Media Representation of the Bayraktar TB2 in «The New York Times»: Thematic Contexts and Coverage Dynamics
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17721/2522-1272.2026.88.10Keywords:
media representation, «The New York Times», Bayraktar TB2, drones, media, social communications, full-scale invasion, recognition, agenda-settingAbstract
The subject of this study is articles in “The New York Times” that mention the Bayraktar TB2. The analysis focuses on the media representation of the Bayraktar TB2 in «The New York Times», specifically examining the contexts in which the publication mentioned the Bayraktar TB2 and the aspects it emphasized during the first year of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The aim of the study is to identify the characteristics of the media representation of Turkish Bayraktar TB2 drones in «The New York Times» through an analysis of thematic contexts and the dynamics of coverage during the first year of the invasion. Methods: the article employs content analysis, quantitative counting of publications, comparative analysis and a case study. The empirical basis consists of English-language materials from The New York Times covering the period from 24 February 2022 to 24 February 2023. Research findings. The study found that the Bayraktar TB2 appeared in the publication’s coverage as early as the first day of the full-scale invasion, although it did not become the subject of separate or intensive coverage. In most publications, it featured not as a standalone story but as part of a broader technological and geopolitical context. Only one publication during the analyzed one-year period presents Turkish drones as the central theme. It is shown that the authors of articles in «The New York Times» generally demonstrate caution in assessing the effectiveness of the Bayraktar TB2, presenting claims about its effectiveness largely through expert assessments and secondary sources. Furthermore, it has been demonstrated that Turkish drones do not acquire the status of an independent, glorified phenomenon in the publication to the same extent as they do in the Ukrainian media landscape, but instead serve a predominantly illustrative function in the coverage of the war.
Downloads
References
Andrianova, A. (2023). Not your ordinary drone: Odes to the Bayraktar in the Russia–Ukraine war. Popular Music, 42(4), 395–415. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261143024000047.
Burak, B. (2022). The image of Bayraktar TB2 drones in Western media. In Proceedings of the II Inter-national Social and Legal Studies Congress (May 12–13, 2022).
Erdinç, İ. E. (2022). ABD medyasında Bayraktar TB2 silahlı insansız hava aracı hakkında yayımlanan haberlerin kamu diplomasisi bağlamında incelenmesi. İletişim ve Diplomasi, 7, 25–46.
Gosselin-Malo, E. (2021). Turkey’s modern way of doing foreign policy: Drone diplomacy. Aspenia Online. https://aspeniaonline.it/turkeys-modern-way-of-doing-foreign-policy-drone-diplomacy/.
Kahn, L. (2022, March 2). How Ukraine is using drones against Russia. Council on Foreign Relations. https://www.cfr.org/articles/how-ukraine-using-drones-against-russia (Council on Foreign Relations).
Kunertova, D. (2023). Drones have boots: Learning from Russia’s war in Ukraine. Contemporary Secu-rity Policy, 44(4), 576–591. https://doi.org/10.1080/13523260.2023.2262792.
Kunertova, D. (2023). The war in Ukraine shows the game-changing effect of drones depends on the game. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 79(2), 95–102. https://doi.org/10.1080/00963402.2023.2178180.
Martins, B. O., Tank, P., & Isleyen, B. (2023). Turkish drones as a foreign policy tool: A technology-mediated search for autonomy (Mideast Policy Brief, Vol. 1). Peace Research Institute Oslo. https://www.prio.org/publications/13435.
Péria-Peigné, L. (2023). TB2 Bayraktar: Big strategy for a little drone (pp. 1–14). French Institute of International Relations (Ifri). https://www.ifri.org.
Plakoudas, S., & Sofitis, V. (2023). Explaining the Bayraktar paradox. The RUSI Journal, 168(6), 42–52. https://doi.org/10.1080/03071847.2023.2285752.
SCImago Lab. (n.d.). SCImago media rankings. https://www.scimagomedia.com/rankings.php.
Sher, A. (2025). Turkish drones disrupting battlefields: A case study of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Wah Academia Journal of Social Sciences, 4(2), 1452–1466. https://wahacademia.com/index.php/Journal/article/view/227.
Türkmen, A., & Guillet, C. (2023). Hard power elements in nation branding: Bayraktar TB-2 example. In Proceedings of the 5th World Conference on Research in Social Sciences. https://doi.org/10.33422/5th.socialsciencesconf.2023.02.103.
Циховська, Е. (2025). Порядок денний УНІАН у формуванні іміджу безпілотників «Bayraktar»: кількісно-якісний аналіз заголовків [Unian’s Agenda Setting in Shaping the Image of Bay-raktar Drones: Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis of Headlines]. Knowledge, Education, Law, Management, 4(72), 116–125. https://doi.org/10.51647/kelm.2025.4.18.
Downloads
Published
Data Availability Statement
All data is provided in the article.
Issue
Section
Categories
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Елліна Циховська, Ольга Боговін (Автор)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors published in this journal agree to the following terms:
a. Authors reserve the right to author their work and transfer to the journal the right to first publish this work under the CC BY 4.0 license, which allows others to freely distribute the published work with mandatory reference to the authors of the original work and the first publication in this journal.
b. Authors have the right to enter into independent additional agreements on non-exclusive distribution of the work in the form in which it was published in this journal (for example, to place the work in the electronic repository or publish in a monograph), provided that the link to the first publication in this journal.
c. The journal's policy allows and encourages authors to post manuscripts on the Internet (for example, in repositories or on personal websites) both before the submission of this manuscript and during its editorial processing, as it promotes productive scientific discussion and has a positive impact. on the efficiency and dynamics of citing published work.
