Ukraine says it has a new home-grown long-range weapon that will allow it to strike deep into Russia without asking permission from allies.
With the characteristics of a missile and a drone, the “Palianytsia” was created due to urgent necessity, Ukrainian officials said, as Russia has dominated the skies since the outbreak of the war in February 2022.
President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed on Saturday the existence of the Palianytsia, a type of Ukrainian bread and a word so notoriously difficult to pronounce correctly that it was used to unmask suspected spies early in the war. Zelensky called it “a new class” of weapon.
Saturday, which marked Ukraine’s 33rd anniversary of independence from the former Soviet Union, also saw the first use of the new weapon, targeting a Russian military installation in the occupied territory, officials said without providing details.
A Ukrainian military video hinted that its range is up to 700 kilometres (430 miles) – on par with the US-supplied ATACMS. It showed a map with various airfields, including Russia’s Savasleyka airbase, which lies within that range, adding that the Palianytsia can reach at least 20 Russian airfields.
The United States and other Western allies provide long-range weapons to Ukraine but restrict it from launching them deep into Russia for fear of escalating the war. Ukraine can target the border regions but wants to go deeper into Russia.
The Institute for the Study of War said Russia was “leveraging sanctuary space in deep rear areas” for military infrastructure. It estimated at least 250 militarily significant targets in Russia were within range of the ATACMS missiles, but current restrictions allow Ukraine to strike only 20 of them.
Ukraine’s technology minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, said in his first interview about the new weapon that the next step was to scale up the production.
“I think this will be a game changer because we will be able to strike where Russia doesn’t expect it today,” he said.
Fedorov declined to elaborate on the range or current supply, citing security reasons, but said that he has been involved in the projects for developing domestic missiles since the end of 2022.
Ukraine’s battlefields have become a deadly testing lab for new weapons and new adaptations of old ones. Both Ukrainian and Russian forces have rigged off-the-shelf equipment with explosives and military-grade infrared cameras; Russia has retrofitted Soviet-era unguided bombs with GPS harnesses; and Ukraine’s underwater drones have crippled Russia’s Black Sea fleet.
But the new weapon has been a long-term goal of Ukraine.
One of the specialists involved in the long-range missile project said it was “a completely new development, from scratch” that began about 18 months ago.
“This is not an extension of an old Soviet project,” said the specialist, speaking on condition of anonymity to safeguard the project’s secrecy. The missile has a solid-fuel booster that accelerates it, followed by a jet engine, the specialist said.
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Ukraine says its inability to fight back against Russian long-range weapons has deadly consequences. Ukraine’s Commander-in-Chief General Oleksandr Syrskyi said Russia has launched 9,627 long-range missiles and Ukraine’s defence shot down only a quarter of them, and that more than half the Russian targets were civilian.
The specialist and Fedorov said each missile costs less than US$1 million, and the military is turning to the private sector to bring down production costs further. “The private market generates solutions incredibly quickly,” the minister said.
As of this year, private companies have become the main suppliers of drones for the Ukrainian army, including those now striking inside Russia and the underwater ones that have repeatedly struck the Russian Black Sea fleet, said Fedorov.
“All types of missiles will be available in Ukraine,” he said. “If we have our own weapons like this, we will feel more independent and confident.”
Fedorov added that he believed Russia’s vast size could also be its vulnerability.
“It’s impossible to produce enough air defence systems to protect such a large territory,” he said. “For us, this opens up the possibility of operating deep behind enemy lines.”
