Two years into Myanmar’s civil battle, civilian drones refitted to drop explosives on junta troops are serving to flip the tide in opposition to the nation’s better-equipped navy, insurgent teams say.
Drones had been as soon as used solely by the military to detect and crack down on pro-democracy protests on the streets of Myanmar’s largest metropolis of Yangon within the days after the Feb. 1, 2021, takeover.
When the anti-junta Individuals’s Protection Power first shaped within the months following the coup, its members had been compelled to struggle Southeast Asia’s second-largest military utilizing solely slingshots and the identical crude flintlock “Tumee” rifles their forefathers used to struggle British colonizers within the Eighteen Eighties.
The insurgent teams began utilizing home made landmines to focus on their enemy’s convoys, and a few yr in the past added drones to their arsenal. They’ve proved efficient, protected, correct and require little manpower to function throughout clashes, the fighters say.
“To let you know the reality, drone strikes may find yourself being a decisive device in some areas,” mentioned a member of the Wings of the Irrawaddy, the PDF’s drone unit. “In 2023, the junta troops will probably be damage [by this weapon] much more. Junta troopers are extraordinarily terrified of our drone assaults. After they see drones coming their method, they run for canopy.”
Statements not too long ago issued by three drone items working in opposition to the navy mentioned they’d carried out a complete of 642 drone assaults in Sagaing and Magway areas and in Kayin and Kayah states final yr.
Tough to defend
Thein Tun Oo, govt director of the Thayninga Institute for Strategic Research, which is made up of former navy officers, acknowledged the menace PDF drones pose and mentioned the navy is deploying applied sciences to defend in opposition to the assaults.
“We will restrict the variety of drones getting into our areas and shoot some down as nicely … [using] drone weapons and [frequency] jammers,” he mentioned.
“A few of our weapons can shoot them down from a distance of 700-1,000 meters (2,300-3,300 toes),” he mentioned. “There are numerous methods to defend in opposition to them.”
However Zay Thu Aung, a former Air Power captain within the navy who defected to the armed resistance, informed RFA that whereas the junta should buy gear to defend in opposition to drone assaults, it requires a excessive studying curve and is tough to deploy successfully.
“The junta has limitless monetary sources and since some developed international locations are supporting them with know-how, they will purchase drone safety methods,” he mentioned.
“However its floor troops should not educated sufficient to function such high-tech gear and it’s too arduous to deploy these to all of the frontline battlefields all through the nation.”
The drone fleets have allowed the PDF to attain a level of air superiority, even with out the helicopters and fighter jets obtainable to the navy, he added.
Drawbacks
Regardless of the success the insurgent drone items had loved in opposition to the navy, there are nonetheless drawbacks to the gear they’ve obtainable, mentioned the Wings of the Irrawaddy fighter.
It requires a big variety of elements to improve a industrial drone used to document video into an assault drone and the price of producing one continues to be increased than that of 1 computerized rifle, he mentioned. Different PDF members acknowledged to RFA in September that drones are additionally prone to being shot out of the sky.
PDF drone items are additionally restricted of their operations by daylight, the Wings of the Irrawaddy fighter mentioned, including that the items plan to equip their plane with night time imaginative and prescient cameras in 2023.
Kyaw Zaw, the spokesperson for the workplace of shadow Nationwide Unity Authorities President Duwa Lashi La, informed RFA that it plans so as to add extra funding in 2023 for drone items via a program initiated via its ministry of protection named Venture Skywalk.
“With the sources that we’ve got, we’re working to make extra high-tech drones,” he mentioned.
“Now we have not but been capable of provide the complete vary of drones and weapons [for drones]. However you will notice that we can destroy the junta’s tanks as we are able to provide a sure variety of weapons.”
A Jan. 4 report launched by the Falcon Wings – a PDF drone unit which operates from inside territory managed by the anti-junta ethnic Karen Nationwide Union in Kayin state – claimed that it had carried out 437 assaults in 2022, killing about 200 navy troopers.
On Jan. 9, a Falcon Wings PDF drone unit in Kayah’s Loikaw township reported that it carried out 125 drone assaults in 2022, though it didn’t present numbers of navy casualties.
The Wings of the Irrawaddy group claims to have carried out about 80 drone assaults final yr, killing about 80-100 junta troops.
RFA was unable to independently confirm the casualty numbers claimed by the drone items.
A PDF official in Kayin state mentioned that not solely are drones efficient in attacking the navy, they are often relied upon as air assist for paramilitaries on the bottom.
“Drones have served as air assist for our floor troops and are an enormous menace to our enemy as nicely,” mentioned the official, including that they permit the PDF to “fully dominate the air of the enemy camp.”
Translated by Myo Min Aung. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.
