How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Battlefront.com]

3 hours ago, FancyCat said:

A drone can't get thru ECM, artillery can tho, the Time article link broadly states that they are complementary as a result. We have had several months of Ukraine relying on drones and the universal demand has been artillery shells, not more drones and from what I can read, artillery can do counter battery in a way drones can't. Obviously 800 of both is best but effectively Ukraine has been stuck with 0 artillery and 200 drones and their response has been more artillery.

I mean sure maybe in a future conflict I would prefer 800 drones but right now it's 800 artillery shells. Evolution is occurring but it's still 800 shells > drones.

We've been over this 100s of times by now.  Drones can get around ECMs by being autonomous and there is no counter for well placed mines.  Which is why Russia's fast moving columns appear to be most affected by both of those more so than artillery.

Yes, artillery has its place and large artillery (ATACMS) even more so.  But I'd still rather have 800 drones than 800 dumb artillery rounds.

If the US had drone production cranked up imagine what $500m in drone purchases would do compared to $500m in 155mm dumb round purchases.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

3 hours ago, zinz said:

Any source for the FPV pricing? Hell a Mavic 3 costs 2000€ of the shelf and that is miles too fancy for a FPV drone. The correct price for the front line FPV drones that take out tanks and Infanterie which we all have seen so many times is most likely around 500€ if it's not sold by the military industrial complex. 

I was overestimating to give artillery a little bit of a boost   I bet the majority of Ukrainian FPVs are well under 1000€ including the cost of getting a boom-boom strapped onto it.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

20 minutes ago, cesmonkey said:

https://t.me/osirskiy/692

 

Based on what we've seen, this is a plausible assessment of the situation.  it will be interesting to see what local Ukrainian counter attack opportunities might come up over the course of several months.  Ukraine had no incentives to directly attack Russian forces on the other side of the border, but they do have incentive to attack them on their side of the border.

Assuming Ukraine goes on the strategic defensive for the rest of 2024, I can envision periodic counter attacks in select areas of the front.  Maybe not enough to gain any significant ground, but enough to keep things lively.

Steve

[FancyCat]

Some neat graphics in here: https://www.reuters.com/graphics/UKRAINE-CRISIS/DRONES/dwpkeyjwkpm/

[dan/california]

 

Quote

 

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-may-17-2024

Russian forces reportedly leveraged notable electronic warfare (EW) capabilities to support tactically significant gains during the first days of their limited offensive operation in northern Kharkiv Oblast. The Washington Post reported on May 17 that elements of a Ukrainian brigade operating in northern Kharkiv Oblast lost connection to drone and communications systems due to intense Russian EW jamming when Russian forces began their incursion into Kharkiv Oblast on May 10.[12] The Washington Post reported that the Ukrainian soldiers stated that the Russian EW jamming completely disrupted Ukrainian forces' satellite internet connection via Starlink devices, reportedly the first time that Russian EW has completely knocked out Ukrainian Starlink connection since the start of the full-scale invasion.[13] A Ukrainian soldier told the Washington Post that these disruptions forced Ukrainian forces to communicate only through radio and phones and prevented Ukrainian forces from conducting basic reconnaissance.[14] Russian and Ukrainian forces have been in an offense-defense race involving EW systems and counter-EW adaptations, and it is notable that Russian forces were able to achieve such a widespread effect with their EW capabilities in northern Kharkiv Oblast.[15] Russian forces may have waited to deploy a new EW adaptation to achieve widespread disruptions during the beginning of their limited offensive operation in northern Kharkiv Oblast. Both Russian and Ukrainian forces have previously adapted quickly to changes in each other's EW capabilities, and Russian forces may have decided that leveraging a new capability to make tactically significant gains at the outset of a new offensive operation would be the most worthwhile use of the capability's novelty.[16]

 

Russia managed to jam Starlink at the schwerpunkt of their attack in border regions of Kharkiv Oblast. That is significant in and of itself since it is the first time they have managed that. I find it even more interesting though that they revealed the capability, and only took a few kilometers of border area. You want to get more than a medium sized propaganda win when you roll out a zero day exploit like that one.

