The Russian military has consistently deployed KAB glide bombs to strike Ukrainian forces and cities. These bombs, with a range exceeding 40 kilometers and warheads weighing up to 3 tons, have played a significant role in Russia’s offensive in Eastern Ukraine.
However, the effectiveness of Russia’s once highly praised satellite-guided glide bombs has significantly decreased in recent operations. According to a report by Forbes on the 22nd, newly leaked footage from a Russian military drone clearly shows a KAB missile, which was initially claimed to have an error margin of just 4.6 meters, missing its target by several hundred meters and detonating in an open field, completely missing the intended target. Military experts have analyzed this as a sign that Ukraine’s electronic warfare capabilities have made substantial progress.
The KAB or UMPK satellite-guided glide bombs used by the Russian military possess formidable combat capabilities, capable of gliding over 40 kilometers and delivering hundreds of kilograms of explosives. Previously, the Russian Air Force’s unofficial Telegram channel Fighterbomber claimed these missiles had high precision. However, now they lament that the “golden age of the sacred UMPK” was fleeting.
The leaked footage clearly records the real-time effects of Ukraine’s electronic warfare. The footage shows a Russian drone hovering over the front lines, with its crosshair aimed at a suspected Ukrainian military base. As the KAB missile is released, it explodes hundreds of meters away from its intended target in an open area, rendering the strike tactically ineffective.
With Ukraine deploying increasingly advanced electronic warfare systems, such occurrences are becoming more common along the 1,127-kilometer-long front line. Fighterbomber has acknowledged that “the missile was still in flight, but all satellite-guidance correction systems had failed.” The core issue is Ukraine’s electronic warfare technology, which has successfully blocked the connection between these missiles and Russia’s GLONASS satellite system (similar to the U.S. GPS system but with lower accuracy). As a result, the missiles are unable to correct their course, causing them to miss their targets.
Ukraine’s electronic warfare company Night Watch has revealed to Forbes that their Lima jammer uses innovative “digital jamming” technology that combines jamming, deception, and cyberattack techniques, going beyond the traditional method of simply emitting radio interference. “After deploying this system, the enemy’s bombing accuracy has significantly decreased, and they ultimately ceased shelling the regional centers due to the failure to achieve military objectives,” a representative from the company stated.
Night Watch has confirmed the deployment of their jamming systems in key conflict zones, including Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia. Military experts predict that as Ukraine’s electronic warfare systems continue to cover more battlefronts, the effectiveness of Russian KAB missiles will be further restricted, causing more missiles to miss their targets and reducing their overall threat on the battlefield.
