Posted on 07/13/2022 6:52:47 PM PDT by elpadre
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed was in a tough spot last August when he paid a visit to Turkey. For nearly a year, his government had been at war with rebels from the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, which was now pushing south from its stronghold near the Eritrean border and threatening to move on the country’s capital of Addis Ababa.
Thousands had already been killed, and the United States and the United Nations had accused all the warring parties of blockading aid, committing sexual assault and deliberately targeting civilians.
With only a small, aging fleet of Soviet-era military jets, Abiy needed a way to quickly — and cheaply — expand his air campaign against the rebels. Turkey had just the solution: a military drone known as the TB2 that could be piloted from nearly 200 miles away. China and Iran also supplied drones, but the TB2, outfitted with cutting-edge technology, had fast become the new favorite of the world’s embattled nations, helping to win wars even when it was pitted against major powers.
On August 18, Abiy met Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to sign a military pact. It’s unclear whether drones were part of the agreement. But two days after the signing, publicly available flight records showed that an Ethiopian Airlines charter flight took off from Tekirdag, an hour’s drive west of Istanbul, at an airstrip known for testing and exporting the Turkish drones.
It was the first of at least three such runs over roughly a month, the records show. Neither the Turkish nor the Ethiopian governments responded to questions about the flights, but officials in Turkey have previously acknowledged drone sales to Ethiopia.
(Excerpt) Read more at asiatimes.com ...
The world of violence does drone on and on!
Despise that man. I’ll never forget he was interviewed on live TV and said he wished all the south who served in the civil war had been killed in battle or executed. Every single last Johnny Reb., 3/4 of a million of them.
pusher prop in the back.
Yes, it is. $5 million drone, mildly effective, vulnerable to air defense. I imagine war is expensive on all fronts and equipment loss would be expected. 10 of these drones would constitute quite an investment and the loss of a number of them disappointing to say the least.
Yes; I looked up photos on the web. I figured it had to be a pusher prop on that obvious hub at the back of the fuselage. Interesting; most pics showed two props but one showed three. I would think three would make it more efficient in the air - but more costly to lose. Obviously the props were removed for truck transport although with two props it wouldn't be necessary.
Two-blade pusher prop driven by Rotax internal combustion engine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baykar_Bayraktar_TB2
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotax_912
Light-weight, efficient jet engines are one of the more difficult technologies for manufacturers of more advanced cruise missiles and drones.
That is some special sort of mental illness, right there.
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