Ukraine’s newest weapon: Troops use remote-controlled ‘kamikaze’ cars

Images have emerged of Ukrainian troops using remote-controlled ‘kamikaze’ cars packed with explosives to destroy Russian tanks.

The fighting is mainly focused on the easternmost regions of Ukraine, where the city of Bakhmut has been embroiled in intense conflict.

Some Ukrainian soldiers on the front lines are now using remote-controlled cars packed with explosives, also known as unmanned ground vehicles, to attack Russian targets, according to a video shared on social media over the weekend.

The video, first posted as part of a YouTube documentary about the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade, appears to show Ukrainian soldiers preparing a remote-controlled vehicle for battle before sending it off.

Soldiers are then seen controlling the vehicle’s movement on a phone, so that it explodes near what appears to be a Russian tank.

“Ukrainian 3rd Assault Brigade is using kamikaze UGVs filled with explosives on Russian positions,” Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, tweeted.

The documentary video was posted over the weekend on Twitter, where it garnered more than 400,000 views.

“Ukrainian 3rd Assault Brigade is using kamikaze UGVs packed with explosives on Russian positions,” Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, tweeted.

The use of these UGVs was also covered by the pro-Russian Telegram channel Novorossiya ZOV Militia Reports, which argued that the weapons “can be dangerous for armored vehicles, shelters and personnel.”

The Ukrainian military has not released any further information on the extent of the use of the remote controlled vehicles, including how many Ukraine has and how often soldiers use these types of weapons.

Soldiers are seen monitoring the vehicle’s movement on a phone, cuing it to detonate near what appears to be a Russian tank.

The video, first posted as part of a YouTube documentary about the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade, appears to show a group of heavily armed Ukrainian soldiers preparing a remote-controlled vehicle for combat before dispatching it.

The 3rd Separate Assault Brigade was formed last year from the Azov Regiment. His soldiers have been fighting the battle to take Bakhmut, which has been locked in a war of attrition.

Russia has also used UGVs during the war, including its ‘Marker’ vehicles, four of which were shipped to eastern Ukraine in January.

Ukraine said on Tuesday that Russian cruise missiles were destroyed in an explosion in the Crimean peninsula that was annexed by Moscow in 2014, but denied responsibility for the “mysterious” incident.

“An explosion in the town of Dzhankoi, in temporarily occupied northern Crimea, destroyed Russian Kalibr-NK cruise missiles while they were being transported by rail,” Ukrainian military intelligence said in a statement on social media.

In the video, the soldiers are seen driving the remote-controlled vehicle using a device before taking cover in the trenches.

Russian investigators had previously said that air defense systems repelled a drone attack on Dzhankoi and that debris from the incident damaged a shop and a house and injured one person.

“The targets of all the downed drones were civilian objects,” the Investigative Committee added in its statement.

Dzhankoi is a logistics hub on the border between Russian-controlled Crimea and southern Ukraine, which came under the control of Russian forces after they invaded in February last year.

Oleg Kryuchkov, adviser to the Russian-installed Crimea chief, said the attack was apparently “revenge” for the annexation, several days after Moscow marked the ninth anniversary of its takeover of the region.

Russian President Vladimir Putin visited Crimea over the weekend, his first visit to the peninsula since sending troops to Ukraine on February 24 last year.