Edited May 18 by dan/california

[holoween]

3 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

I was overestimating to give artillery a little bit of a boost   I bet the majority of Ukrainian FPVs are well under 1000€ including the cost of getting a boom-boom strapped onto it.

Steve

Quote

an FPV UAV with an anti-tank grenade
attached to it may have a unit price of approximately $800 to $1,800.51 However,
operational data from Ukraine demonstrates that only approximately one in
five of these munitions reaches a target, because of the manufacturing quality
and reliability, the pilot skills required and the effect of EW on their control
channels.52 Indeed, there are large parts of the day when EW means that FPVs
simply cannot be used. FPVs also have an unreliable effect on armoured targets,
requiring multiple hits to kill. Moreover, because of their short range – made
even shorter in cold temperatures – and the problems associated with spectrum
crowding in cheap FPVs due to simple, low-quality radios, it is difficult to
concentrate FPVs. Ukrainian FPV teams often need to disperse 500 m apart to
avoid spectrum interference.53 There are more advanced FPV systems emerging,
which are more reliable and have higher hit ratios, but cost in the region of
$3,000. FPVs nevertheless remain tools that are primarily effective when the
enemy decides to accept the risk from them by turning off jamming. They are
a useful section-level tool, able to deliver precise effects from cover, but are not
a sufficiently reliable system to form a core capability in a mass precision strike
complex.

https://static.rusi.org/mass-precision-strike-final.pdf

[JonS]

9 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

However, the total cost of that 155mm round delivered to the breach block of a cannon is way higher than its acquisition cost.  How much?  I have no way to estimate it, but it's not cheap.  An FPV drone, on the other hand, can literally be brought to the battlefield in a backpack. 

That's ... wot? Are you asserting that people /walk/ drones from the factories in China and Iran to the frontlines in Ukraine?

Really?

I mean, I don't actually think you do believe that, but in that case you're trying to push a pretty hearty false equivalence.

So; weird belief, or false equivalence?

[cesmonkey]

Ukrainian milblogger  Konstantin Mashovets offers this observation on the Russian attack in the Kharkiv direction:
https://t.me/zvizdecmanhustu/1875

Quote

General Lapin - “the evil genius of the Russian army”

The Russian command expected that the Ukrainian Armed Forces would be forced to use a significant part of their reserves in the Kharkov operational direction (some of them hoped that even from among the strategic ones).

Here's how it turns out. The Russians themselves are forced to pull their own reserves there from other operational directions (for example, from Kramatorsk and Kupyansky) in order to simply “gain a foothold on the outskirts of Volchansk” or “break through to Liptsy.” More on this a little later.

The Russian command seems to have decided to play a losing game called “we know what you know, but we don’t know what else you know.”

This is the first time I have seen that the planning and organization of combat operations (and, of course, the practical use of troops) took place on the basis of conspiracy theories.

It seems that Puilo, with its “control features”, has a sharply negative effect on the mental abilities of its own generals.

 

[poesel]

11 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Nope.  The cost of production of a dumb 155mm shell is about EUR 3k, a smart one EUR 100k.  FPV drones are somewhere around EUR 2k-3k and they are precision. 

9 hours ago, zinz said:

Any source for the FPV pricing? Hell a Mavic 3 costs 2000€ of the shelf and that is miles too fancy for a FPV drone. The correct price for the front line FPV drones that take out tanks and Infanterie which we all have seen so many times is most likely around 500€ if it's not sold by the military industrial complex. 

If we talk about the kamikaze type drones, then we obviously go as cheap as possible. That would be at about $300 + warhead per drone. Not counting the equipment of the human drone controller.

Example:
First hit on amazon

You can easily build them yourself:
https://www.instructables.com/The-Ultimate-DIY-Guide-to-Quadcopters/

And that is what Ukraine does for less than what Amazon would charge them. I guess they have been gold members at AliExpress for a long time.

From there the price goes up for longer range, more lift, better antenna, better camera or better ECM shielding.

[Letter from Prague]

So the Starlink. Do we know if it was Russian EW or just Musk turning them off before the offensive on Putin's order?

