Discover how Ukrainian hackers executed a modern-day Trojan Horse operation, turning Russia’s own BARS-Moscow air defense network against its crown jewel: the Su-57 stealth fighter. When Moscow’s advanced pride and joy was shot down just outside the capital, it exposed catastrophic cyber vulnerabilities, questionable stealth capabilities, and deep cracks in Russia's air defense. Watch the full breakdown to uncover how the war has finally come to Putin’s doorstep!
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NewsTranscript
00:00The Ukraine war has been an embarrassment for Russia's air force,
00:04already practically forced out of Ukraine itself following the loss of hundreds of planes and
00:09helicopters. That air force has been reduced to attacking from behind the lines.
00:20Even Russia's best fighter jet, the Su-57, has practically been a non-factor in the fighting.
00:28So Ukraine had a challenge on its hands. How do you take out an Su-57 when it's inside Russia?
00:35The answer is with a genius trick that made Russia shoot down its own fighter jet. A modern-day Trojan
00:42horse, this trick possessed Russian air defences into taking aim at the one thing they weren't
00:47supposed to shoot. As for the Su-57, let's just say it isn't flying anymore. The early reports were
00:54vague. On July 23, Euromiden Press said that a Russian fighter jet, then reported and later
01:00confirmed as an Su-57, had crashed in the Moscow blast. No casualties were reported as the pilot
01:07ejected and the jet didn't crash into a populated area. The incident occurred at 13.50 in the Odinsovo
01:14district, which lies about 65 kilometers west of Moscow and is close to Zvenigarod. Photos soon
01:21started making the rounds, showing the burning wreckage of the jet in the middle of a field.
01:25Russia kept its lips sealed. All it would say was that a combat trainer had crashed during an
01:31attempted takeoff that the pilot had ejected and there was no damage reported on the ground.
01:36Later came claims of a technical malfunction that had inflicted the jet, forcing a crash.
01:41Russia's investigative committee also opened a criminal case under legal statute that covers
01:46violations of flight preparation procedures and in-flight rules. The Su-57 that crashed was an
01:52interesting case. It appears likely that it was based at the Kubinka air base, which is the closest
01:57to Zvenigarod, being just 30 kilometers to the southwest of the settlement. Russia uses this base
02:03for evaluation and demonstration flights, and it's also home to the Swifts and Russian Knights aerobatic
02:08teams. From this base, Russia likes to showcase its supposedly fifth-generation fighter,
02:13as well as conduct tests. Most other Su-57s are nowhere near this base. They have been withdrawn
02:19to Diomgyi Air Base, which is so deep in the Russian Far East that it's about 5,000 kilometers
02:25away from the combat lines in Ukraine. That's humiliating enough for Russia. It's having to
02:30keep its best fighter jet as far away from Ukraine because of its fear of drones. Now Russia has lost
02:36one
02:36of the few Su-57s that are within Ukraine's range. Was it a drone that did the damage? Did the
02:41Russian
02:42fighter experience the technical malfunction that Russia claims? As it turns out, neither.
02:47Something far more embarrassing happened. A friendly fire incident that has Ukraine's fingerprints
02:53all over it. The rumors soon started to swirl, and they went against the grain of Russia's claims
02:59that a more technical fault in one of the most advanced fighter jets in the world had downed the
03:03Su-57 just outside of Moscow. And it wasn't Ukraine that started the rumors. Russian military
03:09bloggers were among the first to start picking holes in the Russian Defense Ministry's story.
03:13A blogger named Romanov was one of the first to start asking what really happened,
03:18posting to Telegram alongside a picture of the downed jet. A number of questions must be put to
03:24the bar's Moscow air defense crew. Another military blogger named Arrowsmap outright stated that the Su-57
03:31had been shot down by Russia's own air defenses, and openly speculated that a crew using a shoulder-fired
03:37missile launcher may have done the damage. The plot started to thicken. Though questions started to
03:43be asked, the Russian military bloggers also pointed out that Russia has a quandary on its hands.
03:48So a friendly fire incident may have been recorded, and that's bad. But it would be even worse to pull
03:53the Su-57 still near Moscow away. That would be a nightmare for the city's air defenses. And it's not
03:59like the traditional air defenses can go either. Losing them leaves Moscow exposed, and that city,
04:04along with the surrounding territory, already has plenty to deal with when it comes to Ukrainian
04:09drone strikes over the past few months. These rumors turned attention toward the BARS Moscow air
04:14defenses. As Aerospace Global News reports, BARS stands for Combat Army Reserve, which tells us that
04:20Russia is using reservists among its air defenses. Specifically, private militia groups and civilian
04:25volunteers have been working around Moscow, most armed with manned portable air defense systems,
04:30or manpads, to shoot down low-flying drones. Another wrinkle to the story.
