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As Russia and Ukraine engage in war, a photo of Mary Magdalene holding a Javelin, an anti-tank missile launcher, in her arms, has caught the attention on social media. In the photo, Mary Magdalene, styled as in Eastern Orthodox church paintings, is wearing a green robe and her halo is bright red. Further, the image hailed as St. Javelin has become the face of Ukraine's resistance to the ongoing war.
A website with the same name has been launched to raise funds to support Ukraine. The website is selling clothes, flags and stickers with the icon.
Designed by the US defence firms in the late 1980s, this lightweight weapon (approximately 50 pounds) can be fired by soldiers and does not require a millie launcher.
Javelin is a “shoot and scoot" weapon, meaning you don’t have to stick around to guide it to its target once fired. This allows soldiers to get out of the way of possible return fire from their target, a report by VICE said.
Ukraine would probably not be able to take on the Russian without the Javelin.
Armored vehicles and tanks are typically weakest at the top. Much of the armor and anti-missile protections exist on the sides and the Javelin cuts right through all of it by flying above and crashing down with explosive force. The reusable CLU also doubles as a thermal imaging and night vision system when separated from the missile, a nice piece of equipment in its own right, the VICE report said.
Ukraine's defence ministry has claimed that until February 26, the Russian forces have lost 3,500 soldiers, 102 tanks, 536 armoured vehicles, 15 artillery pieces, 14 fighter jets, 8 helicopters, one BUK-1 system.
Ukraine first bought the missiles in 2018 from the United States as part of a $47 million dollar military purchase.
As situations heated up ahead of the invasion at the end of 2021, Ukranian used the weapon against Russian-backed separatists. Several videos of the same circulated on the internet.
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