The bombs are equipped with guidance systems that allow them to be launched remotely from fighter jets. They are difficult to stop, and Russia has made them more powerful: the latest model weighs 6,600 pounds.

But Russia did not use the bombs on the same scale against Ukrainian troops who crossed the border into Russia earlier this month.

Mark Cancian, a retired Marine Corps colonel and senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Russia has not yet deployed large-scale air support or glider bombs against Ukrainian forces in Kursk.

“I think this is a sign of a weak air control system,” he said.

While the US and NATO have “very sophisticated mechanisms” and a “very extensive, well-trained system” between aircraft and a control center to ensure they don’t hit enemy aircraft, that is not the case for Russia.

The U.S. is “pretty good at it. The Russians are not,” Cancian said.

Cancian said Russia can make extensive use of glider bombs in Ukraine because the front is static and largely immobile, allowing Russia to get by with a weaker control system and less unintended damage.

He said Russia’s relative caution in Kursk “reflects their inability, their weakness in using air power to support ground forces.”

Not to scale

There have been some recorded cases of glider bombs in Kursk, but not on the same scale as elsewhere.

The Ukrainian military said Wednesday that Russia had fired 27 glide bombs into the region. It was unclear whether this was the total number or just one day.

In any case, it is a much smaller number than what Russia is reportedly firing at targets on Ukrainian territory. Russia used 750 glide bombs on Ukrainian towns and villages last week alone, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Sunday.

It is also fewer than the 50 glide bombs that Russia reportedly fires daily at Ukraine’s Sumy region, which borders Kursk.

“The Russians are hampered in one way, in that they cannot drop these fantastic glider bombs into Kursk as they have done in parts of Ukraine, particularly on the eastern front, because of course it is their own territory,” said Rajan Menon, a senior research fellow at Columbia University’s Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies.

“They will kill many people. Civilians.”

George Barros, a Russian military expert at the U.S. Institute for the Study of War, told BI that Russia has not yet used the bombs in Kursk on a “large scale.”

According to Barros, the Russian attacks in Ukraine have “completely wiped out entire neighborhoods and cities in the space of just a few days.”

“The Russians are absolutely not doing that in Kursk,” he added.

But as Ukraine continues its invasion, Russia’s risk calculations could change.

Russia has been dropping bombs on its territory and destroying its own weapons since invading Ukraine, including shooting down its own fighter jets.

But these were relatively isolated incidents and not something that resulted from a new strategy, such as the use of glide bombs at Kursk.

Barros said Russia fears the “political considerations” involved in attacking its own territory.

Meanwhile, Ukraine has begun deploying glide bombs against Russia in Kursk.

Zelenskyy said the raid is intended to create a “buffer zone” to minimize Russia’s ability to harm Ukraine.

However, war analysts also told BI that Ukraine likely wanted to expand Russian forces and give its troops and allies new motivation.

Barros said it was unclear how the fast-moving operation would end. But he said it had been positive for Ukraine so far after months of grueling warfare with little territory changing hands.

Ukrainians, he said, “are no longer stuck in a rut where they no longer have the initiative.”

“It is no longer the Ukrainians who lie on their backs for more than nine months and just do their best to sort out the patients,” he said.