November 2, 2024: Over the past two years, Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian targets have reached further and further into Russia. Russian naval and air force bases in Murmansk have increasingly suffered attacks by Ukrainian drones. How this can happen baffles the Russians because Murmansk is over 2000 kilometers from Ukraine and the Russians believed the Ukrainians did not have a drone that could get that far. Apparently, the Ukrainians do have drones that can reach Murmansk.

Earlier this year Ukraine revealed that they had developed and used their new Palianytsia turbojet powered drone. So far, this drone has been used in at least three successful attacks. Ukraine was believed to be working on longer range drones and that was what was apparently used for recent drone strikes on Murmansk.

Ukraine has already revealed that their new Palyanitsa drones have a range of 700 kilometers and cost about $100,000. It carries a 40 kg warhead. Speed is about 500 kilometers an hour. That means Palianytsia can reach a target 700 kilometers away in about 72 minutes. Palianytsia can fly low to avoid detection by radar.

Palianytsia was developed and in production after about 18 months of work. Palianytsia does not use any exotic or hard to obtain components and can be mass produced by Ukraine. Ukraine has been developing and building its own drones for over two years. It is likely that Ukraine now has a drone that can travel over 2,000 kilometers and hit targets in Murmansk. This bothers the Russians a great deal because they believed their aircraft and ships in Murmansk were safe.

Ukrainian drones are cheaper than American and Russian missiles, which cost over $10 million each and carry heavier warheads than drones. What the drones lack in warhead weight they make up with far more droves and increased ability to find and hit targets

Palianytsia and other new longer range drones are doing a lot of damage to Russian forces, factories and military bases. In a familiar pattern for the Ukraine War, Russia quickly came up with counter measures for specialized Ukrainian drones.

Russia found itself with a serious problem because there was no easy or economical way to defeat these drone attacks. Russia could not build enough air defense systems fast enough to prevent the Ukrainians from inflicting substantial damage on the Russian military and economy. Unlike the Russians, Ukraine only attacked military or economic targets. Russia has increasingly attacked towns and cities in an effort to demoralize Ukrainians. Instead it angered most Ukrainians and increased resolve to continue the war against the Russian invaders. The Russian invasion failed to defeat Ukraine and cost Russia far more time, resources and personnel than expected. The invasion was the idea of Vladimir Putin, who wanted to restore the Soviet Union. So far that effort has been an expensive failure. But the war is the first, since 1945, between nations with equal technical abilities. The result has been a tremendous amount of innovation. Wartime pressures usually produced this burst of inventiveness. One of the more notable innovations was the widespread development and use of drones.

NATO military aid has been massive but came with one restriction, no use of these weapons for attacks deep inside Russia. NATO could not prevent the Ukrainians from developing and building their own weapons for attacks on Russian targets. Initially these were carried out by drones. While Russia has used ballistic missiles, Ukraine had to develop their own. These missiles are much more difficult to defend against and do a lot more damage to targets deep inside Russia. Since these ballistic missiles will be produced in Ukraine, the Ukrainians can use them any way they see fit and that means not announcing the use of these missiles against Russia. It is unclear if Ukrainian ballistic missiles have been used against targets in Murmansk.

Both Ukraine and Russia have embraced cheap drones costing a few hundred dollars, and more expensive quadcopters, as essential battlefield weapons. This has a lot to do with economy and efficiency. Compared to a 155mm or 152mm artillery shell and the expense of an expensive howitzer to fire these unguided shells 20 or 30 kilometers, armed drones are more certain to find and attack enemy troops or vehicles than artillery shells. Drones are currently the primary cause of casualties in Ukraine. In 20th century wars, most casualties were inflicted by artillery.

Artillery still has its uses for long range bombardment of a specific target or more random harassment fire to discourage enemy use of certain roads or off road terrain. FPV (First Person Viewing) drone control range varies from one to ten kilometers depending on how much electronic jamming or random interference there is. Average range is closer to four or five kilometers. Within these ranges the amount and extent of the damage these drones can inflict is enormous, precise, and often decisive in a battle or encounter.

Both Russian and Ukrainian forces are using cheap quadcopter drones controlled by soldiers a kilometer or more away, who use FPV goggles to see what the day/night video camera on the drone can see. Adding night vision doubles the cost for each drone, so not all of them have that capability. Each of these drones carries half a kilogram of explosives, so it can instantly turn the drone into a flying bomb that can fly into a target and detonate. This is an awesome and debilitating weapon when used in large numbers over the combat zone, and Ukraine this year has produced more drones than Russia has produced artillery shells. If a target isn’t moving or requires more explosive power that the drones can supply, one of the drone operators can call in artillery, rocket, or missile fire, or even an airstrike. Tanks and infantry obtain some protection from these attacks by erecting a screen above the vehicle or trench line of fox holes troops are in. When moving, the troops are vulnerable. For vehicles, multiple drone attacks will eliminate the overhead screen and damage or destroy the vehicle. Since the drone operator is viewing all this from the drone, these attacks are rather devastating.

