The Russian air force is lobbing as many as 5,000 glide bombs at Ukrainian positions every month, including some bombs weighing 3,000 kg that are powerful enough to destroy any defences.

As they are WWII vintage munitions that are more a gravity bomb, that falls, rather than a cruise missile that flies, they are extremely difficult to stop. They travel too fast for regular air defence systems to intercept them.

Much is written about Russia’s new class of hypersonic missiles which Putin showcased during his 2018 state of the nation speech. But like Ukraine, Russia has been innovating at the low tech end of the spectrum. With a massive stock of these bombs, someone had the bright idea of strapping cheap wings and a propeller on their backs together with UMPK (Universal Gliding and Correction Module) guidance systems to create a vast arsenal of low-cost but deadly weapons that the Armed Forces of Russia (AFR) is now using to pummel Ukrainian forces. A state-of-the-art Kinzhal (Kh‑47M2) missile costs a whopping $10-15mn per missile; a FAB 500 glide bomb costs a mere $5,000 at the very most. (In fact, as Russia has a large stock left over from WWII, they actually cost the Kremlin nothing.)

And they are massive. The payload of a regular drone is around 50kg of explosive. The FAB 500 is one of the smaller glide bombs that carries a payload of 180-250 kg of explosives. The largest, the FAB 3,000 has a payload of well over a tonne of explosives that can flatten an entire apartment block with a single missile.

And Russia has a lot of them. While there is no official number, based on Soviet-era production data, satellite imagery, and Western intelligence assessments suggest that Russia holds hundreds of thousands of these general-purpose aerial bombs, including a very large reserve of FAB-500s.

But as a low-tech solution, the FAB glide bombs have their drawbacks too. They have to be launched from the air and with ranges of 50-100km, that takes Russian fighter jets like the SU-30 and Su-34 perilously close to the frontline making them vulnerable to Ukrainian SAMs. More than 250 of these jets remain in service—and Sukhoi continues to deliver replacement airframes at a rate of a couple of dozen a year.

The AFU is not entirely helpless against the glide bombs, but given they can’t hope to hit the falling bomb itself, the options are limited to: jamming its crude navigation system during its short flight; shooting down the jets that launch it; and targeting the factories that make replacement jets, located deep inside Russia.

However, there is no magic bullet solution. Russian electronic warfare (EW) countermeasures are constantly evolving. Ukraine’s air force is limited, and the West has only sent it a dozen F-16, of which at least two have already been destroyed, so engaging in dog fights with Russia’s fleet of over 250 state-of-the-art fifth generation fighters is not possible. And Ukraine lacks the long-distance powerful cruise missiles like the US-made Tomahawks that could reach Russia’s aviation production facilities, so they too are currently beyond Ukraine’s reach.

Ukraine has almost doubled its production of low-cost drones from 2.5mn last year, to 4mn this year, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. But Russia has countered by investing into upgrading its glide bombs. The AFR recently swapped the propeller propulsion system for a small jet, cannibalised from civilian use, that has already doubled the range to 200km and further modifications threaten to put Kyiv in range of the glide bombs soon.

The first jet powered units were field tested in 2024 and are now entering general circulation. The jets turn the glide bombs into a low-cost cruise missile, albeit still with a very limited range of some 200m.

In 2025 Russia is expected to produce 120,000 guided FAB bombs for active use, according to the Ukrainian intelligence services, and about 70,000 long-range UAVs, including 30,000 Shaheds, according to Skibitskyi, Deputy Head of GUR.

The glide bombs have been in heavy use since 2023. Currently Russia is firing some 5000 glide bombs of various sizes a month, according to Ukrainian reports. In the battle for Pokrovsk, Russian forces dropped up to 450 glide bombs per week on a single sector, destroying fortified strongpoints that Ukrainian forces spent months building—and allowing Russian infiltration, Euromaidan Press reports.

"Glide bombs are a truly terrifying weapon," Canadian journalist Neil Hauer explained. He recalled a story about 3,000kg glide bombs striking an apartment building in Kostiantynivka, in eastern Ukraine. "Levelled it to the ground in one go," Hauer wrote.

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