Jet-powered Geran drones are just the beginning. How Russia is switching to small missiles and what Ukraine can do about it

Ukraine has barely had time to adapt to Russian jet-powered drones, and Russia is already ramping up production of another weapon – small cruise missiles.

They look like scaled-down versions of conventional cruise missiles such as the Kh-101 and Kalibr. Inside, they have the same components and warheads as long-range drones.

Drones are becoming more like missiles, and missiles more like drones, making it hard to draw a clear line between them. But this new generation of Russian long-range weapons poses a much greater threat for one main reason – they are faster.

Ukrainska Pravda's calculations, based on figures from several public sources, indicate that Russia plans to produce tens of thousands of small cruise missiles next year. These missiles can fly at more than 600 km/h. Russia plans to produce other missiles as well.

Ukraine is still learning how to counter jet-powered drones. Its air defences are getting better at it, and their success rate reached 66% last month. But Ukraine needs to urgently prepare for the new threat to avoid repeating the mistakes it made in dealing with jet-powered drones.

Ukrainska Pravda looks at the threat posed by Russia's small cruise missiles and what Ukraine can do about it.

Small cruise missiles

Interestingly, it was Ukraine that first tested the concept of small cruise missiles, at least publicly. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy unveiled the Palianytsia in 2024. The Peklo and Bars followed. These weapons were dubbed "missile-drones" – a name that was soon forgotten, although the concept proved remarkably appealing.

Conventional cruise missiles such as the Kh-101 and Storm Shadow are extremely complex pieces of engineering.

The engine is the most challenging part. It has to bring a missile weighing several tonnes up to about 1,000 km/h. To hit their targets, cruise missiles use everything from satellite and inertial navigation to optical and radar systems that compare the terrain below with a map stored on board. Composite materials are often used to make the missiles harder to detect. Electronic warfare (EW) equipment and decoy flares are built in to counter air defences.

Small cruise missiles are much simpler. Like modern long-range drones, they rely on mass-produced, off-the-shelf components.

Instead of large turbojets, they use small jet engines designed for model aircraft. These cost up to US$40,000 apiece. Their civilian electronics, which almost anyone can buy online, take the place of in-house components built to military standards. They use the same warheads as attack drones.

Jet-powered drones share all these features. The distinction between a jet-powered drone and a small cruise missile is therefore far from clear-cut – it depends on what the weapon can do and how closely it resembles a conventional cruise missile.

For the military, the difference comes down to what each weapon offers. A single large, powerful cruise missile costs US$2 million. The same amount of money can buy about 10 smaller, less powerful missiles, each costing hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Despite their lower cost and smaller warheads, these missiles retain key characteristics of conventional cruise missiles. They are highly manoeuvrable, fly at 600 km/h or more and can operate at altitudes of 200 m or less.

Russia is now counting on those capabilities.

The use of jet-powered Geran drones has shown how hard they are to counter. Their speed of 500 km/h and ability to fly at altitudes of 200 to 6,000 m make them very hard to detect and shoot down. Ukrainska Pravda has previously reported on why jet-powered drones are so difficult to intercept.

Small cruise missiles are even harder to intercept because they fly faster and are more manoeuvrable.

A highly competitive market

Demand for a weapon of this kind has sparked an unusual level of competition within Russia's defence-industrial base.

Pavel Luzin, a senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) and the Saratoga Foundation, told Ukrainska Pravda: "We're now seeing big companies compete based on the resources they have available. It's a case of making what you can. Conventional cruise missiles need large turbojet engines, which can be produced only in limited numbers because of technical constraints.

What we're seeing here is a version of the cruise missile geared to wartime production. It uses model aircraft engines made in China or Russia. They're smaller and less powerful, but they can be made in large batches."

The Kronshtadt plant was among the first to work on this type of weapon. After 2021, it specialised in producing Orion reconnaissance and strike drones. In 2025, it emerged that the plant was involved in making the Banderol, a small cruise missile that can be launched from drones. Russia has begun using Banderol missiles regularly against Ukraine in 2026.

Kronshtadt was struggling financially despite its military contracts. Lawsuits filed against the company in 2023 sought more than RUB 1.5 billion (about US$18 million) in total. A plant representative said production "came to a complete standstill" after a Ukrainian strike on the facility in 2025. In 2026, it emerged that the plant had changed hands and that its new owner is banking on long-term civilian contracts.

Around the same time, the name of a previously unknown cruise missile surfaced in media reports citing intelligence sources. It was called the Dan-T. Major General Vadym Skibitskyi, Deputy Head of Defence Intelligence of Ukraine, said one of this programme's objectives was to move to Russian-made components.

In photos that emerged later, the new missile looked suspiciously like the Banderol. Both carry warheads of up to 130 kg, cruise at 500 km/h and have a range of 450-500 km. They can be launched from ground-based launchers or from Orion drones, Mi-28 helicopters and Su-25, Su-30, Su-34 and Su-35 aircraft.

Reports, however, named Rostec as the Dan-T's manufacturer. Kronshtadt may well have sold Rostec the technology to make Banderol missiles when the plant changed hands. Several details support that theory.

Militarnyi, a Ukrainian military news outlet, previously reported that Russia's Aerospace Forces were considering switching exclusively to the Dan-T. One reason cited was that it cost about 35% less than the Banderol.

Another clue is that the Dan-T has appeared at exhibitions and media events, while the Banderol has been absent. The name Dan-T was most likely chosen to suggest it was derived from the Dan-M target drone, though the two are unrelated.