[The_Capt]

3 hours ago, JonS said:

That's ... wot? Are you asserting that people /walk/ drones from the factories in China and Iran to the frontlines in Ukraine?

Really?

I mean, I don't actually think you do believe that, but in that case you're trying to push a pretty hearty false equivalence.

So; weird belief, or false equivalence?

I think Steve was leaning pretty heavily in favour of artillery rounds to give them the best light…and in typical gunner fashion - biting open hands (a more acerbic lot is impossible to find).  If we are talking strategic transport then the key metric is weight.  I will leave it to you to compare the weight of an artillery shell with propellant vs that of a drone and RPG warhead.

[The_Capt]

4 hours ago, holoween said:

https://static.rusi.org/mass-precision-strike-final.pdf

One has to ask out of each artillery shell, or direct fire round for that matter, how many effectively reach a target either?  Warfare is a highly inefficient business.  We waste millions of rounds of ordinance all the time. 20% pk is actually very high compared to say small arms.  Not as high as reports of the Javelins (80-90%) but given the low costs of the systems 1 in 5 is frighteningly effective for something that hasn’t even been designed or produced with milspec.

But the article is very good and on point as to the foundation of a mass precision complex - the new arms race.  Full, or near full autonomy is a must to sidestep EW shielding.  This will mean drones will need to get smarter. Light, cheap processing power is not the problem, algorithms likely will be the competitive space.

The videos of drones with MGs is also interesting.  Someone is going to put a 40mm GL barrel or two in one of those in about 15 secs and now we have HE/HEAT standoff out to 1000+ m.  Now put fins on that 40mm with a laser designator seeker and things could get interesting really quickly.  We have seen all sorts of really expensive counters to FPVs being pushed but it is important to remember that the UAS/UGV side of the equation has barely even gotten warmed up.  Most of the FPVs in Ukraine are civilian make being repurposed.  We have not really seen the results of real investment by military industry in this field.  We are going to, which will drive costs up of course, but capabilities that survive a lot longer and do a lot more are going to happen.  A UAS with a Javelin or Spike missile.  A Wild Weasel UAS with anti-radiation missiles. Fuel air or aluminum powder based explosive drones.

The mass precision complex is coming because mass precision beats everything,

[holoween]

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

One has to ask out of each artillery shell, or direct fire round for that matter, how many effectively reach a target either?  Warfare is a highly inefficient business.  We waste millions of rounds of ordinance all the time. 20% pk is actually very high compared to say small arms.  Not as high as reports of the Javelins (80-90%) but given the low costs of the systems 1 in 5 is frighteningly effective for something that hasn’t even been designed or produced with milspec.

But the article is very good and on point as to the foundation of a mass precision complex - the new arms race.  Full, or near full autonomy is a must to sidestep EW shielding.  This will mean drones will need to get smarter. Light, cheap processing power is not the problem, algorithms likely will be the competitive space.

The videos of drones with MGs is also interesting.  Someone is going to put a 40mm GL barrel or two in one of those in about 15 secs and now we have HE/HEAT standoff out to 1000+ m.  Now put fins on that 40mm with a laser designator seeker and things could get interesting really quickly.  We have seen all sorts of really expensive counters to FPVs being pushed but it is important to remember that the UAS/UGV side of the equation has barely even gotten warmed up.  Most of the FPVs in Ukraine are civilian make being repurposed.  We have not really seen the results of real investment by military industry in this field.  We are going to, which will drive costs up of course, but capabilities that survive a lot longer and do a lot more are going to happen.  A UAS with a Javelin or Spike missile.  A Wild Weasel UAS with anti-radiation missiles. Fuel air or aluminum powder based explosive drones.

The mass precision complex is coming because mass precision beats everything,

 

Quote

There is a perennial tendency in the literature to describe
a quadcopter costing around $2,500, and then to casually endow it with capabilities
that would require processing power, battery, sensors, communications links
and lift that are unlikely to be viable below a price point of around $80,000

 

[Battlefront.com]

6 hours ago, JonS said:

That's ... wot? Are you asserting that people /walk/ drones from the factories in China and Iran to the frontlines in Ukraine?

Really?

I mean, I don't actually think you do believe that, but in that case you're trying to push a pretty hearty false equivalence.

