IDEX 2025 – First international appearance for Russian Forpost-RE UAV

IDEX 2025 – First international appearance for Russian Forpost-RE UAV


The Forpost-RE medium-range unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was presented for the first time in the Middle East during IDEX 2025 on the JSC Rosboronexport booth. In previous years, Russia had never exhibited the Forpost abroad, since it was an Israeli Searcher II UAV, manufactured under license by the Ural Civil Aviation Plant (UZGA)

However, since then, only the external airframe has remained from the first version of the aircraft. According to the company the Forpost-R UAV is now an absolutely new and fully Russian aircraft design, in which all imported components, key units, control systems, communications and navigation have been replaced.

The payload includes replaceable load modules with a thermal imaging camera, a colour video camera on a gyrostabilized rotating platform, a photo camera and other equipment. It can also be fitted with EW sensors to provide radiofrequency monitoring of the area.

Since 2015, the Forpost has been used in Syria as a reconnaissance UAV, and since 2022 it has been actively used in the Ukrainian theatre of military operations as a reconnaissance and strike UAV.

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As EDR On-Line learned from a representative of the UZGA, the Forpost in the strike version can carry guided missiles or gliding bombs for engaging both stationary and moving targets, including armoured vehicles. The model visible at IDEX featured two hardpoints under each wing, carrying what looked like four KAB-20 guided munitions.

According to the representative of the aircraft plant, the UAV developers are expanding the combat capabilities of the Forpost by improving its design and installing new payloads, including new airborne weapons. In the near future, for example, it will be modified to carry loitering munitions.

The Forpost-R can also be fitted with electronic equipment allowing it to act as a radio relay, increasing the communications range of units deployed on the ground. A version of the UAV equipped with an onboard radar has been created for battlefield monitoring, allowing to search land targets, pick-up moving targets, and designate targets to the profit not only of land-based effectors but also naval ones.

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The Forpost has a classical architecture, with the fuselage carrying a high wing, an internal combustion engine being located at the back, a two-blade pushing propeller providing the thrust. A twin tail boom carries the tailplane with two vertical stabilisers. It is fitted with a fixed tricycle landing gear. According to available information the Forpost-R has a 500 kg maximum take-off mass, it is 6.9 metres and has a 10.5 metres wingspan. It can fly up to 18 hours with a ceiling of 20,000 ft.

The version exhibited at IDEX 2025 was the Fornpost-RE, where typically for Russian equipment the “E” stands for Export. No details were provided on differences between the system in service with the Russian Army and that proposed to other nations. However comparing the model seen at Abu Dhabi with the Fornpost-R seen at Army 2024, the latter seemed to be equipped with a four-blade propeller, and featured a series of EW payloads and antennas that were missing on the mock-up exhibited in the Middle East that should be representative of the export version.

Photos by N. Novichkov

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