and preserve critical infrastructure.

“The idea was to make a drone that would create a feeling of complete uncertainty for the enemy,” the source explained.

“So he doesn’t know if it’s really a deadly weapon… or essentially a foam toy.”

And with thermobarics, there is now a “tremendous risk” that an armed drone will veer off course and end up in a residential area where the “damage will be nothing short of terrifying,” he said.

In recent weeks, decoys have filled the Ukrainian skies by the dozens, each appearing as an indistinguishable dot on military radar screens.

During the first weekend of November, the Kyiv region spent 20 hours on air alert, and the buzz of drones mixed with the rumble of air defenses and rifle fire.

Unarmed decoys now account for more than half of the drones targeting Ukraine, according to the person and Mr. Beskrestnov.

The Iranian-designed Shahed unarmed decoys and armed drones are built at a factory in Russia’s Alabuga Special Economic Zone, an industrial complex created in 2006 about 600 miles east of Moscow to attract business and investments in Tatarstan.

It expanded after the 2022 invasion of Ukraine and some sectors shifted to military production, adding new buildings and renovating existing sites, according to satellite images analyzed by The Associated Press.

In social media videos, the factory presents itself as a hub of innovation. But Mr. Albright said Alabuga’s current focus was solely on producing and selling drones to the Russian Defense Ministry.

Russia and Iran signed a £1.35 billion deal for the Shaheds in 2022, after Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine and Moscow began using Iranian drones in combat over late that year.

Soon after the agreement was signed, production started in Alabuga.

In October, Moscow attacked with at least 1,889 drones, 80 percent more than in August, according to an AP analysis that has been tracking drones for months.

Russia launched 145 drones across Ukraine on Saturday, just days after Donald Trump’s re-election cast doubt on US support for the country.

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