Ukraine says it destroyed 26 Russian helicopters in one day with mysterious weapon

A Russian helicopter was shot down in Ukraine in 2022 (Photo: Forbes).

Mr Zelensky claimed Ukrainian forces had destroyed 26 Russian helicopters in a single day using a mysterious long-range weapon supplied by Kiev's allies.

During a press conference in Latvia on January 11, Mr. Zelensky only spoke generally, without revealing details about what the mysterious weapon he mentioned was, which country provided aid, when it took place specifically, and where the Russian helicopter was destroyed.

"Our partners have supplied us with some long-range weapons. I will not go into details about this, but our partners will understand," Zelensky said, according to RBC Ukraine .

"With this weapon, we destroyed 26 Russian helicopters in one day. Among them, 12 took off and launched missiles at Ukraine. We destroyed 12 at once," he said.

In a war, it is difficult for a third party to verify claims from one side because this information may be used for psychological warfare tactics against the opponent.

According to previously public statistics from the Ukrainian Armed Forces, they have not destroyed any Russian helicopters since October 19, 2023, when Kiev said it had eliminated one of Moscow's.

So it is unclear when the 26 Russian helicopters that Mr. Zelensky mentioned were destroyed.

Mr Zelensky said the mysterious weapon he was referring to was part of Ukraine’s national defence system, according to Interfax . So it remains unclear what kind of weapon he was referring to.

Previously, Ukraine had announced the use of Western-funded long-range missile systems to attack Russian military targets, destroying enemy equipment, such as the US-made Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) and the British Storm Shadow missile.

In mid-October, Ukraine announced that it used ATACMS missiles to fire at two military bases in the Russian-controlled area, destroying nine of Moscow's military helicopters.

Russia has not commented on the reports since then, but a Telegram account run by a former Moscow pilot at the time said it was one of the most serious attacks Moscow had faced in its war with Ukraine.

The ATACMS version the US provided to Ukraine has a range of 165km and is a cluster munition variant. Each ATACMS contains 950 submunitions inside, which can explode after firing, causing widespread destruction.

In October last year, GeoConfirmed, a community platform specializing in open-source intelligence data, analyzed satellite imagery and concluded that Ukraine may have disabled 21 Russian helicopters in the first use of ATACMS missiles provided by the US. This information has not been verified to date.

The Royal Air Force said Moscow had a military helicopter force of about 899 when it began a special military operation in February 2022.

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/the-gioi/ukraine-noi-tung-pha-huy-26-truc-thang-nga-trong-1-ngay-bang-vu-khi-bi-an-20240113074516238.htm