“Kerch Bridge Destruction Will Happen on Zelenskyy’s Order”: Interview with a Ferrata Fighter

25.08.2026, 02:04 uatv.ua

SENSATIONAL EXCLUSIVE WITH A WARRIOR OF THE MAIN INTELLIGENCE DIRECTORATE: RUSSIA WON’T LIKE THE ARSENAL OF CUTTING-EDGE WEAPONS THAT UKRAINE TODAY POSSESSES AND DEVELOPS! Direct words from a legendary frontline commander about the future defeat of the occupiers!

In an extensive exclusive interview, the commander of the “Black Sea Legion” naval detachment of the FERRATA active operations unit of the Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense, with the callsign “Ninth,” frankly spoke about how Ukraine is outpacing the enemy on the battlefield thanks to unique domestic technologies.

— I suggest we start our conversation with this interceptor drone right here. Just before we started recording our interview, I learned that this is already a model capable of shooting down jet-powered Shaheds, which the Russian Federation has been actively using to attack all of Ukraine over the last few weeks.

— Yes. Naturally, all technologies are advancing — in some areas we’re leading, in others they’re leading, and we adapt. It’s an arms race.

— The reason I’m bringing this up is, the Russians have stockpiled a huge number of regular Shaheds — the propeller ones, right?

— Yes. They’re often called mopeds, Gerans, and so on.

— But now they’ve shifted their focus to the jet-powered ones. Considering that Ukraine was supposedly having a harder time shooting them down, do I understand correctly that the process is now so fast — meaning, from the task to the completion of that task and its practical application? What has changed here, if it can be discussed publicly?

— Absolutely correct. The speed has been improved here accordingly — based on this, the speed is being improved in a specific way. I believe that in this process, it’s necessary to move two steps ahead. The fact that the speed here has increased, reaching 400-plus kilometers an hour — that’s the second step in this process, and no one is saying we aren’t working on the third step. So now the second step will be released, they’ll learn how to counter it after some period of time, and we’ll come out with a new release, with something else. We know in advance, as far as we can talk about it now. I don’t want to exaggerate the significance of these developments, because, as practice shows, you also need to know the enemy, and the enemy shouldn’t be underestimated.

— Absolutely — in the matter of protecting the Ukrainian sky, to what extent is Ukraine, perhaps, a leader right now? Again, I’m a journalist, and I only compare — for example, the NATO alliance, about which I’ve had a lot of questions lately, considering how easily their airspace — with F-35s in Poland, with F-16s in other NATO alliance countries — how easily drones and missiles and so on fly into it. To what extent, what place does Ukraine specifically have here, in protecting the sky? Your position on this is interesting.

— My opinion is that, you know, when we are practitioners, we essentially have a problem, and we solve it. Based on this, we don’t pay attention to, you know, NATO countries, but rather move within the framework of what our people need, so they can stay at home calmly, sleep, rest, and pay less attention to the air raid sirens. To the extent that it’s possible for us, it’s working out. I think with each passing year we’ll only get stronger, because we’ve learned how to fight against these threats effectively — from the perspective of interceptors, which is clearly evidenced by the interest of the Western audience, and people, in interceptors.

You know, based on this, these aren’t our only aces up our sleeve. As I said in one of the interviews, that Ukraine has aces up its sleeve — it’s precisely here that we have all the other trump cards that will be released in the process of our actions in the coming years. Who would have thought, right, that once, in the Oval Office, it was said to Ukraine, from the lips of JD Vance, “You have no trump cards.” But it turns out we do. This, by the way, is one of the aces, I’d put it that way.

— They actually included that little clip in the interview — I don’t remember which one, the Americans, Business Insider, included that clip — and I was, like, given an interview, where I said, “You think we don’t have any cards up our sleeve? Any cards?” I showed them pirate cards. Not just cards — whole decks.

— Yeah, yeah, yeah. The point of the situation is — let me add, let me finish — the fact that we have interceptors is one of the ways to combat one of the types of weapons being used against us. And the next stage is that we have a sufficient number of people working on missile programs that will allow us to ensure security, in the near future, against the tactical weapons being used against us.

