Overnight on December 27–28, 2025, Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, including the “Birds” unit of the 1st Separate Unmanned Systems Center, launched a coordinated FPV drone strike on Russian positions in and around Chornomorske in western Crimea. Military officials say the operation targeted three specific facilities: a Valdai radar station, a command post for a radar-intelligence complex, and a storage and launch base for Russian unmanned surface vessels, often referred to as sea drones.
Video released by commander Robert “Madyar” Brovdi showed multiple night-time explosions, and several Ukrainian and international outlets later reported that the sites were destroyed or heavily damaged, though Russia has not confirmed the scale of losses.
Why These Three Targets Matter
The Valdai radar system hit near Chornomorske is designed to detect and counter small unmanned aerial vehicles, including many of the short-range drones that now dominate much of the battlefield. The radar-intelligence command post helps coordinate air-defense assets by collecting and redistributing information, while the sea-drone facility supports Russia’s unmanned maritime operations used to monitor and protect Black Sea approaches.
By striking these three sites at once, Ukrainian forces aimed to cut local radar coverage, disrupt air-defense coordination, and reduce Russia’s ability to operate naval drones from this section of the Crimean coast.
Drones and Strain on Crimea’s Defenses
The Chornomorske strikes are part of a broader Ukrainian campaign using FPV and other short-range drones to probe and exploit gaps in Russian air defenses across occupied territories, including Crimea. Analysts and human-rights monitors note that such drones, though individually less powerful than missiles or artillery, have become one of the deadliest and most flexible weapons in the war, both against military targets and, tragically, in incidents that caused hundreds of civilian casualties since 2022.
Repeated Ukrainian hits on systems like Valdai radars, radar command posts, and related infrastructure suggest that Russian defenses around key nodes are under growing pressure, but evidence so far points to localized degradation rather than a fully documented collapse of air defenses across the entire peninsula.
What Is Known, and What Is Still Unclear
Verified reporting strongly supports the core facts of the operation that Ukrainian Unmanned Systems Forces, including the Birds unit, struck three specified facilities in Chornomorske during the night of December 27–28, using drones guided by operators with real-time video feeds. However, some of the more detailed claims circulating about precise Russian casualty figures, the exact scale of lost patrol capacity, and internal political disputes in Moscow over the state of Crimea’s air defenses are not clearly documented in independent sources and remain difficult to confirm.
What is clear is that both sides now treat drone warfare as central to shaping the balance of power in and around Crimea, with Ukraine focusing on high-value radar and command assets and Russia trying to adapt its layered defenses to an era where small, low-flying drones are increasingly hard to stop.
Sources:
UNITED24Media, “Ukrainian Drone Attack Disables Russian River Flotilla Base and ST-68 Radar Site in Crimea,” December 30, 2025
UNITED24Media, “In 2025, Russia Launched Over 60,000 Guided Aerial Bombs…,” December 31, 2025
Institute for the Study of War, “Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, December 31, 2025,” December 30, 2025