Wednesday, June 24, 2020

"Turkey Now Has Swarming Suicide Drones It Could Export"

Swell.
They want Libya's hydrocarbons.
And Greece's.
And Cyprus'.
Probably not Israel's, Israel has a better air force than Cyprus.
And Turkey is a member of NATO.

From The Drive's Warzone column:
This is yet another wake-up call to the threat that low-end weaponized hobby-like drones pose and how widespread they will become.
The Turkish military reportedly plans to buy more than 500 quad-copter-type Kargu series loitering munitions, or suicide drones, in the near term. The Kargus, at present, can operate in semi-autonomous or manually-controlled modes, but work is underway to give up to 20 of them the ability to carry out mass attacks as a swarm, which could give Turkey's troops a potentially game-changing new capability.
Turkey's state-run Anadolu Agency news outlet first reported that Defense Technologies Engineering and Trade Inc., also known by its Turkish acronym STM, was expecting to deliver the hundreds of drones to the Turkish armed forces on June 15, 2020. It's not clear if this total order for "over 500" of the drones includes or is in addition to a purchase agreement for 356 Kargus that the Turkish government itself announced in January.

STM introduced the first generation Kargu in 2017 and the Turkish military first began receiving small numbers of the improved Kargu-2 variant last year. Turkish forces have reportedly at least deployed, if not employed, the drones during operations along the country's border with Syria last year.

The manufacturer says that Kargu, a name that literally translates as "hawk" in Turkish, and which is also used to refer to small mountain watchtowers, "has been engineered specifically for anti-terror and asymmetric warfare scenarios." The 15-pound Kargu-2 can fly at up to 90 miles per hour and can remain airborne for up to 30 minutes. It has a line-of-sight control link with a range of around six miles....
....MUCH MORE

And don't forget Syria.

It gets complicated.