— Well, that’s the Freya project, I understand, right? Which President Zelenskyy talks about a lot.

— Not only that. A lot — not only that, a lot.

— That’s good. That means there are ideas. Let’s also talk about the sea — the Black Sea region — because it’s a very relevant topic right now.

— President Zelenskyy is also talking about this — the harvest season. There’s a lot of grain that needs to be exported. The railway won’t be able to handle it — according to my data, 15 to 20% is all Ukraine can export by rail, the rest has to be exported by ships. The Russian Federation, and its terrorists, attack grain carriers — it couldn’t care less that food is necessary for other countries as well, including those in the Middle East. President Zelenskyy has set the task of ensuring the safety, the uninterrupted passage of vessels. How successful is that being?

— Right now there are quite a number of different projects currently working in this specific area. This includes the Catherine project (ph), as well as these specialized interceptors, which will ultimately allow foreign vessels to safely arrive at Ukrainian ports and make it back out again, for the safest possible unloading process. There are mobile groups working to ensure security in the Odesa ports. And right now, actually, a very important event is taking place: an echeloned defense against enemy missiles and Shaheds is being built along the Black Sea coast.

— And how much of a challenge is there here? After all, Ukraine does have a navy, right, but it’s not comparable to the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation. To what extent can USVs be a kind of replacement, or a supplement — a powerful supplement?

— It’s very important to understand here which navy we’re talking about. If we’re talking about all the well-known vessels, the standard ones, into which the enemy has invested millions, billions, of its money — that’s one type of navy. From the point of view of our navy, and from the point of view of using our USV technologies, which are, after all, leading — which can be evidenced by the fact that Russian Federation helicopters no longer fly calmly over the sea, planes don’t fly over the sea, and their ships don’t sail calmly in our waters — we can confirm that our strategy of unmanned systems is leading over their heavy, expensive fleet.

You just need to understand the specifics of the two countries. If the Russian Federation is a large, massive state and needs a very large fleet, including nuclear ones, then from Ukraine’s point of view, we need a vessel that can restore order in certain operational sectors — which we’ve already confirmed. Accordingly, our fleet has its own specifics, which have proven their effectiveness, and which are of interest to the Baltic countries, who are expecting threats from the Russian Federation, and other states that are smaller than the Russian Federation.

— But big ships — they’re vulnerable, aren’t they? We can see this perfectly well with the Russian fleet.

— That’s right — we’re talking about the big ones, and we’re talking in comparison with USVs, unmanned surface vessels.

— As far as I understand, the Ukrainian unmanned vessels are constantly evolving — new modifications and new forms are constantly being invented. You’ve mentioned a lot, including, just now, the so-called “mother” USVs — figuratively speaking, which transport them to a certain point, sail to a certain point, and from there drones take off. To what extent does this exist now, and is it effective?

— We use them constantly. It’s not to say I’m some kind of soothsayer — it just turned out that I hit a period of time with certain feelings, and they became reality. At one point we had these kamikazes that were destroying ships, right? I realized the kamikazes are kamikazes, but we needed to make a group of drones that would allow us to carry something unmanned, something we could reach faster — right now these are FPV drones, fixed-wing type drones. And that’s how it turned out. Then came the interceptors, then came the missiles. And where this will lead, only God knows. I think all of this will eventually go underwater.

— I have a feeling it will too — just some predictions. Yeah, it’ll go underwater — an inspection of the cruiser Moskva. You’re hinting at that, right?

— No — it’ll go underwater to appear, destroy, and go back underwater, disappearing in an unknown direction.

— That’s some inside info coming from you.

— Yeah, for some reason that’s just what I envisioned.

— But do I understand correctly that there’s a lot of development going on right now that can’t be spoken about publicly yet?

— That’s always the case. We have one peculiarity, because we’re a smaller power — we have a peculiarity in that we have to put some of our developments on display, in order to get some help in promoting them, to show their effectiveness. Actually, we’re still proponents of the idea that the most delicious, richest stuff should be saved for later — for the enemy — so that after a series of uses, they could realize what it was. That’s why we don’t talk about a lot of things.

— But the Russians are also keeping an eye on Ukrainian developments, aren’t they? As far as I know, they’re already activel