Drone wars: How the U.S. is playing catch up and learning how to use unmanned aircraft in combat situations
The war between Ukraine and Russia has seen the use of cheap, mass-produced drones play a key role on the battlefield and become the future of warfare.
When Russian forces poured into Ukraine in February 2022, many thought the fight would be over within days. However, nearly four years on and despite being greatly outnumbered, the Ukrainians have managed to keep the invaders struggling to make ground.
While weapons shipments from the United States, Europe and other friendly countries have helped, Ukrainian forces mastery of drones in battle have been harrying the Russians with great efficiency. FVP drones are responsible for roughly 80% of their success in hitting Russian targets according to Major General Volodymyr Horbatiuk, deputy chief of Ukraine’s General Staff.
The mass use of cheap drones, costing less $1,000, with explosives attached which can take out multi-million-dollar tanks has US military official speeding up plans to integrate the technology into its own combat forces.
“This is not tomorrow’s problem. This is today’s problem”
The US Army began efforts to modernize the weapons and technologies that will make up the standard kit of its soldiers last year. However, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth circulated a memo in July to senior leaders urging them to accelerate integrating drone capabilities.
“Lethality will not be hindered by self-imposed restrictions, especially when it comes to harnessing technologies we invented but were slow to pursue. Drone technology is advancing so rapidly, our major risk is risk-avoidance,” Hegseth said.
Speaking to CNN, military leaders, who don’t like taking unnecessary risks, said that this gave them the cover they needed to move faster with plans already in place.
One of the places that this initiative is being put into practice is Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. There soldiers are undergoing an initial training program where they learn how to build drones, and thus will know how to fix them.
Then they practice on simulators before getting hands-on time with drones in what has been dubbed a ‘FPV gym’, FPV standing for first-person view, the type of drones that have been used so lethally in Ukraine.
Likewise, every US Army unit that rotates through Europe is leaving with “company-level training” on drones. Drone training is also expected to begin at Fort Benning, Georgia, next month.
“This is not tomorrow’s problem. This is today’s problem… And the first fight of the next war is going to involve more drones than any of us have ever seen,” said Major General Curt Taylor, commander of the US Army’s 1st Armored Division, speaking to CNN.
Ukraine offers to help US catch up in drone technology
While the US industrial complex has been making unmanned aircraft for several decades, US companies lack the ability to mass produce the types of drones that will be the future of battlefield warfare. There is also the problem of sourcing parts for manufacturing them, as they cannot contain any from China for security reasons.
Ukraine has seen an opportunity here to give the US something in exchange for the help that it is receiving and needs more of as well as security guarantees. “We provide high-quality drones, high-quality data and our expertise, and then we get back more security assistance,” Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s vice prime minister told CNN.
The country’s drone technology has shot far past other countries as manufacturers in Ukraine are getting direct feedback from the frontline allowing for more rapid innovation.
“Ukrainian companies were here on the ground and getting feedback, so they were able to overtake other types of drones that didn’t really work,” said Fedorov, who is the person behind Ukraine’s wartime effort to buy and mass produce drones.
He sees the winner of the current conflict as the one “who can update their technology the fastest.”
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