It is not yet known whether Kronshtadt has stopped making Banderol missiles altogether or is continuing to fulfil the order. Ukraine's Air Force groups the Banderol and Dan-T together as a single missile type when reporting targets shot down.

The Dan-T is one of several small cruise missiles Rostec is developing. The company is also working on the S-71K Kovyor and S-71M Monokhrom, two cruise missile designs for launch from Su-57 fighters. Russia first used them in late 2025. The S-71K has a 250 kg warhead, a range of up to 300 km and a speed of about 600 km/h. The S-71M Monokhrom is based on the S-71K and features a system that enables it to search for targets autonomously.

Tactical Missiles Corporation (KTRV) and Alabuga are also vying with Rostec to become Russia's leading producer of small cruise missiles.

Another small cruise missile, the Filin, recently came to light. It is made by NPO Molniya, which is part of KTRV. Its specifications are broadly similar to those of the Dan-T. It has a top speed of 800 km/h and a range of 1,200 km, and can carry either a 50 kg or a 100 kg warhead.

Alabuga has shifted some of its Geran production from petrol-powered to jet-powered drones and is now investing in small cruise missiles based on the Geran-5. Russia is experimenting with the design of what is already, in effect, a cruise missile.

In the first upgrade, the Geran-5's engine was moved inside the fuselage, improving its aerodynamics and increasing its range and speed.

Serhii "Flash" Beskrestnov, an adviser to Ukraine's president and a radio technology expert, told Ukrainska Pravda at a briefing on foreign components in Russian weapons: "The Russians are changing the design to find ways to fit a bigger warhead, extend the range and increase the speed. The jet-powered Shaheds we're seeing now are essentially an intermediate step towards cruise missiles.

Competition is driving the development of individual missiles and diversifying production."

Russia later developed a new variant, the Geran-5 K5-K. It has a reshaped fuselage, a shorter wingspan, an internally mounted engine and side air intakes. These changes allow it to reach 900 km/h, a speed comparable to that of a conventional cruise missile such as the Kh-101. The Geran-5 K5-K is also fitted with the Susanin optical navigation system, which makes it less vulnerable to electronic warfare.

Vladyslav Vlasiuk, the Ukrainian president's commissioner for sanctions policy, told Ukrainska Pravda: "We're seeing competition among Russian manufacturers, and that's bad news for us. They have different ideas about how to develop offensive weapons and use different sets of components. But they're all effective in their own way."

Dependence on imports

Competition within Russia's military-industrial complex has done nothing to reduce its dependence on foreign components. Russia relies most heavily on China, its main supplier of jet engines. Each engine costs about US$35,000-40,000, and there are problems with quality.

To improve matters, Russia is trying to assemble Chinese engines at its own factories. Ukrainska Pravda has learned that the latest batches of Geran-4 and Geran-5 jet-powered drones are fitted with Chinese Telefly TF-TJ2000A jet engines assembled at Alabuga. Because of quality issues with parts made in China, the engines assembled in Russia undergo an additional defect check.

Russia is also trying to set up domestic production of jet engines. That work falls to Reynolds, part of Rostec. Its R500 engines have been spotted in Filin, S-71 and Dan-T cruise missiles.

Even if Russia gets its own engine production up and running, it will still depend on foreign parts. A DIU representative told Ukrainska Pravda at the briefing that Russian drones rely entirely on foreign components.

"The Russians work with whatever is available on the market," the representative said.

How can Ukraine shoot them down?

Russia is still ramping up production of small cruise missiles. Colonel Yurii Ihnat, head of communications for Ukrainian Air Force Command, said Russia used a total of 360 Banderol and Dan-T missiles in October.

Russia is also making extensive use of the Geran-5.

At the briefing on foreign components in Russian drones and missiles, Beskrestnov told Ukrainska Pravda that Russia makes about 700 Geran-5s a month. There are still no production figures for the Filin or S-71.

Russia plans to scale up production of the Dan-T to 14,000 next year, RBC-Ukraine reports. Increasing production serves several purposes.

It lets Russia use more high-speed jet-powered weapons, wear down the Ukrainian air defences tasked with intercepting cruise missiles and reduce its reliance on strategic aircraft for strikes.

A priority for Ukrainian weapons makers is therefore to develop a range of systems capable of shooting down both jet-powered drones and cruise missiles. The systems must be inexpensive and easy to produce.

Ukraine has unveiled several weapons of this kind this year. Ukrainska Pravda reported on two that Luch, a Ukrainian armaments design office, presented at the MSPO 2026 defence exhibition – the RK-19 anti-aircraft missile for the Osa surface-to-air missile system and a small missile based on the Barier anti-tank guided missile system. Another company unveiled a prototype of the Shershen multi-calibre air defence system. Newer teams are also playing an increasingly active role in developing anti-aircraft missiles.

Interceptor drones could also be used to shoot down small cruise missiles. Twenty-two teams are currently developing interceptors to counter jet-powered Geran drones. It is too early to say how many of these interceptors will be able to bring down faster small cruise missiles.

None of these solutions on their own, however, will be effective against the new threats Ukraine needs to keep strengthening its air defences by combining the use of interceptor drones, turrets, anti-aircraft guns, surface-to-air missile systems and aircraft. Kyiv's Western partners could also help develop affordable interception systems, especially given that some are already undergoing trials in Ukraine.

Strikes on Russian production facilities and pressure through sanctions matter too. Given Russia's dependence on foreign components, Ukraine needs to work to cut off those supplies or at least make them harder and more expensive to obtain.

 Illia Volynskyi

Translated by Artem Yakymyshyn

Edited by Susan McDonald