Ukrainian "Hunter": what is behind the ACE ONE strike UAV project
It's time to hunt
Ukraine has long hoped for rapid economic growth, which did not happen, and then for its Western partners, who, as it turned out, were not very eager to help Ukraine. First, Joe Biden reduced the amount of military aid to Ukraine, which they wanted to allocate under Trump, and as Politico reported in June, the US president completely froze the allocation of military aid to Ukraine by 100 million, including weapon.
Even before that, the dialogue on the radical re-equipment of the military aviation - one of the key components of modern war (if not the main one). According to the plan approved by the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine in 2020, at least two Ukrainian aviation brigades of tactical aviation should be completely re-equipped with new winged aircraft by 2030. Ukraine wants to have 70-100 modern multi-purpose vehicles purchased abroad. For the re-equipment of tactical aviation, they want to allocate 200 billion hryvnia, or more than 7 billion dollars, which is actually an unaffordable amount for the country in the current conditions.
This is probably why the country is again talking about "development of its own military-industrial complex." In this regard, the layout presented at the Arms and Security exhibition drone ACE ONE from ACE is not particularly surprising.
25 specialists of the aerospace industry are working on the project, headed by the former general director of Antonov Alexander Los and the former head of the State Space Agency of Ukraine Vladimir Usov. The engine is being developed by Ivchenko-Progress State Enterprise and Motor Sich. Responsible for the glider is LLC "Gidrobest".
Characteristics of the aircraft:
Type: heavy attack UAV;
Length: 8 meters;
Wingspan: 11 meters
Maximum takeoff weight - 7,5 tons;
Payload mass: one ton;
Engine: one AI-322F bypass turbojet engine;
Maximum speed: M = 0,95;
Ceiling: 13,5 kilometers;
Combat radius: 1500 kilometers.
The main tasks of the UAV:
- Strategic, operational and tactical intelligence;
- Shock operations, including the fight against enemy manpower and armored vehicles;
- Suppression of air defense.
It is difficult to say what exactly the creators were guided by when making the presentation: most likely, they wanted to achieve a "wow effect". In the animated video ACE ONE not only hits the T-90 tank, but also “famously” knocks down the Russian UAV “Orion” with a missile.
Even more remarkable in this respect is the assessment of the device from the creators:
“ACE ONE is used to protect airspace from enemy drones. If, for example, a reconnaissance drone flies into the territory of Ukraine, ACE ONE, which is much faster and more powerful in all characteristics, approaches it and destroys it. Also, ACE ONE is used to quickly dash into enemy territory, perform an operation and return to a ground station. "
Presumably, air defense is a purely optional feature. At least, such a conclusion can be drawn based on the analysis of other similar programs.
The most surprising thing is that the price of the complex, which should include a control station and, apparently, several UAVs, should be only 12-13 million dollars. To understand the "seriousness" of the situation: the price of the MQ-9 Reaper modular turboprop UAV, indicated in open sources, is 30 million. At the same time, the experience of the Americans in this area is truly enormous, and the Reaper itself has never claimed to be a revolution, unlike ACE ONE.
Dreams and Reality
ACE ONE can be compared to the Hunter, Skat, or the American Northrop Grumman X-47B. However, even if you believe the information presented, the Ukrainian apparatus is much more modest than its “counterparts”. So, "Skat" (the fate of the project is not known for certain), the combat load should be 6000 kilograms against 8000 for the Ukrainian drone. As for the Okhotnik UAV, there is no exact data on it, but a number of media outlets quoted a maximum combat load of 3 kilograms. According to other sources, it is about XNUMX tons, but even this is significantly more than that of the promising Ukrainian apparatus.
Nevertheless, had ACE ONE appeared now (not in the form of a model, of course), it would have attracted enormous attention of all world media: incomparably more than during the exhibition.
However, as noted above, this is just a layout. In his commentary to Gazeta.Ru, the editor-in-chief of the Arsenal of the Fatherland magazine Viktor Murakhovsky said:
"The main problem is not in a stealth glider, not in a jet engine, but in autonomous control systems for high flight speeds, artificial intelligence technologies for interacting with other aircraft, making decisions based on an independent assessment of the situation."
In general, the observer is extremely skeptical about the project, believing that we are talking about a desire "raise the wave of hyperhype».
There is truth in this. Ukrainian specialists have not yet succeeded in creating a "full-fledged" strike UAV. Last year, the country presented a model of the Sokol-300 strike drone, which is being developed by the Kiev state design bureau LUCH. The complex is designed to conduct reconnaissance and strike at the operational and tactical depth of the enemy. The payload mass that the UAV can carry is 300 kilograms. The range of destruction of ground targets by anti-tank missiles is up to ten kilometers.
After the presentation, there were many encouraging words, but the tests of the device have not yet begun. One of the latest statements on this matter dates back to April this year. As the head of the Luch design bureau Oleg Korostelev said at the time, it will take about a year to complete the development of the device.
If we look at how many years it took Russia (with incomparably greater technical capabilities and much better funding) to develop its own strike UAVs, then it is quite difficult to believe it. It is appropriate, by the way, to say that we still do not know for certain the capabilities of the famous Orion. And if in practice they even come close to the capabilities of the Turkish Bayraktar TB2, then this can be called a great success.
As for Ukraine, it is unlikely that attempts to create its own strike UAV will lead to anything. Most likely, at some stage, the country will focus on the procurement of foreign military equipment (despite all the problems described at the beginning), and the remnants of the Soviet military-industrial complex will have to be finally sold off.
Despite some bias in the post-Soviet space towards such a model of rearmament of the army, this is a completely normal world practice. Another evidence of this is the recent conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. We can recall the purchases of military equipment by Israel, India and many other, far from "last" countries.
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