Russian opposition media channel Astra reported on Wednesday that the Kremlin’s forces had deployed three Soviet glide bombs this week onto Russian-controlled regions.
No injuries were reported, but Astra assessed that the new incidents mean Russia has dropped a total of 103 bombs on its own territories in the last four months.
The independent outlet, which is vocally critical of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, wrote in a Telegram post that one glide bomb was found on Monday in the village of Krapivnoye in Belgorod.
Another was found in Dobroye village in Lipetsk that day, Astra reported, citing sources in the local emergency services. The third bomb was found on Tuesday in Tseplyaevo-Vtoroe, a village in Belgorod, Astra added.
All three villages are located in regions near Ukraine. It’s unclear if any of the munitions detonated.
The Kremlin has admitted to accidental discharges before, including in April 2023, when a Su-34 bombed a residential area in Belgorod and injured two women.
As of Wednesday evening, Russian state media has not addressed this week’s spate of bomb deployments reported by Astra.
Astra’s assessment comes amid multiple reports of the Kremlin’s forces accidentally discharging munitions for months over Russian or Russian-occupied territories.
Belgorod, a region along Ukraine’s border, has received most of the apparent self-inflicted strikes. One extreme example involves reports on May 4 that an FAB-500 had fallen into a civilian area, damaging 30 houses and injuring seven people.
“Such errors have destructive and lethal consequences for the Russian population,” wrote the UK’s Ministry of Defense in May of the self-bombings.
The Ministry previously assessed that these incidents on Russian soil may point to fatigue from the Kremlin’s air and ground crews or a lack of training for frontline troops.
Russian analyst says cheap electronics may be to blame
Ruslan Leviev, a Russian analyst who founded the independent open-source investigation organization Conflict Intelligence Team, proposed this week that the accidents may be caused by deficiencies in Russian munitions.
“One of our theories for these malfunctions is the shortage of components responsible for the bomb wings’ activation,” Leviev said in a Wednesday YouTube video uploaded by Russian political figure Maxim Katz.
Leviev theorized that, unlike Western-made munitions, the UMPK kit used by Russia to convert unguided munitions into guided munitions is likely built for cheap with civilian electronics of lower standards than their military-grade counterparts.
He added that other defects, like poor workmanship or mechanical issues, could also be at fault.
“This problem persists since the UMPK was first used, but no one seems to be on it,” Leviev said.
However, Leviev estimated that the percentage of faulty bombs is too small to undermine the Russian munitions’ effectiveness significantly.
The Russian Ministry of Defense’s press department did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent outside regular business hours by Business Insider.
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