Electronic warfare is reshaping battlefields
DONETSK REGION, UKRAINE>> The Ukrainian soldier swore and tore off his headset. His video monitor had gone blurry at first, the landscape of shattered trees and shell craters barely visible, before blacking out completely. The Russians had jammed the signal of his drone as it was flying outside the town of Kreminna in eastern Ukraine.
“Some days everything goes smoothly; other days the equipment breaks, the drones are fragile and there is jamming,” said the soldier, who goes by the call sign DJ and was speaking from his underground outpost a few miles from the front line.
For a while, the Ukrainians enjoyed a honeymoon period with their self-detonating drones that were used like homemade missiles. The weapons seemed like an effective alternative to artillery shells for striking Russian forces.
Now the bad days are starting to outweigh the good ones: Electronic countermeasures have become one of the Russian military’s most formidable weapons after years of honing their capabilities.
Electronic warfare remains a hidden hand in much of the war, and like Ukraine’s disadvantage in troop numbers and ammunition supplies, Ukraine suffers in this area as well in comparison to Russia. Russia has more jamming equipment capable of overpowering Ukrainian signals by broadcasting on the same frequencies at higher power. It also exhibits better coordination among its units.
With Western military aid looking far from certain and artillery ammunition running low, the pressure on Ukraine’s unmanned air capacity has grown, leaving Ukraine’s forces in an increasingly perilous position.
Interviews with Ukrainian soldiers, commanders and military analysts say that Russia’s jamming capabilities are straining Ukraine’s limited supplies of offthe-shelf drones and threatening to sideline a key component of Ukraine’s arsenal as the Kremlin mass-produces its own fleet of drones.
Ukrainian troops describe a back-and-forth dance where one side makes technological changes — such as using different frequencies or jamming devices for drones — then the other side catches up in a matter of weeks or months, undercutting any shortlived advantage.
“There is a constant arms race,” said Babay, a sergeant in charge of a drone platoon on Ukraine’s eastern front, who, like DJ and others interviewed for this article, went by his call sign, as is military protocol. “We are improving our technology to counter these new realities on the battlefield, and in a while, the Russians will again have to invent something new to be able to defend themselves against our attacks.”
Small, cheap drones have been a staple of the conflict in Ukraine since 2014, when Russian-backed separatists attacked in the country’s east. But in 2022, when Russia launched its full-scale invasion, the use of the unmanned vehicles over the battlefield ballooned.
In 2023, Ukraine gained the upper hand in the drone war by deploying the compact racing drones known as FPVS, for First Person Views, in large quantities.
“FPVS play a critical role for us, as these toys are essentially mobile artillery that compensate for the lack of artillery ammunition,” said Dyadya, a drone operator with the 63rd Mechanized Brigade. “We work at the same distance as a mortar, but our accuracy is much higher.”
Artillery’s strength often comes from its imprecision. By blanketing wide areas with high explosives and fragmentation, it can quickly disrupt battlefield operations by maiming troops and destroying vehicles. It’s a tactic that is nearly impossible to replicate with one or two drones.
As Ukraine’s artillery ammunition dwindled last fall and into the winter, the FPVS, used as guided projectiles, were effective in suppressing and harassing Russian trenches and vehicles. Precious artillery ammo was reserved to push back Russian ground attacks.
But the Russian military has since improved its jamming capabilities and uses poor weather to its advantage, advancing in fog and rain, when drones have difficulty flying.
“Both sides have quickly picked up on their adversary’s key FPV developments and tactics,” said Samuel Bendett, an expert on Russian military drones at the Center for Naval Analyses, a research organization based in Virginia. “And now these technologies are maturing very rapidly for both sides.”