Eurasia Daily Monitor/Jamestown Foundation
First Strike: The Political Consequences of Ukraine’s Bayraktar Drone Attack on Russia-Backed Forces in Donbas
Yuri Lapaiev

On October 26, the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) for the first time used the Turkish-produced Bayraktar TB2 unmanned combat aerial vehicle (UCAV) to strike at forces. Donetsk People’s Republic militia in Donbas. [T]he AFU’s [Ukrainian Air Force’s] commander-in-chief, Major General Valeriy Zaluzhny, ordered Ukrainian units to deploy a Bayraktar TB2 to fire on…the enemy’s offensive capabilities….Within hours, the AFU posted a video of the strike online (Facebook.com, October 26).

The incident marked Ukraine’s first employment of this modern UCAV in combat since its purchase from Turkey in late 2018….But the situation [hesitancy about using the combat drones near Russia’s border] changed in light of several episodes of Turkish military units using the Bayraktar TB2 against Moscow-supported forces in the Syrian theater and, especially, after these drones’ much-commented-on performance in the recent war in Karabakh (September 27–November 9, 2020). Thus, since 2020, the AFU started to use these UCAVs more often in exercises, mostly to rehearse intelligence-gathering but also to practice aerial targeting of missile-artillery systems (Ukrinform, May 26)…..

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…Turkish journalists called the aerial drone assault “a shock for [Russian President Vladimir] Putin” (Yeni Akit, October 26)….