So; weird belief, or false equivalence?

No, you focusing on the shrubbery instead of the forest

Of course the logistics chain to get a drone to Ukraine doesn't start a few KMs back from the front line.  I figured I didn't need to specify that because, well, it's kinda obvious?  My quip was about the "final mile" delivery.

So getting back to the forest...

Compare the total cost of getting a shell from the factory floor to the cannon against the total cost of getting a drone from it's assembly point (which may be in Ukraine, BTW) to the front line.  I have no way to estimate this, but I'm guessing a single shell costs several orders of magnitude more than a single drone.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

34 minutes ago, holoween said:

There is a perennial tendency in the literature to describe
a quadcopter costing around $2,500, and then to casually endow it with capabilities
that would require processing power, battery, sensors, communications links
and lift that are unlikely to be viable below a price point of around $80,000

BS.  I mean, complete and utter BS.

Almost all of those things mentioned are infrastructure related, not specific to a single drone.  If you're going to do that then you have to compare the total cost of the artillery delivery systems, warehouses, training, parts and services, AND all of the ISR stuff that goes along with getting a single shell onto a target.  Might as well throw in the cost of all the bureaucracy, training facilities, mess halls, retention bonuses, recruiting centers, etc. that it takes to run a military.

This is also really stupid because even a half arsed ignorant guess at the total cost of getting a single 155mm shell onto a target compared to a FPV drone is going to show a massive cost advantage for the FPV.  So we can waste time arguing about how many angles can dance on the head of a pin or we can spend our time discussing something more meaningful.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

7 hours ago, holoween said:

However,
operational data from Ukraine demonstrates that only approximately one in
five of these munitions reaches a target, because of the manufacturing quality
and reliability, the pilot skills required and the effect of EW on their control
channels.

It is fine and proper to point out that FPVs are not 100% hit or 100% kill when they do hit.  However, when we're doing a comparison between FPVs and artillery there needs to be a similar assessment of artillery's effectiveness per shell or the information about the FPV is useless trivia.

The_Capt pointed to some info and it checks out with my cumulative knowledge.  Anybody can fire up Combat Mission and report back about how effective 155mm barrage is against entrenched infantry or a fast moving column and I'd accept those numbers as reasonably realistic.

The point RUSI made about multiple hits being required to take out some vehicles is valid.  However, often a single hit is enough to get the vehicle to change what it was doing or even abandon it (we've seen hundreds of examples of that).  Some of the damage is also not visible to us, something we are all familiar with in Combat Mission.  Specifically "wow, my tank survived that hit!  Oh wait, I don't have my gunnery systems and I have a wounded crew member".  Those are things you won't see from the outside.

And all of this applies to artillery too.  We've seen many videos of vehicles continuing to drive after a near hit from artillery.  There may be damage to the vehicle, there might not be more than some chipped paint.  No way to assess from the information we have.

Steve

[Letter from Prague]

Big part of suicide drone autonomy is cameras and image processing, and we can make cheap cameras (in visible spectrum) and cheap chips that are pretty good at image processing. Basic communication is also easy, motors, batteries, everything is COTS and already accessible.

Once you go into things like "every drone can see in far infrared" or "every drone has satellite uplink" or "every drone has AESA radar or similarly complex electronics so it can become anti-radiation missile" or something, that is where I can imagine things might get expensive.

[holoween]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

It is fine and proper to point out that FPVs are not 100% hit or 100% kill when they do hit.  However, when we're doing a comparison between FPVs and artillery there needs to be a similar assessment of artillery's effectiveness per shell or the information about the FPV is useless trivia.

The_Capt pointed to some info and it checks out with my cumulative knowledge.  Anybody can fire up Combat Mission and report back about how effective 155mm barrage is against entrenched infantry or a fast moving column and I'd accept those numbers as reasonably realistic.

The point RUSI made about multiple hits being required to take out some vehicles is valid.  However, often a single hit is enough to get the vehicle to change what it was doing or even abandon it (we've seen hundreds of examples of that).  Some of the damage is also not visible to us, something we are all familiar with in Combat Mission.  Specifically "wow, my tank survived that hit!  Oh wait, I don't have my gunnery systems and I have a wounded crew member".  Those are things you won't see from the outside.

