For four years Ukraine has fought an air war essentially blind above a certain altitude, relying on ground-based radar that cannot see over the horizon and cannot move quickly when it is targeted.
On 5 September the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence confirmed something that had been strongly suspected for months: a Swedish-supplied ASC 890 airborne early warning aircraft has been flying combat missions over Ukraine since March.
It is a converted regional airliner with a rectangular box bolted above the fuselage. It is also, arguably, the single most consequential aircraft Ukraine has received. […]
The six-person crew includes a mission control officer, a combat control operator and a surveillance operator, which tells you the aircraft is meant to direct a fight as well as watch one. It sees Russian aircraft, cruise missiles and drones a long way out, and passes that picture to fighters and ground-based air defences. Läs artikel