04:35The loss of Russia's Su-57 evolved from a technical fault downing the jet to a reservist taking aim at
04:41the Su-57 with manpads and shooting it down. As it turned out, BARS Moscow seems to have played a
04:47role.
04:47But there's more to it than a panicked reservist firing at an Su-57. What seemed at first to be
04:53a
04:53malfunction and then a mistake is actually so much more worrying for Putin and his cronies. What happened at
04:59Odintsovo was neither. This was a case of possession, of Ukraine taking over control of
05:05Russia's air defenses like the Trojan horse sneaking into Troy and then unleashing them on one of the
05:10most valuable fighter jets in Russia's arsenal. It may have been Russian air defenses that shot the
05:15Su-57 down, but it was Ukraine that took aim. That's according to InformNapal. The Telegram channel,
05:23which is a military analysis and investigation channel that uses a combination of human, cyber,
05:28and open source intelligence to expose what really happens in military operations, says that this
05:33wasn't a case of Russian error at all. Instead, Ukraine pulled off an ingenious trick against Russia
05:39and it used a small army of hackers to get the job done. As a result of a complex cognitive
05:46influence and cybernetic invention, it was possible to influence the work of the air defense calculation
05:51of the Bars Moscow formation and turn the Russian air defense circuit into a tool for defeating its
05:57own aircraft, the channel reported. What followed was an interesting analysis of what really happened
06:02to Russia's Su-57. InformNapalm says that the story actually starts on July 17th, which is when the
06:09channel revealed that it was processing a new collection of materials that had been intercepted
06:14from the Russian occupiers. Among those materials were video streams of the very training ground from which the
06:20doomed Su-57 launched, which revealed that Russia was training its Bars Moscow crew on how to intercept
06:26long-range Ukrainian drones. InformNapalm didn't keep those intercepted materials to itself.
06:31It transferred them, along with an analytical note, to the relevant components of the defense
06:36forces of Ukraine. That note was a document providing data on the personnel training procedures
06:41Russia had in place, alongside combat algorithms, the hardware and software used,
06:46and potential vulnerabilities in the Bars Moscow air defense system. In other words,
06:51InformNapalm handed over the keys to the Kubinka air base castle. Ukraine started work on using those
06:57keys to unlock the base's air defenses. The information received was not only to observe the enemy.
07:03Approaches were found that allowed influencing the work of one of the Bars Moscow calculations and using
07:08the system created by the Russians against the Russian target, InformNapalm reports. Soon after,
07:14an Su-57 crashed into a field near the base. The victim of friendly fire that appears to
07:20have been caused by Ukrainian hackers taking control over an air defense system that is supposed to
07:25protect Moscow. This was a technical malfunction all right, but it was a malfunction that Moscow
07:30isn't going to reveal anytime soon. The Su-57 was flying fine. It was the air defenses that were supposed
07:37to protect the jet and everything surrounding it that went haywire. Russia just lost an aircraft that is
07:43reported to cost somewhere around the $100 million mark because it wasn't able to protect its cyber
07:48systems from Ukrainian hackers. Those hackers found a way in. They manipulated the Bars Moscow system,
07:54and in a flash, Russia's best fighter jet was hit. That's the real story here. But this is also where
08:00things start to get interesting, because behind this very real issue that Russia has with protecting
08:05its cyber systems against Ukrainian hackers lies a much bigger problem. An issue that reveals how
08:10pathetic Russia's air force really is and sheds light on the reality that lies behind what Putin
08:16has claimed to be the best fighter jet in the world. Before we dig deeper into all of that,
08:20this is a reminder that you are watching The Military Show. We reveal the stories behind the headlines.
08:26If you are getting insight from the channel, make sure you hit subscribe and activate notifications
08:31so you can see more of our videos as they are published.
