Analysts are currently trying to determine why the Bayraktar TB2 UAV from Ukraine vanished on the battlefield lately.
The recent mentions of the Bayraktar TB2 UAV’s victories on the Ukrainian battlefield have abruptly and entirely vanished from social networks and online media. Not only did the rumours about the appearance vanish, but so did the reports concerning the downing of the Ukrainian Bayraktar TB2 drones. In actuality, UAVs built in Turkey are no longer used in Ukraine for the reasons listed below.
Lack of reserve radix is one of the potential causes. Moscow-based sources claim that since the start of the conflict, the Russian military has shot down at least 130 Ukrainian drones. This number contrasts with Turkey’s widely reported claim that Ukraine has bought 50 Bayraktar TB2, though. There are also claims that Ankara has delivered at least 50 more unofficially. Additionally, the media covered European people’ efforts to raise money for Ukraine by purchasing Turkish drones. In actuality, just 3 to 5 units were bought altogether.
The gas agreement between Russia and Turkey may also be to blame. According to reports, in order to continue cooperation, President Vladimir Putin requested from his counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan that the Bayraktar TB2 drone not be sent to Ukraine. According to some experts, Russia’s involvement in the grain export agreement with Ukraine is also the reason why Turkey no longer provides drones to Ukraine, even though this was originally one of Moscow’s conditions. Concern over the lack of information regarding the combat operation of the Bayraktar TB2 UAV on the Ukrainian battlefield since mid-August 2022 has also been expressed in Russian media.
Russian propaganda would find it absurd, but according to Moscow’s media, Moscow and Ankara’s agreement politics are most likely to blame for Turkey’s absence of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), not the nation’s air defence system.
Turkish drones also had less success in Ukraine than they had in Libya, Syria, and particularly during the Nagorno-Karabakh War. Numerous Bayraktar TB2 drones have undoubtedly been shot down by the Russian military in Ukraine because to the variety of missions and combat situations, which has hurt this combat vehicle’s reputation. The assault to take Snake Island, which started in the first weeks of May 2022 and proceeded until the end of the year, was one of the last notable encounters involving drones made in Turkey. June 2022.
Because hundreds of the aforementioned drones were successfully shot down this summer, the Russian media dubbed this time period the “Bayraktar TB2 rain.” There is a good chance that the Ukrainian military’s supply of Turkish drones has been depleted. However, it is also hard to rule out the chance that Ankara ordered Kyiv to withhold information about Bayraktar TB2’s military activities in order to preserve its relationship with Russia.
