RUSI produced a new paper on Russian air defences.

Disrupting Russian Air Defence Production: Reclaiming the Sky

Dr Jack Watling , Nikolay Staykov, Maya Kalcheva, Olena Yurchenko, Bohdan Kovalenko, Olena Zhul, Oleksii Borovikov, Anastasiia Opria, Roman Rabieiev, Nadiia Reminets and Alex Whitworth

It focuses mostly on the geographic distribution of Russian SAM/radar production and on ways it should be targeted/sanctioned. I find this hopeful “pie in the sky” part less interesting, but your mileage may vary.

However, it also contains some really interesting information coming from Ukrainian frontline sources about the effectiveness of the Russian air defences. What it boils down to is that Russia is able to shoot down a high percentage of Ukrainian long-range munitions, which severely constrains both the number and the selection of objectives that Ukraine can target.

Details

– Ukraine’s persistent strikes on Russian territory over the course of the war have created a popular perception that Russian air defences are not very effective. This is misleading. Russian air defences have imposed significant constraints on Ukraine’s military, shielded the Russian military and industry from the bulk of attempts to strike them in depth and improved substantially over the course of the war.

– One Ukrainian aircraft was shot down by Russian air defences at a range of 150 km while flying below 50 ft.

– Over time, Russian air defences learned how to track and engage these munitions effectively and the rate of successful hits dropped from close to 70% with GMLRS in 2022, to around 30% in 2023 and 2024, and often close to 8% in 2025.

– For attacks on components of the air defence system, it has been found that up to 10 ATACMS must be committed to destroy one radar.

– When Ukraine has attacked more protected targets, the results have been consistent. Out of a salvo of 100–150 UAVs, costing between $20,000 and $80,000 each, around 10 will get to their target, where their small payload often causes negligible damage that can quickly be repaired. The overall success rate of Ukrainian strikes has been that less than 10% of munitions have reached a target, and fewer still have delivered an effect.

– Even where Storm Shadow or other prestige weapons are used by Ukraine, the improvements in Russian munitions matching have meant that they often intercept over 50% of these munitions, even when they are part of a complex salvo.

– Russian air defence interceptors are currently being fired faster than they can be produced, but this is overwhelmingly concentrated in older or obsolete platforms such as 9K33 Osa and SHORAD systems, especially Pantsir.

Key Recommendations:

1) Prevent Modernisation of Microelectronics Production: Disrupt Russia’s access to critical materials and technologies, such as beryllium oxide ceramics and advanced microprocessors, to hinder radar and missile production.

2) Enforce Targeted Sanctions: Impose sanctions on companies supplying raw materials, components and machine tools to Russia, including those from NATO member states and third countries.

3) Exploit Cyber Vulnerabilities: Leverage Russia’s reliance on foreign software for designing and testing air defence systems to disrupt production and compromise system integrity.

4) Target Critical Nodes: Prioritise kinetic strikes on concentrated industrial hubs, such as Tula, to disrupt production of key systems like Pantsir SHORAD.

5) Reassess Russian Air Defence Reliability: Encourage international customers to reconsider the resilience and reliability of Russian air defence systems, given their exposure to disruption and potential technical compromise.