08:35Let's start with Russia's dead planes. So, so many dead planes. The Su-57 that Ukraine just
08:42manipulated Russian air defenses into shooting down is the latest in a long line of fighter jets,
08:47bombers, spy planes and choppers that Russia has lost in its invasion of Ukraine. In fact,
08:53this kill comes in the wake of a recent incident where Ukraine managed to score an air-to-air kill
08:57against a Russian Su-35 flanker using an F-16. That isn't supposed to be possible. The Su-35
09:05should defeat the F-16 in a straight fight, but it failed. It's almost looking like Russia's claims
09:10about its fighter jets can't be backed up in real combat situations. More on that in the context of the
09:16Su-57 later. According to Ukraine's Ministry of Finance, Russia has now lost 439 planes and 354
09:24helicopters since Putin launched his invasion. If you're looking for the answers as to why Russia
09:29hasn't used its massive air force, which Global Firepower reports maintains 4,237 assets,
09:362,754 of which are combat ready, then this is your answer. Ukraine just keeps on shooting Russian
09:42aerial assets down, whether they're in Ukraine or hiding away inside Russia. The Su-57 that now
09:48burns in a Moscow field isn't even the first that Russia lost in its war.
09:53Back in June 2024, Ukraine was able to damage a pair of them using drones in an attack at the
09:58Akhtubinsk airbase. And in the spring of 2026, Ukrainian drones reached the Shargol base near the
10:05Urals, taking out another pair of Su-57s, alongside an Su-34 and another unnamed fighter jet made by Shukhoi.
10:13This isn't even the first time that Russia has shot down its own aircraft, albeit it's definitely a
10:18first in terms of the confirmed manipulation of Russian air defenses by Ukrainian hackers.
10:23A not insignificant number of Russia's aerial losses have occurred due to Russian air defenses
10:28taking aim at their own aircraft. Aerospace Global News reports that the number of its own aircraft that
10:34Russia has downed is unconfirmed, but it's likely greater than 10. We know for sure that Russia itself
10:39has blamed friendly fire on several incidents, including a pair of A-50U mainstay
10:44AEW and C aircraft shoot-downs. Though whether that's a case of the Kremlin preferring friendly
10:49fire stories over admitting that Ukraine has successfully conducted a strike remains to be seen.
10:55Late 2024 saw Russian air defenses shoot down Azerbaijan Flight 8243M Briar 190 over southern Russia.
11:03This incident apparently took place during a Ukrainian drone attack, so air defenses were
11:08definitely active. Russia also hit an Aeroflop plane as it flew from Belarus in July 2025,
11:14though that plane managed to still land safely in Moscow after taking flak fire.
11:19Euromiden Press adds more to the friendly fire casualty count. An Su-27 flying over occupied Crimea went
11:26down to Russia's own fire in March 2024. In 2023 over Tokmak, Russians killed one of their own Su-27s,
11:33Su-35 pilots using an S-300 air defense system. And near Moscow, Russian air defenses opened fire
11:39against the country's own helicopters in 2025 after mistaking those choppers for drones.
11:44It's almost as though Ukraine didn't need to hack the Bars Moscow air defenses at all.
11:49Wait long enough and poor coordination between Russian air defense crews and aviators would have
11:54done the job for them. Then we come to Russia's Su-57 and a question that we haven't asked yet.
11:59How did Bars Moscow manage to take the jet down? We don't mean this in terms of the hacking. The
12:05Su-57
12:06is supposed to be a fifth generation stealth fighter that is on par with US airframes like the F-35
12:12and
12:12F-22. Putin even said it himself, the Su-57 is supposed to be the best fighter jet in the
12:19world.
12:19If Russia's claims are accurate, the jet should have barely shown up on air defense radars at all,
12:24making it practically impossible for Bars Moscow to take it down. That leaves us to draw one of two
12:29conclusions. The first is that Bars Moscow is so effective that it's able to take out one of
12:34the world's best and stealthiest fighter jets. Russia wouldn't mind that conclusion, but it's
12:39a little difficult to make this claim when we have seen Ukraine score hit after hit in the Moscow region
12:44over the past couple of months using its drones. If Bars Moscow really is as effective as this
12:49incident of forced friendly fire makes it seem, Moscow should be a hell of a lot safer than it
12:54is right now. The second conclusion is the more interesting of the two. The Su-57 may not be all
13:01that Moscow claims it to be. As Global Defense Corps puts it, the downing of this aircraft by a Soviet
13:07era missile system again proves that the aircraft is in no way a stealth fifth generation aircraft.
