South Korea, a global leader in tank and armored combat vehicle production, has started integrating advanced protective systems to defend against drones.
These are cage armor and mesh screens, which are similar in principle to the solutions widely used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces on armored vehicles, News.Az reports, citing foreign media.
The corresponding protective elements were spotted on Korean main battle tanks during training and testing in winter conditions.
The structures are installed above the turret and partially above the engine and transmission compartment and are designed to reduce the effectiveness of FPV strike drones and top-attack munitions.
However, the current implementation is far from optimal — the grids have limited rigidity, complex geometry, and potentially complicate access to the turret equipment.
The question of integrating such solutions with active protection systems, optoelectronic devices, and weapons also remains open.
In Ukrainian practice, such designs have evolved from improvised solutions to relatively standardized schemes adapted to specific types of threats.
It was combat experience in Ukraine that demonstrated the critical need to protect the upper hemisphere of armored vehicles in conditions of mass use of cheap strike drones.
Despite its shortcomings, the very fact that South Korea has moved in this direction indicates systemic changes in approaches to the survivability of armored vehicles on the modern battlefield, according to some military analysts.
