Recently, the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine announced in a high-profile manner on the electronic bidding platform that it intends to spend up to 3 billion hryvnia, equivalent to about 5600 million yuan to purchase 20,000 drones. The drone models purchased this time include 150,000 units of the DJI M**IC3 and 5,000 units of the MacViC3Thermal special version, the latter with infrared visibility.
Although Ukraine has made its procurement plan public, its actions are a clear violation of the ban on sales by Chinese companies. In the context of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, commercial drones have been transformed into tools of war and have become the "new favorite" of the battlefield. DJI, the global leader in drone manufacturing, has stopped selling drones to Russia and Ukraine since April 2022 due to concerns that its products are being used for military purposes.
However, Ukraine does not seem to be deterred by this, and they have even acquired DJI drones through smuggling channels. What's more, the Ukrainian side has also specially designed and mass-produced kits for UAV ** mounts for the use of the Ukrainian army. After two years of "iteration", these ** kits have matured quite well and cover a wide range of UAV and artillery shell models.
Interestingly, although there are also many civilian drone companies in Europe and the United States, Ukraine and Russia prefer DJI's products on the battlefield. The reason is simple, DJI drones far surpass other brands in terms of performance. Take the French Parrot drone as an example, although it was a competitor of DJI 10 years ago, it is now not comparable to DJI in terms of design and performance.
In fact, the reason why civilian drones are favored by foreign military and police forces is mainly because of their excellent performance and cost performance. With the rapid development of civilian UAV technology, although military UAVs are more powerful, the high cost makes civilian UAVs have obvious advantages in mass production.
While meeting the basic shooting needs, civilian UAVs also have a wide range of application prospects, such as low-altitude transportation, line patrol, fire fighting, etc. However, with a little modification, these drones can be transformed from "firefighting artifacts" into "killing machines". But apparently, the drone itself is not to blame, the key lies in the choice of the operator.
Ukraine's move has undoubtedly sparked controversy, ignoring the ban on sales and buying DJI drones, what is the intention? The story behind this is probably far more complicated than it seems.