WSJ: Iranian drones supplied to Russia create new dangers for Armed Forces of Ukraine

Over the past week, Shahed drones, repainted in Russian cors and rebranded as Geranium 2, started appearing over Ukrainian armor and artillery positions in the northeastern Kharkiv region, said C. Rodion Kulagin, commander of artillery of Ukraine’s 92nd Mechanized Brigade, The Wall Street Journal reports.

In his brigade’s erational area alone, the Iranian drones have destroyed two 152-mm self-prelled howitzers, two 122-mm self-prelled howitzers, as well as two BTR armored infantry vehicles, he said.

Earlier, Russia struck a U.S.-supplied M777 155-mm towed howitzer with the drone.

So far, the Iranian drones seem to have been mostly deployed in the Kharkiv region, where the 92nd Brigade and other Ukrainian forces carried out a major offensive this month.

The Iranian drones are relatively small and fly at a very low altitude, making it hard for Ukrainian air-defense systems to detect them, C. Kulagin said. He said he hed the U.S. and allies could provide Ukraine with more advanced antidrone technogies, or would step in to disrupt Iranian drone shipments to Russia.