13:13Note the use of the word again. This is hardly the first time that questions have been raised about
13:18the Su-57 and its supposed stealth capabilities. Back in December 2022, the Aviation Geek Club
13:24released a damning report that revealed that Su-57s, despite being marketed to potential buyers
13:30as stealth fighters, aren't even close to their American equivalents. The outlet revealed that both
13:35the F-22 and F-35 have a radar cross-section or RCS that is between 1,000 and 10
13:42,000 times smaller
13:43than the Su-57s. Even the retired F-117, which was developed in the 1970s and is the first operational
13:51stealth aircraft, has a much smaller RCS than the Su-57. There are all sorts of reasons for this,
13:58from the weapons being carried on the outside of the Su-57 to the jet being little more than an
14:02upgraded version of the Su-27. But what it all boils down to is that Russia is incapable of building
14:08a
14:08stealth fighter jet. Sure, it will claim that it can, but the Su-57's RCS isn't an accident. It's what
14:14Russia aimed to achieve, and it's still nowhere close to true stealth. This is just humiliation
14:20after humiliation for Moscow at this point. An Su-57 crashed, that's bad enough. Then it was revealed
14:26that Russia's own air defenses took the jet down. And after that, we learned that Ukrainian hackers
14:31Trojan horsed their way into Russia's air defense system. And to top it all off, an Su-57 isn't even
14:36supposed to be detectable by the very defenses that took it down. Russia's supposed best in the world
14:42fighter jet has just been exposed. Replacing this lost fighter jet isn't going to be easy for Russia.
14:48Global Defense Corps says that Russia's air force is believed to have only about three dozen Su-57s in
14:54service, and the Kremlin has been struggling to build more, likely as a result of Western sanctions.
14:59Russia has also been trying to sell Su-57s, though the only recorded sale made so far is to Algeria.
15:06There won't be many more sales made after Ukraine just exposed the Su-57 for what it really is,
15:11an updated fourth-generation fighter jet that can't even hide away from air defense systems
15:16made decades ago. Take a moment to think about what the people of Moscow must be thinking right now.
15:21Their region is under attack. Ukraine's drones have been flying, and it's clear that even the
15:26mass of air defense systems that have been arranged around Moscow aren't doing enough to stop them.
15:31Ukraine has hit the Moscow region several times in 2026, including a strike in late June that
15:37targeted a satellite center in the oblast. Ukraine's drones have also been on a rampage
15:42against a company called Wildberries, which is often referred to as Russia's version of Amazon,
15:48and has a nice sideline in selling drones, military gear, and dual-use components.
15:54Muscovites who use wild berries, from consumers purchasing products to business owners who rely
15:58on the service to make money, are panicking as warehouses burn and billions of dollars of
16:04inventory have gone up in smoke. Those living in Moscow are also only being spared from the fuel
16:09crisis that wracks Russia right now because fuel is being rerouted to Moscow from Siberia, Reuters reports.
16:15That half-measure can only work for so long before Muscovites find themselves in hours-long queues at
16:21the gas stations, just like the rest of the Russian population that doesn't happen to live in Putin's
16:25gilded city. Now they're having to watch Moscow's air defenses fail so badly that they're shooting
16:31down ultra-modern fighter jets that Putin has told them are the best jets in the world. What must
16:36those people be thinking right now? The war that Putin started hasn't just come to their doorstep,
16:40it's becoming increasingly clear that Ukraine is only getting stronger. The drones prove that.
16:46But now Ukraine has the ability to hack into Russian air defenses, forcing them to fire on
16:51their own equipment. Could that happen again? If it does, what will Ukraine force those defenses to
16:56target next? Those have to be the questions swirling around in the minds of Muscovites who can see,
17:01clearer than ever before, that their great protector Putin can't shield them from a thing.
17:06That's just what Ukraine wants. The remarkable possession of Russian air defenses around
17:11Moscow is a brilliant trick, and it's produced a devastating result for an Su-57. But it's the
17:16message that Ukraine sent with this Trojan horse that is even more valuable. Every day, Putin's war
17:22creeps closer to the doorsteps of those living in the one city that was supposed to be untouchable.
17:26How much longer are Muscovites going to take this before they start asking serious questions about
17:31their president and the state of the military that he has created?
17:35As Russian air defenses turn against their own in Moscow, Russians in Belgorod have a much different
17:40problem. Putin's war was brought to their doorstep years ago, and just a few days before Russia's Su-57
17:46catastrophe was revealed, Ukraine pulled off a strike for the ages. A Belgorod dam has been breached,
17:52the flooding has disrupted everything, and there's an unexpected yet brilliant military purpose for
17:57this attack that you can learn about if you watch our video. Plus, if you enjoyed this video, we have
18:01plenty more waiting for you on the military show. Hit subscribe today to make sure you're among the
18:06first to see what we have coming next, and thank you for watching.
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