A major limitation is the need for trained drone operators. These troops need over a hundred hours of training before they are able to start operating these drones, and another hundred hours of actual use before they are able to make the most out of the system. These drones are difficult to shoot down until they get close to the ground and the shooter is close enough, as in less than a few hundred meters, away to successfully target a drone with a bullet or two and bring it down. Troops are rarely in position to do this, so most of these drones are able to complete their mission, whether it is a one-way attack or a reconnaissance and surveillance mission. The recon missions are usually survivable and enable the drone to be reused. All these drones are constantly performing surveillance, which means that both sides generally commit enough drones to maintain constant surveillance over a portion of the front line, to a depth, into enemy territory, of at least a few kilometers. Both sides now seek to find and attack each other’s FPV drone operators. That means more drone operators near shelters.

This massive use of FPV-armed drones has revolutionized warfare in Ukraine and both sides are producing as many as they can. Not having enough of these to match the number the enemy has in a portion of the front means you are at a serious disadvantage in that area. These drones are still evolving in terms of design and use and are becoming more effective and essential.

One countermeasure that can work for a while is electronic jamming of the drones control signal. Drone guidance systems are constantly modified or upgraded to cope with this. Most drones have flight control software that sends drones with jammed control signals back to where they took off from to land and await. The jammers are on the ground and can be attacked by drones programmed to home in on the jamming signal and detonate their explosives on the source of the jamming signal. As a result, even countermeasures can be overcome and the side that can do this more quickly and completely has an advantage. That advantage is usually temporary because both sides are putting a lot of effort into keeping their combat drones effective on the battlefield.

Ukraine was not where extensive use of these drones first occurred. Innovative use of small drones is something that has been going on for several decades and is evolving all the time. This began in 2010 when the French firm Parrot introduced the first consumer friendly quadcopter. By 2017 Parrot had competition from the Chinese firm DJI, which innovated more quickly than anyone else and soon dominated the market for commercial quadcopters. This is why both Russia and Ukraine first turned to DJI’s Mavic quadcopters as models for new militarized quadcopters they would produce. Both sides soon designed and built their own drones or heavily modified commercial models like Mavic. Russian troops had a more difficult time doing this. Russian troops also used Mavic quadcopters, when they could get them. Corruption in Russia made importing Mavic quadcopters difficult. This isn’t just about Mavic because corruption became more widespread in Russia in 2022 when the Ukraine War started, and subsequent sanctions disrupted the Russian economy.

Ukrainians are encouraged to take the initiative in designing and building new models of drones. Many important innovations have come from Ukrainian civilians building drones at home. This is often done for family members of friends who are in the military and could always use a few more drones. Individuals or small groups of Ukrainian drone enthusiasts arose from peacetime groups interested in nonmilitary remotely controlled unmanned aircraft. When Russia invaded, the Ukrainian civilian drone hobbyists quickly joined or worked for the military.

In contrast, Russia has its national bureaucracy that not merely discourages and disrupts any private efforts to design and build not merely drones, but private efforts to build most anything which might compete with government ways of building or doing things. This has been true since the 1920s, originally because of the Communist system, then because that was normal even after the Communists were overthrown, and then because such private enterprise interferes with government corruption. Ukrainians have noticed that one of their assets in the war is the disruptive effect Russian bureaucracy has on the Russian military. The Ukrainians are faster in developing new weapons, and particularly new drones. The Russians have adapted, as they usually do, to the wartime drone emergency and adopted more effective procurement practices. These will disappear when the war is over, as most practical measures adopted in wartime tend to do.

While there is some corruption in Ukraine, there is also a lot more popular anger and active opposition to any corruption hurting the war effort. Less corruption in wartime Ukraine means there are a lot more opportunities for innovation without interference from some corrupt official or supplier. Russian troops still have lots of drones but not as many as the Ukrainians, and particularly not with all the innovations found in many Ukrainian drones. This made a difference and still does, even though the Russians have been quick to use new forms of jamming to disrupt or destroy Ukrainian drones. Both sides suffer heavy, as in the thousands, of drone losses each month and Ukraine, with NATO support and unencumbered by economic sanctions, is able to maintain a drone edge on the battlefield.

Earlier in 2024 Ukraine announced the creation of another branch of its military. Now, in addition to the army, national guard, navy, and air force there will also be an Unmanned Systems Force. This organization trains personnel to manage production of air and naval drones as well as development of new or improved models. The Unmanned Systems Force will develop and install useful changes in new or existing drones. As of late 2024 Russia has not responded to this innovation.