Ukraine reinvents old technology to make a potent new weapon

Ukraine has been very resourceful in the war against Russia. Recently it was revealed that Ukraine has taken old technology from World War II and adapted it to make a new, potent modern weapon. This weapon is surprisingly simple yet deadly. It is a laser fuze for drone bombs.

The proliferation of drones on the modern battlefield has turned these formerly fun toys into one of the most powerful weapons being utilized in Ukraine, but Kyiv’s alleged laser sensor is a simple device that allows its drones to be even more effective. 

On September 3rd, the Telegram channel UAV Developer posted about Ukraine's laser sensor innovation and commented on the powerful nature of the weapon, which can be used to measure the distance between a drone bomb to its target. 

Photo Credit: Telegram @mil_hub

UAV Developer reported that Ukraine's new laser sensor can be used to trigger a bomb at any distance but added that it was a simple device and questioned why Russia didn’t have the same sort of laser fuzes in its drone-dropped munitions. 

What makes the Ukrainian laser fuze such a powerful addition to drone bombs is that it can allow Ukrainian soldiers to turn their bombs into airburst weapons, which can make drone bombs even more deadly when dropped on infantry soldiers. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By USN, U.S. DefenseImagery, Public Domain

In March 2024, David Axe reported in a Forbes article that the first drones with airburst fuzes began appearing on Ukrainian battlefields in the fall of 2024 fitted to first-person view drones and quickly began posing a big threat to Russian forces. 

“Remotely detonated in mid-air and blasting tiny fragments over a wide area, the airburst drones pose an ever greater danger to unprotected infantry than do the usual explode-on-impact FPV drones,” Axe explained. But these aren’t the only new fuzes for weapons Ukraine has developed. 

David Hambling of Forbes reported on the claims from UAV Developer but also noted that Ukraine has “displayed a rare talent at creating new fuzes for old weapons” and cited the ‘Johnny’ or ‘Jonik fuze’ as the most celebrated of Ukraine’s innovations in this field. 

Photo Credit: Telegram @mil_hub

The ‘Johnny’ size is fitted to Soviet-era PTM-3 anti-tank mines, which originally only had a simple pressure fuze that worked when a tracked vehicle drove over it. However, the new Johnny fuze added a magnetometer and an accelerometer to the mine.

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By Podilchanyn, Own Work, CC BY-SA 4.0

The addition of a magnetometer increased the destructive power of the PTM-3 mine since it allowed the weapon to detonate when a large, metal vehicle or object moved close to the mine, and the new accelerometer works by triggering a detonation if the anti-tank mine is moved. 

Ukraine also has developed an electronic fuze called ‘Verba’ according to the X warfare analyst Roy, who explained that the fuze is fitted to improvised mines dropped by Ukraine's infamous Baba Yaga drones. 

“The fuze has a magnetometer that detonates the IED if a vehicle, or even the metal on a person, comes close. The mine is an automotive pipe filled with high explosives,” Roy explained. This exemplifies how the Ukrainians are innovating on the battlefield melding old technologies with new ones. 

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