"Whole family of domestic drones" coming, says Russian top official

Russia was behind other countries in developing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) until recently and now it boasts both reconnaissance drones and loitering munitions, Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev said on March 23.

In an interview with Russian media outlets, including TASS, and users of the VKontakte social media network, Medvedev said that Russia would soon possess a whole family of drones.

"I am sure that we will have a whole family of drones in the immediate future," he said, responding to questions about why Russia had run into problems with the production of domestic drones.

The politician admitted that the production of unmanned aerial vehicles was not Russia’s strong point or advantage before.

"Moreover, this has been felt in recent years. As life shows, some processes go faster and some a little slower. There can hardly be any country that would be ahead of all others by all parameters," he pointed out.

Now such devices are already being developed and produced in Russia, he added.

"If we talk about a whole product range, I can say that we already have normal reconnaissance drones and have set up their production. Secondly, what we also possess and what operates well - it will suffice to look at Telegram channels of military reporters or reports from the Army - these are so-called loitering munitions or kamikaze drones. That is, this is also a drone but it has the sole aim of hitting the target accurately," the security official said.

Such loitering munitions as Kub and Lancet and some others that are produced by the Kalashnikov Group or its contractors "demonstrate their excellent quality," Medvedev said.

"We are told: this is somewhat of Iranian make. However, these are absolutely Russian high-precision munitions with a relatively small charge. We possess this family of drones as well," he stressed.

Now Russia needs to create a family of strike drones, "that is, full-fledged large aerial platforms," he said.

"This is the area where we still need to carry out further work, although we already have several prototypes for serial production and I am certain that they will be made operational in the immediate future," he said.