A video is being widely circulated on the social networks and through various media outlets, where Minister of Defence of the Republic of Armenia David Tonoyan, speaking about the Israeli-made UAVs, disputes their effectiveness and in parallel with his speech, a footage is shown of how the opponent’s UAVs strike the combat equipment and personnel of the Armenian Armed Forces.

The mentioned video is an obvious information manipulation, since in the shooting of 2016, David Tonoyan who was first Deputy Minister of Defence of Armenia at that time spoke about the Israeli-made, mainly Harop type "kamikaze" UAVs used against the Armenian forces during the combat operations of April 2016, while under his words, the completely different striking UAVs of Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 type used in 2020 are shown. In other words, David Tonoyan spoke about one type of armament in 2016 and in the circulating video his words are attributed to a completely different type of armament used 4 years later, which, by the way, appeared in the armament of Azerbaijan just before the war against Artsakh until September of 2020.

There is a huge technological-practical difference between Harop used in 2016 and Bayraktar TB2 UAVs used in 2020 and it is absolutely unacceptable to attribute the comments given to one type of armament to a completely different type. The Israeli-made Harop type UAVs used in 2016 are easy to detect, especially because of the high noise of the engine, which can be heard over a long distance, which allows the personnel to take cover before the blow and at the same time to target them.

While the Bayraktars operate at an incomparably high altitude and their detection is much more difficult. The Israeli-made Harops were relatively easily detected and hit by the Armenian air defence units during both the 2016 and 2020 combat operations. In particular, during the 2020 combat operations, around 200 Israeli-made Harop UAVs were hit by the Armenian air defence units. Meanwhile, the detection and destruction of the Turkish-made Bayraktars are incomparably difficult due to their completely different technological characteristics. But even in that case, the Armenian forces managed to destroy a considerable amount of Bayraktar TB2 UAVs, as a result of which the opponent, in some cases, had to stop their flights altogether.

The Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Armenia considers such manipulations to be categorically unacceptable, attributing them to the extremely dangerous programs of attacking the reputation of the army and calls the society and mass media to refrain from spreading such cheap tricks.