As usual, information about it varies according to the source, but it’s fairly clear that on the night of 20-21 February 2026, Zelensky/NATO fired 6 ot 7 of these long rage missile using coordinates supplied by the CIA, of which only 1 evaded being shot down.
The target was the Votkinsk Machine Building Plant, a strategic defense industrial facility located in the Republic of Udmurtia, some 1,300 km from the Russian-Ukrainian border. The missile, equipped with a 1,000-kg warhead, struck a building housing Workshop 19, which houses a critical electroplating and stamping workshop. It is here that Russian technicians carry out the metal stamping and forming processes related to the manufacture of missile body elements, as well as the galvanic processing of parts, including the application of protective and functional coatings and surface preparation for further assembly.
Workshop 19 is said to play a fundamental role in the manufacture of some of Russia’s most strategically vital ballistic missiles. The Flamingo’s warhead blasted a 30-by-24-meter hole in the roof of the structure, setting its interior on fire. At least 11 workers were wounded in the attack.
A 1-tonne warhead is big one and it’s surprising it didn’t cause more damage than it did. It’s likely that because the complex was built in Soviet times with lots of redundancy incorporated, the damage will be repaired within about 5-6 weeks and won’t make a major impact on the missile production needed to defeat the Nazis in Ukraine.
Other points about Zelensky’s missile:
- It shares a design with the British-Emirati firm Milanion Group, which has marketed the FP-5 internationally. Additionally, Ukraine has planned a rocket fuel plant in Denmark to support the program.
- Although British designed, approximately 90% of the final assembly occurs within Ukraine across dozens of secret, dispersed locations to prevent destruction by Russian strikes.
- To keep costs low (estimated cost is $US 500,000 per unit), the missile utilizes refurbished Soviet-era AI-25TL turbofan engines salvaged from old L-39 trainer aircraft and scrapyards.
- Production scaled from one unit per day in August 2025 to a claimed target of roughly 200 units per month by early 2026, though Russian strikes on production lines have occasionally disrupted this pace [200 would cost $100 million, so Winston Peters’ $US 5 million donation to Zelensky won’t go far].
The ones Zelensky/NATO fired last week from launch positions deep within Ukrainian territory used complex flight paths designed to evade air defenses and likely traveled between 1,600 and 1,650 km.
This operation demonstrates that Zelensky/NATO have not only achieved parity in long-range precision strikes but may have exceeded the publicly acknowledged combat ranges of Russia’s 3M14 Kalibr, which previously recorded a 1,500 km flight during strikes on Syria in 2015.
