Russia has reworked its Iskander ballistic missiles. This has enabled them to change direction in midair and strike with "an accuracy of within a few meters." The Telegraph reports, UNN writes.
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"The redesigned structure of Russian ballistic missiles has enabled them to change direction in midair and strike with extraordinary accuracy. Moscow's forces have equipped their Iskander missiles with optical and radar homing heads, which allow the weapons to make adjustments at the last second as they descend toward their targets," the publication says.
"The homing heads, which have an accuracy of up to several meters, were used during recent strikes on bridges in Kyiv," according to Serhii "Flash" Beskrestnov, an adviser to the President of Ukraine, whom the outlet quotes.
The attacks, the outlet notes, "destroyed transport links between the city's left and right banks and are part of what Ukrainian officials call Russia's new efforts to divide Ukraine in half."
Earlier this week, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said: "Russia is trying to divide Ukraine along the Dnipro River and make life as difficult as possible for people, our cities and villages."
A Ukrainian official told the Financial Times that Moscow's plan also involves disrupting the distribution of electricity from west to east, potentially leaving millions of people without power.
"The Dnipro flows through the heart of Kyiv and then stretches south, serving as one of Ukraine's most important waterways and transport corridors. For weeks, Russia has attempted to disable the capital's eight main bridges using jet-powered drones, seeking to disrupt the capital's transport links as much as possible. It then began attacking the largest crossings with ballistic missiles," the outlet notes.
"The optical and radar homing heads, which are likely a new development, scan the terrain using radar several seconds before the warhead detonates, allowing the missiles to bypass Ukrainian electronic warfare systems," the publication states.
According to Mauro Gilli, a professor of military strategy and technology at the Hertie School in Berlin, "they may solve some of the most important tactical problems Russia has faced since the beginning of the war." "The thing is that ballistic missiles have a certain degree of inaccuracy because ballistic missiles follow a parabolic trajectory," he told The Telegraph. "This means that the flight path is controlled by an onboard computer, and when the missile reaches a specified altitude, it positions the missile. But the final phase usually takes place under pure gravity. That has now changed."
According to Professor Gilli, "the attacks have failed to destroy Kyiv's sturdy bridges and are unlikely to do so. However, they have disrupted traffic across the crossings, paralyzed public transport and caused hours-long traffic jams, while strikes on energy infrastructure have left large parts of the city without electricity, heating and water," the outlet writes.
"Although Russia is increasingly attacking bridges, its efforts to split Ukraine's energy system into two parts along the Dnipro River began in December last year," according to Maksym Beznosiuk, a junior fellow at the GLOBSEC think tank.
"The Kremlin is seeking what engineers call 'islanding,' aiming to break Ukraine's power system into isolated pockets that must operate independently and cannot redistribute energy from functioning generation to support areas with demand," he told The Telegraph.