The official channel of the 3rd Spartan special purpose brigade of the National Guard of Ukraine published footage showing their airborne reconnaissance operators discover the positions of russian Pantsir-S1 missile and gun air defense systems in the Kharkiv operational axis. The intelligence was passed over to the missile troops of the Ukrainian Defense Forces who launched a strike, hitting two enemy vehicles as a result.
Read more: OSINT Power: russian Overprotected T-72 Tank Located by Hints and Eliminated
But if we dig deeper, there are more interesting details to this story. In fact, the Ukrainian forces destroyed these anti-aircraft systems in the vicinity of the Belgorod city in russia. According to the CyberBoroshno OSINT community, one of the Pantsir-S1's was destroyed on June 20th, right near the city, and the other was used to provide cover for the russian invasion forces advancing on Lyptsi village in the Kharkiv Region of Ukraine.
The first one to report a hit on one of these Pantsir systems was the Telegram channel called Dnipro | OSINT with Harbuz. As the author points out, the location of the Pantsir-S1 near Belgorod was compromised back in January 2024, when local residents of russia filmed how their air defense repels a Ukrainian missile attack, and posted the video on social media. OSINT specialists used the footage to find out exactly where the enemy Pantsir was deployed.
So it turns out that for almost half a year russian forces kept their air defense system almost at the same spot while repelling attacks of Ukrainian missiles and drones. They were sure it couldn't be harmed and had a good reason to — earlier, Ukraine had no means of reaching it so deep inside russian territory. However, the situation changed when the USA and other countries finally allowed the use of the weapons they provided to Kyiv for strikes inside the russian federation.
Although there are still certain limitations on the range (for example, recently the United States prohibited attacks at distances exceeding 100 km), nonetheless, the Ukrainian Defense Forces now have more opportunities and tools to destroy the equipment of the russian invasion army beyond the state border.
Read more: How Bradley IFV Defends Its Ukrainian Crew Against russian FPV-Drone Strike (Video)
