How did the Ukrainian army shoot down 13 Russian fighter jets in 2 weeks?

The Kyiv Independent reported that the list of Russian fighter jets shot down included 10 Su-34 bombers, two Su-35 fighters and an A-50 early warning aircraft. Of these, the last three Su-34s were believed to have been shot down on February 29 in the eastern Ukraine battlefield. In addition, on January 14, the Ukrainian Air Force also announced the shooting down of another A-50 early warning aircraft in the airspace above the Sea of ​​Azov.

The downing of the jets comes as Russian forces are trying to step up their offensive on the battlefield after the Ukrainian army, facing a shortage of ammunition due to limited aid from Western countries, withdrew from the stronghold of Avdiivka on February 17 and then continued to withdraw from three other villages in Donetsk province.

According to figures released by the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which have not been independently confirmed, Russia has lost about 670 aircraft, including 345 jets and 325 helicopters. Most of them were shot down in the early days of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Given this reality, on February 27, the Commander of the Ukrainian Air Force, Lieutenant General Mykola Oleschuk, said that Russia should start thinking about reducing the number of sorties.

So what led to the sudden increase in successful Ukrainian attacks on Russian warplanes in February 2024?

In its latest summary, the Ukrainian National Defense Strategy Center said Russian forces had “overcome their fear” of using aircraft directly on the battlefield, which was behind recent more aggressive attacks on Ukrainian troops in the east.

With the help of the Air Force, Russian ground forces will be more confident, but it will also put Russian fighters at greater risk of losses. Guided bombs, which Russia regularly drops from Su-34 and Su-35 fighters to attack frontline settlements, are still one of the weapons that Ukraine cannot deal with. Meanwhile, Ukrainian Air Force spokesman Yury Ihnat said on February 29 on state television that hundreds of such bombs have been launched at Ukrainian positions in the Avdiivka area in recent days.

But to drop those bombs, according to military analyst and co-founder of the Resistance Information Project Oleksandr Kovalenko, Russian aircraft need to operate within a distance of less than 100 kilometers from their target, usually 30-40 kilometers, sometimes even closer. How high they fly and how far they fly from their target depends entirely on how the bomb is modified.

The problem with Russia, as Ukrainian Air Force spokesman Ihnat told the Kyiv Independent, is that Ukraine now has the “tools” to destroy fighter jets “at a considerable distance”. However, Ihnat also admitted that the important issue is that Ukraine needs to be supplied with more systems and ammunition to use those tools, such as guided anti-aircraft missiles. Currently, they are being produced at a slow pace.

Justin Bronk, a senior research fellow at the UK-based Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), told the BBC that recent Russian Air Force losses could be due to Ukraine being more active in moving Patriot anti-aircraft missile launchers closer to the frontline, despite certain risks.

The Ukrainian Air Force has not commented on such claims, and it is unclear what type of weaponry the Ukrainian military used to destroy the scores of Russian warplanes. But Ukraine has a layered air defense system, including medium-range systems such as the IRIS-T, NASAMS, and longer-range systems such as the Patriot, SAMP/T, and S-300. These systems are primarily used to repel regular Russian missile attacks across Ukraine, and can be moved closer to the border or the front line at the discretion of the military leadership.

In May 2023, the Patriot air defense system destroyed five Russian aircraft in Bryansk Oblast, including a Su-34, a Su-35, two Mi-8MTPR-1 helicopters and a Mi-8 helicopter. The Ukrainian Air Force confirmed this and called it “a great operation.”

The most significant loss that Ukraine inflicted on Russia was the shooting down of an A-50 early warning aircraft on February 23, about 200 kilometers from the front line. The US magazine Forbes suggested that the shooting down was related to a different missile system with a longer range, since the Patriot air defense missile system that Ukraine received, the PAC-2, only has a range of 90 miles. Therefore, Ukraine may have used the classic Cold War-era S-200 air defense missile system. If true, it would indicate that Ukraine is returning to the classic missile system that the Soviet Union designed to destroy large, slow-flying aircraft.

The Ukrainian government and military have not officially confirmed the possibility of modernizing and using the S-200, a weapon that the Ukrainian military withdrew from service in 2013. But Ukrainska Pravda newspaper, citing a source in the Main Directorate of Defense Intelligence of Ukraine (GUR), revealed that Ukraine's air defense used an older S-200 air defense system to shoot down the A-50. Some social media accounts also raised the possibility that Ukraine used the S-200 system in combination with the fire control radar of the S-300 complex to shoot down the A-50.

This is the second Russian A-50 shot down by Ukraine. The first Russian A-50 was shot down by Ukraine on January 14, over the Sea of ​​Azov. According to the Director of the Ukrainian Military Intelligence Service, General Kyrylo Budanov, the destruction of the two A-50s in 2024 will cost Russia about $700 million.

More importantly, according to Forbes, the Russian Air Force is believed to have around nine A-50 airborne early warning aircraft in service. They are organized into three groups, one in the south, one in the east, and one in the north, each consisting of three A-50s. The goal is to provide sensor coverage across Ukraine. The downing of the two A-50s means that Ukraine has eliminated a third of the A-50’s coverage area, creating blind spots that could make it difficult for Russian pilots to spot incoming missiles.

In fact, after the second A-50 was destroyed, the Russians did not use these planes for several days, according to Ukrainian Air Force spokesman Ihnat, which may have helped Ukraine shoot down Russian planes at longer ranges. According to Ihnat, the shooting down of so many Russian fighters in the past two weeks has helped push Russian fighters away from the front line and reduced the intensity of the Russian Air Force's bombing. Ihnat told the Kyiv Independent that the Russians realized that the Ukrainians had something to destroy their planes. So they had to reduce the intensity of their operations.