Russia is improving Dragon heavy flamethrower system - military expert

He said this on Espreso.

"The Russians are forced to improve heavy flamethrower systems that can strike with thermobaric shells, which is a very dangerous weapon. They are trying to improve this system because the previous TOS-1 systems were the first target on the battlefield. According to an open resource, it is known that 24 similar enemy systems and 8 transport and charging units for them were destroyed. Because these systems had certain flaws with the aiming and the range of the shells used, and the aiming range was 5-8 km. And the aiming itself had to be done with the help of laser targeting. The TOS-1 system, which is built on the basis of a tank, should have been able to be aimed directly, which contributed to its defeat," explained Valerii Riabykh.

According to him, the invading troops also improved their shells, which began to reach a range of 15 km, and according to other sources, 24 km. And this was implemented in the TOS-2 system.

"The development of this system has been going on for quite a long time, and only recently has there been evidence of the system appearing on the battlefield. And this may indicate that it has flaws in its protection, for example, against debris and that it is vulnerable to counter-battery fire. That is why we are now talking about combining these TOS-1 and TOS-2 to get a more powerful TOS-3 system. It is not possible to say now that the production of such systems can be expected in large quantities. But it should be noted that the invaders are making progress. The creation of this system was announced sometime in February this year, and in April, manufacturers reported the development of experimental samples. In a few months, we can expect significant progress in this direction. And we need to look for opportunities to prevent the enemy from implementing a program to create similar systems and ammunition for them," the military expert commented.

Riabykh noted that this is a genocidal weapon designed to wipe cities off the face of the earth using powerful thermobaric munitions.

• On May 1, the US State Department confirmed that Russian forces used the banned chemical chloropicrin against the Ukrainian Defense Forces.
• On May 3, the General Staff reported that Russia used chemical munitions against the Ukrainian Armed Forces 444 times in April.