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naggressive, self-sabotaging and confused of moscow agent, ukraine gave up their nuclear weapons and arms industry which produced a third of the Soviet Union’s supplies, relied on the West and the Kremlin to protect it – and was left fighting for its life.
Now, thirty years later, the start-up nation is redefining how war is fought has been forced into the world of weapons production, mix of old technology IT knowledge To break the bonds that his associates are bound to make Kyiv Fight with one hand.
The latest innovation is a cruise missile with a range of 3,000 km, a maximum speed of 900 km/h and a payload of over a ton that has been used in depth strikes. Russian region,
The FP-5 “Flamingo” missile is powered by a rocket and a Soviet-era turbofan jet engine mounted on top. Some of those engines have been dug out from landfill dumps.
Its range is double We The Tomahawk carries twice the amount of explosives and costs about the same.
But its main advantage is that it is completely under the control of the Ukrainian army. Britain and France restricted the use of Anglo-French Storm Shadow cruise missiles only against Russian targets inside Ukraine for several months.
The US has reduced Ukraine’s ability to use American ATACM missiles against Russian targets in Russia and has not yet decided whether to allow access to Tomahawks, which will be paid for by European allies.
In contrast, Kiev can fire the Flamingo at any target it wishes. It is not limited to what Ukraine’s “allies” say it can and cannot do when fighting Russia’s invading forces.
The prototypes were painted pink to make them easier to retrieve from test flights. They strike deep into Russia and are designed to destroy Moscow’s ability to wage war in Ukraine.
Targeting oil refineries has had a measurable impact. Russia has at times lost about 20 percent of its fuel capacity and pump prices have risen as much as 10 percent.
Ukraine’s focus has been on fluid catalytic cracking plants inside refineries – they are mostly imported from the West and Russia is banned from buying more.
With arms supplies from the West so uncertain, Volodymyr Zelensky has said that Ukraine now makes about 60 percent of its own weapons.
“When there’s a gun pointed at your head, you don’t think about standards, you think ‘this should work,'” says Ioana Terech, chief technology officer at Fire Point, which makes the Flamingo, among other weapons.
“And the big achievement of the Ukrainian government is to reduce bureaucratic pressure as much as possible so that technology can flourish.
“And that’s what happened with our company. We didn’t care whether we met NATO standards.”
“We only cared about whether our weapons would be effective on the front lines, not about any paperwork. As a result, we could create a very effective weapon.”
Along with the Flamingo, Fire Point also produces the short-range Martyr-style drones FP1 and FP2. The former has been used frequently to attack Russia as far as Moscow.
The latter, which carry a payload of 150 kg, have been mistaken for long-range US missiles due to their explosive power.
Their value lies in that they are cheap and quick to make. The wings take a few hours to make and the torso takes 30 minutes to make from a mixture of plastic and carbon.
The lightweight machines stick to carbon printers, use lawnmower engines and rely on open source navigation systems.
Terech insists that no money was spared on the weapons’ electronics because they are designed to evade Russian jamming systems.
Ukraine shot down about 90 percent of Russia’s incoming Martyr-type drones. So a similar “kill rate” of Ukrainian drones should be assumed. They have to be smarter and cheaper if they want to succeed.
The FP1s and 2s cost around $50,000 each. Ukrainian officials estimate that a modern martyr could be worth up to $250,000 each. According to independent estimates, the price of the Russian-made drone is around $80,000.
For Ukraine, price competition is important. European UnionKiev is the biggest supporter, an economic bloc that is at least nine times the size of Russia’s economy and four times its spending power.
Ukraine’s allies can spend more than Russia if they want – so far they have not.
The war is now mostly a serious stalemate. It balances Russia’s superior manpower resources with Ukraine’s inspiration and innovation, although the latter’s advantage risks eroding as Moscow moves increasingly to learn from earlier and bloody mistakes on the battlefield.
Russia has had years to prepare for an invasion of Ukraine. This was facilitated by the collapse of Ukraine’s arms industry following independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.
At that time Ukraine had the third largest nuclear weapons stockpile. It produced 30 percent of the Soviet Union’s weapons.
Ukraine produces some of the Kremlin’s most terrifying weapons , Intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) such as SS-18 “Satan”,
There is still a factory in Kiev where the company Antonov built many of its aircraft and the capital was also a center for the production of anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles.
Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine produced tanks and boasted 40 universities and educational institutions that produced scientists who produced rockets for sale around the world.
But in 1994, Ukraine was persuaded to give up its nuclear weapons in exchange for an agreement from the US, Britain and Russia to guarantee its security.
China and France later signed on, but only Ukraine believed the memos were worth the ink spent on setting them up.
Ten years later it saw its arms industry collapse from one that employed 3 million to less than a third.
A weakened army faced Russia’s first invasion in 2014 and the country is defended mostly by private volunteer militias.
Now it’s up to start-ups like Fire Point and companies like General Cherry — which produce thousands of interceptor drones a week — to combat Russia’s martyrs and protect troops on the front lines, where the fighting has transformed from trench warfare to terrifying horror. infantry hunted individually By small deadly drones.
In production, 3-D printers roam day and night at secret locations throughout Ukraine. In cubicles across the country, drills scream and solder burns and circuits are laid out to stream semi-autonomous quadcopters into incoming missiles every night.
Ukraine’s arms industry is now worth only $1 billion but it is growing very rapidly. Flying like one of the Ukrainian GC’s “Bullet” drones, which take off from the ground and can hit over 200 km/h in vertical climb to pick off Russian martyrs.
In the midst of a long war, there is growing confidence in Ukraine’s arms industry.
This stems from rapid growth and battlefield success.
But it also realizes that, already, Ukraine has the most powerful military in Western Europe and the lessons learned here, from battlefield to workshop, will mean that Kiev can be a major power in the future of Europe.
“We all have to grow up and build our own security,” says Terech.
This means ending dependence on America.
“What we learn from working in Ukraine is that you have to diversify and rely on yourself. You have to rely on your own resources and that’s what Europe has to do.”