And all of this applies to artillery too.  We've seen many videos of vehicles continuing to drive after a near hit from artillery.  There may be damage to the vehicle, there might not be more than some chipped paint.  No way to assess from the information we have.

Steve

Well then we should also look at reliability of the system and possible density of fires.

Quote

 Indeed, there are large parts of the day when EW means that FPVs
simply cannot be used. FPVs also have an unreliable effect on armoured targets,
requiring multiple hits to kill. Moreover, because of their short range – made
even shorter in cold temperatures – and the problems associated with spectrum
crowding in cheap FPVs due to simple, low-quality radios, it is difficult to
concentrate FPVs. Ukrainian FPV teams often need to disperse 500 m apart to
avoid spectrum interference.53 There are more advanced FPV systems emerging,
which are more reliable and have higher hit ratios, but cost in the region of
$3,000. FPVs nevertheless remain tools that are primarily effective when the
enemy decides to accept the risk from them by turning off jamming. They are
a useful section-level tool, able to deliver precise effects from cover, but are not
a sufficiently reliable system to form a core capability in a mass precision strike
complex.

 

[holoween]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

BS.  I mean, complete and utter BS.

Almost all of those things mentioned are infrastructure related, not specific to a single drone.  If you're going to do that then you have to compare the total cost of the artillery delivery systems, warehouses, training, parts and services, AND all of the ISR stuff that goes along with getting a single shell onto a target.  Might as well throw in the cost of all the bureaucracy, training facilities, mess halls, retention bonuses, recruiting centers, etc. that it takes to run a military.

This is also really stupid because even a half arsed ignorant guess at the total cost of getting a single 155mm shell onto a target compared to a FPV drone is going to show a massive cost advantage for the FPV.  So we can waste time arguing about how many angles can dance on the head of a pin or we can spend our time discussing something more meaningful.

Steve

?

So the stuff you put on the drone has no effect on its price?

Or do you men that those

Quote

processing power, battery, sensors, communications links
and lift

dont go on the drone? Because of those only processing power and comms even are on the ground and the drone still needs it aswell.

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, holoween said:

There is a perennial tendency in the literature to describe
a quadcopter costing around $2,500, and then to casually endow it with capabilities
that would require processing power, battery, sensors, communications links
and lift that are unlikely to be viable below a price point of around $80,000

 Honestly this kinda feels like pulling numbers out of thin air.  A Milspec FPV is going to some at a higher price point, of this there is little doubt, but how much is really unknown.  Most commercial drones already have sensors and comms links and can lift.  Milspecing some bloated monster FPV is the natural trend in this sort of thing but I think we may be able to find so etching between 2500$ and $80k.  The other thing missing at economies of scale for a large military drone industry.  This will drive down price points overtime.  We will also likely start seeing fleets of these systems.  Some broad capability motherships or specialized and other treated like ammunition and made as cheap throw away systems.  So not a single price point but a menu.

[Letter from Prague]

I think whoever is going to figure out long range cheap and precise weapons is going to rule the world, basically. Imagine Ukraine had few thousand Storm Shadows instead of like 50. The war would be probably over by now.

Shaheds meanwhile deliver on the cheap and long range but not on the precise. Russia had a lot of missiles of various types, but they don't seem to deliver on the precise or cheap either. FPVs are cheap and precise but not long range.

The only case where we have seen all three is with the Ukrainian naval drones - and the effect has been devastating. I don't know if the Ukrainian plane drones used for refinery hunting count as cheap and precise, but they seem to be having effect as well.

But delivering on something cheap is kind of hard because the MIC wants its cut. So who knows where we'll end up.

[The_Capt]

12 minutes ago, holoween said:

Well then we should also look at reliability of the system and possible density of fires.

 

Few points on EW - it has been effective in this war in eroding unmanned systems range and effects, but it likely won’t in the next one.  First off EW is very “loud” as one is basically pumping a bunch of EM into atmo.  These basically look like giant beacons to ISR designed to pick this up.  So in a peer conflict where one side is not being starved of long range precision fires, EW systems are going to be hunted by other systems.

