Key Points and Summary – Ukrainian special operations forces and drone units are having remarkable success hunting and destroying Russia’s valuable Buk-M1 (SA-17) mobile air defense systems.
-Using a combination of reconnaissance and loitering munitions, Ukrainian drones have repeatedly tracked and eliminated these $100 million assets, as confirmed by video footage from the front lines.
Switchblade Drone. Image Credit: Industry Handout.
-These precision strikes against what was once a feared Soviet-era “three fingers of death” system highlight a critical vulnerability for the Russian military and showcase Ukraine’s battlefield ingenuity, turning the hunter into the hunted with low-cost, high-tech weaponry.
The ‘Buk-Hunter’: Ukraine’s New Drone Tactic is a Disaster for Russia
On 9 July, it was reported that Ukrainian forces had destroyed another Russian 9K37 Buk-M1 (SA-17) medium-range air defense system.
The value of one of these units is estimated at around $100 million.
According to the Ukrainian Ground Forces’ Telegram channel this operation was carried out by the Black Forest Brigade in cooperation with the 413th Separate Unmanned Systems Battalion “Reid.”
The Ukrainian unit later posted a video of the strike, which was included in their report of the engagement.
Ukraine media outlets that posted the video could not verify the time and location, but in the footage seen through the link, the Buk-M1 is traveling down a road when it then pulls off into a wooded area.
The crew then attempts to camouflage it so it cannot be spotted from the air. At this point, however, the Buk vehicle had been tracked from the air, and there was literally no place for the unit to hide.
Within a few minutes, a Ukrainian kamikaze drone crashes into the system. The SAM unit explodes, and a fireball and clouds of smoke rise up from what was a $100 million piece of equipment.
This was not the first time Ukraine’s special ops drone units had been able to identify a Russian air defense unit, track its movements, and then strike it at the opportune moment.
Two months before in mid-May, Ukrainian reconnaissance troops from the Black Forest Brigade had identified another Russian Buk-M1. They helped coordinate the precision strike that ultimately destroyed that SAM unit as well.
BUK-M1 in the Ukraine War – Russian Mobile Air Defense Tech
The Buk-M1 is a Soviet-era mobile air defense system designed to engage aircraft, helicopters, cruise missiles, and drones.
It entered service in 1983 as an upgraded version of the original Buk system.
The Buk itself is an evolutionary development of the older Cold War-era 2k12 Kub (SA-6) air defense system.
“We used to call the SA-6 the ‘three fingers of death’ back in the day,” said a former US Air Force (USAF) navigator who had flown on numerous missions in the F-4 and F-111 – among others. “And we were more afraid of that system than the other Russian SAMs of that time because it had a much higher Pk than the others – like the SA-8 Osa.”
The Buk is a significant improvement from the SA-6 generation. It can simultaneously engage multiple targets at altitudes from 15 meters to 22 kilometers and distances of up to 35 kilometers. It is mounted on a tracked platform, which makes it highly mobile, and therefore its crews are capable of repositioning quickly to avoid counterattacks.
It is also well-known by Russia’s Ministry of Defense due to the experience the Russian Air Force had at the hands of the Buk-M1 during Moscow’s 2008 invasion of Georgia.
Buk-M1 systems that had been modernized in Ukraine by the air defense firm Aerotechnica and that had been sold to Georgia brought down several Russian combat aircraft, officially lost during the 2008 war in South Ossetia.
These included a Su-24 a Tu-22M strategic bomber and three Su-25 attack aircraft.
Tu-22M3 Bomber from Russia. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
Having had so much experience in upgrading these systems, Ukraine’s military now has now made its armed forces quite capable of finding and destroying the Buk units in Russian hands.
Search and Destroy in Ukraine by Drones
Earlier in the year, in late April, Ukraine’s Special Operations Forces (SSO) reported they had destroyed a Russian Buk-M1 anti-aircraft missile system before it could fire a single missile against any Ukrainian aircraft.
This system was located by operators from Ukraine’s 3rd Separate Regiment during a reconnaissance mission in what the SSO described as “one of the most active areas.”
After identifying the target, the SSO relayed its coordinates to a missile artillery unit of the Ukrainian Defense Forces.
Again, drone footage records the moment of the strike, showing another direct hit followed by a massive explosion, confirming the system’s destruction.
The SSO did not disclose what type of weapon was used in the strike, but it appears to have been one of the many drone systems developed in Ukraine for this kind of mission.
According to publicly available data, the modernized version of the system, the Buk-M1-2 variants of the system, carry an estimated price tag of around $100 million.
As the war continues, the Ukrainian military has shown increasing skill at locating and destroying all models of Russian air defense units.
The Ukrainians are hunting these systems and their crews – and they are getting better at it all the time.
About the Author: Reuben F. Johnson
Reuben F. Johnson has thirty-six years of experience analyzing and reporting on foreign weapons systems, defense technologies, and international arms export policy. Johnson is the Director of Research at the Casimir Pulaski Foundation. He is also a survivor of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. He worked for years in the American defense industry as a foreign technology analyst and later as a consultant for the U.S. Department of Defense, the Departments of the Navy and Air Force, and the governments of the United Kingdom and Australia. In 2022-2023, he won two awards in a row for his defense reporting. He holds a bachelor’s degree from DePauw University and a master’s degree from Miami University in Ohio, specializing in Soviet and Russian studies. He lives in Warsaw.
More Military
The U.S. Navy’s Submarine Crisis Is Real
Swamplaw Yankee
July 14, 2025 at 5:25 am
This op-ed writer scores bulls eye above his punch velocity.
The question is how the weak minded in the MAGA POTUS Trump Cabal brain room are allowed to be feral anarchists who can hinder and/or stop the flow of air defence hardware to Ukraine.
Is the White House staff diorama open to the POTUS view? Or, is the MAGA POTUS distracted or obstructed in his daily monitor of his policy minions? Or, what exactly is the minimum periodicity? This morphology is not evident! Should not it be evident in 2025 is the question?
Ukrainian Fathers’ can not be allowed to be maimed and killed by orc muscovite pedophiles by the inside the White House technique of untested mental 5D nebulous construct. These White House thinkers need to be sent overseas to Ukraine’s Kherson for a 7 day insertion into the Kherson downtown Human Safari zone. Test their theories in existentialist terms. -30-
Pingback: Elementor #2918 - Drone Warfare