A USV washes ashore on the coast of Crimea (Photo: Getty).
Sputnik reported on November 27th that the Russian Ministry of Defense has agreed to deliver the first 10 USVs to the Russian Armed Forces by the end of this year.
"This will be the first test batch to be used in a special military operational area," said Mikhail Danilenko, CEO of the Kingisepp Machine-Building Plant (KMZ). KMZ specializes in producing marine engineering equipment for the Russian Ministry of Defense.
Danilenko revealed that KMZ calls these devices "one-way boats" because they can operate similarly to suicide drones. In particular, they are very difficult to detect due to their optimized design and size.
This USV can reach speeds of up to 80 km/h, carry a payload of approximately 600 kg, and has a range of over 200 km, Danilenko added.
In recent months, USVs have become a particularly effective special-purpose weapon on the Ukrainian battlefield. Kyiv is using USVs to attack Russian targets in the Black Sea and off the coast of the Crimean Peninsula.
USVs are a combination of jet skis and boats. Generally, they aim to be much faster, more compact, and more precise than crewed vessels.
The first recorded use of a USV in Ukraine was in September 2022. During a raid on October 13th, a Ukrainian test USV damaged two Russian military vessels in Crimea. On October 29th, Ukraine again used a USV to attack the port of Sevastopol in Crimea. Since then, Russia has begun to view this weapon as a serious threat.
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