CHINESE DRONES

Medium Altitude Long Endurance drones can be described as UAVs with a service ceiling of
below 9,000 meters and capable of flying a relatively long endurance of up to 24 hours or longer

The GJ-1 and GJ-2 are MALE UAVs capable of the strike role and are the domestic in-service
variants of the original export oriented Wing Loong I and Wing Loong II systems.

High Altitude Long Endurance drones are UAVs with a service ceiling that can approach 18,000
meters

The PLA operates one major type of HALE drone, dubbed with various names over the years
including Soaring Dragon, EA-03, and WZ-7.

The service status of this aircraft has been confirmed in the last few years by satellite pictures
showing the presence of WZ-7s deployed to various different airbases around China, such as the
deployment of WZ-7s to Tibet during the Doklam standoff with India in 2017, as well as the presence of
WZ-7s based in the South China Sea.

The other major HALE drone being pursued by the PLA is a large, twin joined hull aircraft
commonly called Divine Eagle. The aircraft is thought to be an Airborne Early Warning (AEW) UAV,
where the joined hull design may allow for installation of conformal radar arrays on the sides and perhaps
the front surfaces of the fuselage.

The GJ-11 stealthy UCAV and WZ-8 supersonic reconnaissance UAV were both unveiled at the
2019 National Day parade,

GJ-11 is a stealthy UCAV with a deep strike purpose, and estimates of its dimensions would make it

slightly larger than the European Neuron demonstrator and about the size of the Boeing Phantom Ray

demonstrator. Such a UCAV would likely have a combat radius of over 1,000 km, and if photos of an

AVIC model are accurate, its total internal weapons carriage capacity should be able to accommodate

either two 500 kg guided bombs or eight 100 kg guided bombs.

There are also some other, more elusive UAV projects that have been rumored over the years.
The most notable of these, is the “Anjian” (or “Dark Sword”) UCAV.

TURKISH DRONES

There was only one thing for Turkey to do: get to work developing its own. The two main players were
Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) and Baykar Makina.

TAI was licensed by the American company General Dynamics to manufacture Turkish F-16 fighter jets,
which meant it already had useful knowledge for manufacturing attack drones. In addition, the company
had already had a contract to develop an attack drone back in 2004. 
More important was Baykar Makina, run by Selçuk Bayraktar, who had studied electrical engineering at
America’s prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology and in 2005 returned to Turkey at the age of
26 to bring what he knew about drones back home. In 2007, he interrupted his PhD studies to devote
himself completely to developing armed drones in Turkey. Two years later, he won a contract for the
production and sale of an armed drone: the Bayraktar TB2. 
But drones quickly became useful for much more than hunting rebels. 
Armies all over the world are investing in weapons systems that can perform more and more tasks
independently, like autonomous drones and unmanned ground vehicles. China recently set a new
record  by sending a swarm of 3,051 drones into its airspace simultaneously. 

The conflict also provides yet another reminder about the importance of passive defense. In an age of
highly proliferated sensors and shooters, militaries will need to consider new ways to camouflage and
harden their forces. Ground force tactics on dispersal and deception ought to be reinvigorated. Soldiers
should train to limit their electronic and thermal signatures for longer distances and times. The video and
imagery available online suggest that neither Armenian nor Azerbaijani forces had adequate resources or
training on passive defense. We see this time and time again with both sides operating out in the open,
static or moving slowly; poorly camouflaged; and clumped in tight, massed formations.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict also illustrates that while individual weapons systems will not
revolutionize the nature of warfare, the synchronization of new weapons makes the modern battlefield
more lethal. Azerbaijan’s combination of drones and artillery effectively targeted Armenia’s high-value
military assets, most notably in attacks on T-72 tanks and S-300 air defenses. In particular, strikes on air
defense units constrained Armenia’s ability to counter Baku’s UAVs, amplifying their effectiveness. The
use of UAVs and missiles to suppress and destroy air defenses gives greater validation to an observation
of the U.S. Army’s Air and Missile Defense 2028 strategy: “The most stressing threat is a complex,
integrated attack incorporating multiple threat capabilities in a well-coordinated and synchronized attack.”

The lessons here are not new. The importance of both full-spectrum air defense and passive defenses
have been shown in battles across the Middle East and in planning for potential conflict with Russia and
China. The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict provides a small but important case study in the character of
modern air and missile warfare.