Russia’s TOS-1 Heavy Flamethrower Lobs Brutal Thermobaric Rockets At Close Range

Yesterday’s war news brought with it unconfirmed reports that Russia has deployed TOS-1 Heavy Flamethrower launchers to Ukraine. Mounted atop T-72 tanks, the launchers can unleash rockets with lung-searing thermobaric warheads from two miles away to just a quarter-mile down the street.

A senior U.S. defense official reportedly affirmed that Russia has sent TOS-1’s (nicknamed the “Buratino” after a long-nosed Tolstoy character) into Ukraine on Tuesday following a claim from Ukrainian ambassador to the U.S., Oksana Markarova, that Russian forces have used a “vacuum bomb” in Ukraine.

Russia is believed to have used thermobaric rockets in Chechnya in 2000, and more recently in Syria, while some analysts assert Russian-supported separatists in the Donbas region have used them in the past few years.

Contrary to a number of media reports, thermobaric weapons are not the same as fuel-air bombs or vacuum bombs. The Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation describes them as a subclass of volumetric weapons, a grouping that includes thermobaric weapons and fuel air explosives.

Thermobaric munitions employ a fuel container and two separate explosive charges. When a such weapon is dropped or launched, the first charge detonates to disperse the fuel particles. The second charge ignites the dispersed fuel and oxygen in the air, creating a blast wave of extreme pressure and heat that has the potential to reverberate and to create a partial vacuum in an enclosed space.

In such spaces, the blast and resulting vacuum (which sucks up surrounding oxygen) can last for longer than a conventional explosive. While blast effects are obvious, thermobaric devices can cause severe internal organ damage and asphyxiation.

The TOS-1 fires 220 mm rockets with two types of warheads: incendiary and thermobaric. According to data from Military-Today, the website of defense author Andrius Genys, the launcher system has 30 tubes (24 for an updated TOS-1A variant) and the ability to launch a single rocket or a pair of rockets within half-a-second. Full salvo duration is 7.5 to 15 seconds and covers an area of 650 by 1,300 feet. Later versions of the launcher increased rocket range to over 3.5 miles and can be fitted to 6X6 military trucks.

The thermobaric rockets that the Buratino fires are not precision weapons. They are designed for close-in engagements of the kind the Russian Army is likely to undertake in the days ahead, namely in urban firefights. In the apartment complexes, subway and government buildings of Kyiv they can be brutally effective, shielding Russian forces from the risky task of door-to-door combat and terrorizing the civilian populace in the process.

Their very introduction to the theater may be to make up for a deficit in Russian smart weapon stockpiles and training, according to some analysts. As the Center for Arms Control notes, there is a legal argument that thermobaric weapons may be prohibited under the United Nations Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons. However, they are not explicitly listed. Since the U.S. also keeps them in its inventory, the center asserts that “it is unlikely that they will be explicitly listed or that there will be a treaty banning their use.”

The attention on and possible use of thermobaric weapons (introduced in the 1960s) is a reminder that even limited war quickly degenerates into a low technology, personal and vicious fight when the combatants are determined or desperate. The mere presence of the Buratino is enough to demonstrate the levels of determination and desperation in Ukraine now.