But we know it has not been effective enough.  EW has bought neither side an ability to regain freedom of manoeuvre for mech forces.  So while it can erode UAS it cannot achieve denial or superiority.

And then there is autonomy.  No matter how many videos get posted people still have a block on this one.  UAS in the next war are all likely to have levels of full autonomy.  Whether it is complete or partial, no military is going to leave its unmanned arms vulnerable to falling out of the sky just because someone turns on EW.  Right now the UA has a bunch of civilian UAS they have repurposed to effect but a war in 5-10 years is going to see widespread us of fully autonomous systems…why?  Because everyone is watching this war.  Industry is going to explode in these areas because the advantages are simply too high.

So basically in this war we have a bunch of drones bought online with RPG7 rounds gun taped to them pulling off a 20% success rate (which is damned high) in what is likely one of the most potent EW environments ever.  The fact that some are looking down noses at the fact it takes more than one strike for these systems to kill a multimillion dollar tank shows how upside down we are here.  These systems are not only working, as challenged as they are, they are shaping the battlefield.  No large mech concentrations.  Tanks staying back 10s of kms right next to tac aviation.  When we actually see a tank shooting another tank it is a rarity to be highlighted, which is nuts from what we envisioned modern warfare to look like even 3 years ago.

UAS are not a fad, they are breaking war as we knew it…and frankly we should have seen it coming.

[kimbosbread]

27 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

And then there is autonomy.  No matter how many videos get posted people still have a block on this one.  UAS in the next war are all likely to have levels of full autonomy.  Whether it is complete or partial, no military is going to leave its unmanned arms vulnerable to falling out of the sky just because someone turns on EW.  Right now the UA has a bunch of civilian UAS they have repurposed to effect but a war in 5-10 years is going to see widespread us of fully autonomous systems…why?  Because everyone is watching this war.  Industry is going to explode in these areas because the advantages are simply too high.

To expand on this, the computing cost to get to partial autonomy is a non-issue. People simply don’t understand the capabilities that cheap compute unlocks. We already carry around phones that have as much compute power as a laptop from a few years back, and they are cheap. Look at what Intel and NVidia sell- we are talking a few hundred dollars for their embedded/small form factor compute solutions. Quadcopters weren’t even feasible until about 20 years ago due to guess what… compute limitations. Now we are at a point where smaller LLMs can be run on phones. Ignore this fact at your peril.

Visible light cameras and simple SDRs are even cheaper. You only start getting expensive when it’s thermal (starting at a few hundred and going to a few thousand for the cheap but good enough cameras) or fancy antennas and associated signal processing, and even then this can be done cheaply and well. For example, look at Starlink terminals. Anybody who tells me Spacex couldn’t build similar hardware for drones for a few hundred dollars, but with the antenna repurposed for other uses is lying to themselves.

[Eddy]

Another Su25 shot down. Fourth in the last 2 weeks.

https://bsky.app/profile/noelreports.bsky.social/post/3ksro7gnvaa2z 

Quote

️ The 110th Separate Mechanized Brigade named after Marko Bezruchko reports that it has shot down a Su-25 over the Donetsk region.

This is the fourth Su-25 claimed to be shot down in two weeks time.

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=976067893986685&ref=sharing

 

[poesel]

36 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Few points on EW - it has been effective in this war in eroding unmanned systems range and effects, but it likely won’t in the next one.  First off EW is very “loud” as one is basically pumping a bunch of EM into atmo.  These basically look like giant beacons to ISR designed to pick this up.  So in a peer conflict where one side is not being starved of long range precision fires, EW systems are going to be hunted by other systems.

Hmm, not so sure about this part (I totally agree with the rest). Military drones are in their infancy and so is EW wrt to drones.

Devices that blast loudly to drown the spectrum are surely on the way out. But there are other ways. You could attack the transmission protocols and try to take over the drone. Or attack the video transmission to spy on the drone, or even fake it. Or put an EMP blaster on a drone and try to fry others. Or have cheaper EW emitters than the means to find and destroy them (economic attrition).

I'm no expert in this matter, but I think it is too early to dismiss EW.