One surface drone that attacked the Black Sea Fleet was destroyed, and the second exploded itself without causing any damage, Razvozhayev said.
“Today, starting at 3.30 am, an attempt was made to attack Sevastopol. According to the current situation: one surface drone was destroyed by the forces of PPDO (anti-submarine and sabotage support), the second one exploded itself,” Razvozhaev wrote in his Telegram channel.
Since July last year, Ukrainian drones have been periodically trying to attack Sevastopol, the main base of the Black Sea Fleet, as well as other infra in Crimea. The target of the attacks would be the headquarters of the fleet, energy facilities, and military airfields.
Earlier, images of a new sea-borne Unmanned Surface Vessel (USV) surfaced on social media pages, giving rise to speculation whether Ukraine could use these USVs to attack the Russian navy fleet in Sevastopol.
They then began being featured on official Ukrainian government videos , publicizing their wartime domestic drone industry and a factory manufacturing the drones before asking for donations to a fund that supports Ukraine’s defense manufacturing.
File Image: USV Meanwhile, global military expenditure increased by 3.7% last year and reached a new record high of $2,240 billion, with the three largest spenders being the United States, China, and Russia, according to new data published on Monday by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
“World military spending grew for the eighth consecutive year in 2022 to an all-time high of $2,240 billion. By far the sharpest rise in spending (+13 percent) was seen in Europe,” SIPRI said in its report.
The United States remains the world’s biggest military spender, with its military expenditure having reached $877 billion last year, which is 39% of total global military spending.
“The 0.7 percent real-term increase in US spending in 2022 would have been even greater had it not been for the highest levels of inflation since 1981,” SIPRI said.
China was the world’s second-largest military spender in 2022, having spent $292 billion, or 4.2% more than in 2021, according to SIPRI.
“Russian military spending grew by an estimated 9.2 percent in 2022 to around $86.4 billion. This was equivalent to 4.1 percent of Russia’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2022, up from 3.7 percent of GDP in 2021,” SIPRI said.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s military spending saw the highest single-year increase in a country’s military expenditure ever recorded in SIPRI data, reaching $44.0 billion in 2022, which was a 640% increase.
