Chinese tech secretly fuels Russian bomb and drone upgrades
Russian UMPK kits, which turn regular bombs into guided glide bombs, use components imported by bypassing sanctions. Although the trail initially seemed to lead to Taiwan, further investigations revealed that companies from China were collaborating with the Russians.
An investigation conducted by the InformNapalm group led to documents related to servo drives from the Taiwanese company TRC. Following their publication in the media, experts on sanctions and the Taiwanese public became involved in the matter. Vadym Labas explained in an extensive Facebook post that further facts had been uncovered, casting a completely new light on the whole issue.
Chinese companies are cooperating with Russia
The Taiwanese company TRC turns out to be a victim in this situation. In reality, the manufacturer of servo drives intended for the Russians was the Chinese factory KST Digital Technology Limited.
A special scheme for transferring equipment to Russia was developed, where the crucial stages involved selling the produced servo drives to the fictitious Chinese company Kaiffeng Zhendaqian Technology (KZT), which then passed them to another fictitious company from China (UNIHUI INTERNATIONAL LIMITED). Here, illegal rebranding occurred to "impersonate" Taiwanese TRC.
Chinese servo drives in Russian bombs and drones
Vadym Labas noted that such a scheme is also used in other transactions that Russia seeks to conceal.
The latest investigation also covers the Chinese factory KST Digital Technology Limited, which supplies Russia with components needed to produce Shahed kamikaze drones. These were initially ordered from Iran but have been produced in Russia for several months now. In 2024, at least 10,000 Shahed drones might be produced in Putin's country. The drones, measuring about 11 feet in length, can carry loads of up to 88 pounds and accelerate to approximately 115 mph.
UMPK kits (Unified Set of Planning and Correction Modules), which can be used on FAB-500, FAB-1500, and FAB-3000 bombs, are even more significant for the Russians. These kits allow the conversion of a regular bomb into a guided glide bomb with much greater capabilities. This solution resembles the American JDAM-ER conversion kits.
