Fearing Ukrainian UAV Attacks, Russia Installs ‘Cope Cage’ Atop Its Deadly TOS-1A Flamethrower MLRS

With the deployment of Russia’s deadly TOS-1A “Solntsepek” to the frontlines where intense combat is raging, Moscow has reportedly installed “cope cages” atop these flamethrower systems to minimize the impact of a potential enemy attack.

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On April 8, images showing these protective structures installed on the TOS-1A started appearing online. Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, tweeted a photograph of the system saying, “Even Russian TOS-1A Thermobaric MLRS are receiving roof screens.”

If reports in the Russian media are anything to go by, the enemies cannot escape the impact of the rockets fired by this system even in trenches, making it one of the most feared Russian weapon systems on the battlefield.

Since the beginning of the Russian offensive, these systems have been used to shell Ukrainian positions with devastating impact. The Russian armed forces attacked the Ukrainian positions with 220mm thermobaric shells. Vacuum bombs, known as thermobaric weapons, are two-stage munitions producing massive explosions.

A US-based defense expert, David Hambling, recently stated that the fastest method to neutralize this weapon system is to immediately locate them and destroy the launchers before they can fire. Hambling emphasized how vital these MLRS were to the Russian military, besides expressing concerns about the massive damage they can cause to Ukraine’s infrastructure.

According to the Oryxspioenkop OSINT organization, Ukraine has destroyed one, damaged another, and seized four of this series of MLRS.

It is understandable why Ukraine would wish to target them, given the deadly effects of these weapons, which launch rockets with thermobaric, or fuel-air explosive, warheads that absorb ambient oxygen to produce a high-temperature explosion.

Early in the conflict last year, a video published by the Security Service of Ukraine showed when a Ukrainian drone rammed into a TOS-1A just as the MLRS prepared to fire. With an uptick in the use of drones by Ukraine in recent months, the threat of drone attacks on one of these flamethrowers may never be off the table.

On its part, Russia likely knows that the Ukrainians would try to blow up this system to avert devastating attacks on their own positions. This explains why the Russian troops have used “cope cage” on the MLRS, despite the less-than-satisfactory combat record of these protective structures on Russian tanks.

Cope Cages Atop TOS-1A

Russia has thousands of tanks, MLRS, and armored vehicles that are all susceptible to attack from Ukrainian soldiers brandishing Javelins and other anti-armor weapons. Russia attempted to stay ahead of the issue before the escalation of its war in Ukraine by welding homemade slats to the top of some of its tanks.

However, weeks after the war started, it became evident that the unusual additions to Russian tanks dubbed “cope cages” did not seem to reduce Ukrainian munitions’ penetration power.

Cope cages, also called slat armor, bar armor, cage armor, and stand-off armor, are a unique defense employed in heavy military vehicles to lessen the damage brought on by high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) weaponry.

The first cope cages were spotted on Russian T-80 tanks marching into Crimea in November 2021. At the time, a viral TikTok video showed a Soviet-era T-80 tank trudging through the mud with its turret covered with what looked like a peculiar metal slat roof.

However, soon after, the Ukrainian forces started testing Javelins on static targets that were also caged in response. The outcomes did not bode well for the Russian forces in the following months, which saw Ukrainian ATGMs obliterating several Russian tanks, despite the cages installed on them.

A retired Maj. Gen. Patrick Donahoe, the former head of the Army’s Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning, Georgia, told EurAsian Times, “The use of slat armor or stand-off armor- has been around since at least World War 2. It has proven effective against High Explosive Anti-Tank (HEAT) warheads by either tearing the warhead apart or forcing early detonation and early forming of the molten jet that is used to penetrate the armored vehicle. These warheads are known as “shaped charges.” We’ve seen recent employment of these slat armor systems with the RPG Cages that were emplaced on Strykers in Iraq and Afghanistan. The use of dual tandem warheads in modern anti-tank missiles is a way to penetrate these stand-off armor systems and even “reactive” armor that explodes on contact to dissipate the molten jet. The Javelin is such a system.”