Russian drones pose new threat to Ukrainian artillery hideouts
In recent days, numerous recordings have emerged showing attacks by Russian Vandal drones on Ukrainian artillery positioned in hideouts behind the front lines. We explain how this is possible and what challenges it presents.
The spread of inexpensive FPV drones operating on advanced fibre optics, similar to many anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs), has taken the battlefield almost back to the times when FPV drones first debuted near the end of 2022 and beginning of 2023.
It suddenly became clear that jammers do not work on drones controlled via fibre optics. The only solutions are to eliminate them or use some form of armour capable of withstanding the attack or detonating the drone prematurely. So far, nets have been a partially effective form of defence, but as seen in one of the recordings below, even the smallest gap makes them ineffective.
Moreover, it is possible to use a pair of drones for the attack: one with a thermobaric warhead intended to breach the net for the second drone carrying a cumulative warhead.
Roles have reversed — Russian artillery is a shadow of its former self
The nature of the current war in Ukraine means that the greatest losses are inflicted by artillery systems, and in this category, the Russians have been noticeably lagging behind the Ukrainians in recent months, despite having a huge advantage at the start of the war.
Stocks of post-Soviet ammunition have been depleted. While North Korea has filled this gap, covering 60% of Russia's needs, the situation is worse with barrels for artillery systems. Russia has no other source for them (local production is too small), so relics like Koksans or relics like howitzers M-46 or even M-30 dating back to the battle of Berlin are being deployed to the front.
Russians are also trying to compensate for their lack of firepower by using more aviation to drop powerful guided FAB glide bombs with UMPK modules. They have no other option because NATO artillery systems with a calibre of 155 mm and a barrel length of 52 calibres offer a greater range than Russian artillery, even with the cheapest and most plentiful ammunition.
New Russian drones destroy Ukraine's key equipment
Artillery systems are always distanced from the front lines by about 10 or even 20 kilometres in the case of Western systems capable of firing at 30 kilometres with the most common ammunition, or more with better rounds. It is specifically the Polish Krabs, French Caesars, German PzH 2000s, or Ukrainian howitzers 2S22 Bogdana that currently inflict the greatest losses on Russians.
The Ukrainian tactic involves keeping howitzers in camouflaged hideouts and moving them out to perform fire missions, then returning as quickly as possible. Due to the range and inadequate counter-battery capabilities of the Russians, drones have been and remain their only solution.
However, they were not very effective due to the dense network of Ukrainian jammers. That no longer matters due to the proliferation of fibre-optic-controlled drones with a range of over 30 kilometres. Such drones allow Russians to eliminate valuable targets in the Ukrainian back lines, which unfortunately they are doing now.
Protection against them is limited to shooting down the attacking drone, detonating it, or tangling it in a net stretched around the target. The minimum defence would be guards placed around the artillery hideout equipped with weapons with thermal vision and SMASH-type modules from Smart Shooter, but in the Ukrainian context, the most accessible are smoothbore shotguns.
