On the Ozon e-commerce platform, one of the largest in Russia, offers appear for a manually launched “toy airplane” that replicates the design of the Iranian long-range drone — the same type of device that, last week, hit a nursery with 48 children in the city of Kharkiv, in northeastern Ukraine.
The replica of the suicide drones is recommended for children starting at three years old and is described as “an ideal gift for young patriots and future conquerors of the sky”, being presented as having benefits for the development of “coordination, precision, and imagination”.
On the site — sometimes called “Russia’s Amazon” — there is also a version intended for adults, equipped with a firework that explodes on impact. In the promotional videos included in the ads, a hand is seen launching the glider, and the firework placed at the top of it is activated on impact, mimicking the 30–50 kg explosive payload of a real Shahed drone.
Toys sold by “Stalin’s Hawks”
The model for children is listed at 351 rubles (3.29 pounds sterling), and the adult version at about 480 rubles (4.50 pounds sterling). The toys seem to be marketed as branded products of a Russian drone unit, called “Stalin’s Hawks”, a name inspired by the elite Russian fighter pilots from World War II and which uses the same realistic-socialist iconography with a nostalgic touch.
Details, HERE