Group 13: Russian naval drones exist only on paper

Ukrainian naval drones have pushed the Black Sea Fleet into the bays, and Moscow is still only experimenting with FPV drones.

Russia is actively trying to create naval drone units, but currently does not have significant capabilities for their effective use. This was stated by the commander of the Group 13 naval drone unit with the call sign “Thirteenth” in a comment to the publication “Militarnyi”.

According to him, formally “drone regiments” have already appeared in the Russian Navy, but they exist only on paper.

“Currently, they do not have significant capabilities for the use of BEKs (ed.: unmanned boats). They are really working on this, quite stubbornly, but today we cannot say that they have any significant successes,” the military officer noted.

In particular, the Russians are trying to create a naval carrier for FPV drones, which should detect and destroy Ukrainian surface drones. However, for now, the main means of combating UAVs remains large-caliber machine guns on board ships.

“I know that the Russians are working on using drones to counter other drones. Using the same FPV drones. We must look at our enemy objectively – this is a strong enemy,” admits “Thirteenth”, adding that at the same time, Ukrainian units do not stop developing.

Ukrainian drones have already forced the Russian fleet to stay in the deep rear.

“The enemy even from the easternmost basing points goes out a maximum of 20 miles. This suggests that even from 800+ kilometers, the enemy is afraid of being hit. I think that now we can say about controlling more than 90% of the Black Sea,” says the commander.

He also noted that once the main targets were ships of the Black Sea Fleet, but now Group 13 operators also work on small patrol boats. The situation has also changed in the air: after the destruction of several Russian helicopters on December 31, their activity has almost disappeared.

During the presentation of the Main Intelligence Directorate, where the “Thirteenth” performed, modifications of the Magura v7 drone with AIM-9 missiles and a machine gun turret were shown for the first time.

The commander explained that the unit consciously chose the direction of development of the missile component: “There were many ideas, but we decided to concentrate on missiles. The SBU has already worked effectively with destroyers, so we preferred what we could implement better.”

USM also recently wrote that Poland presented the “Seawolf” naval drone, inspired by Ukrainian drones.