Here’s another glimpse into what combat is like on the front lines in Ukraine. To my mind, the main takeaway seems to be that combat already seemed atomized and drone-heavy has become even more atomized and drone-heavy.
“What you’re watching right now is the most lethal weapon on the battlefield of Ukraine. 75% of casualties are produced by this. But because it’s not GoPro footage of the zero line, people don’t want to watch it or learn about it. Well, this is a Mavic 3T.” The Mavic 3T is a commercial-grade Chinese drone with thermal imaging that looks to run in the $6,000—7,000 range, depending on options. And the 75% figure is for both drone attacks and drone-enabled artillery fire.
“We’re watching Ivanivske…That’s right outside of Bakhmut and there’s one road that connects Ivanivske with Bakhmut.”
“So the enemy comes from Bakhmut, and they flood the area with infantry, but it’s slowly by two man teams, and then when they finally amount enough forces over a couple months with enough artillery preparation on a target, they move in to gain the ground.”
“Most of the time though they’re killed on routes and that is our main job as a Mavic pilot, to support the infantry holding the line by attritting the Russian reinforcements making the long trek to the zero line.”
“This is the background behind keeping the front line stable against a much larger adversary.”
“Usually right when they kick it off coming from Bakhmut to Ivanivske along that road, we catch them with flashlights on. We catch them carrying diesel to go and power the jammers, and that’s when we start eliminating them.”
“Most of the time they are killed on route and even run away. But other times they succeed despite tremendous casualties. We’re talking about 50%. Now they like to move during nighttime, mostly, but usually dawn and dusk. That’s when us drone operators switch to a different type of drone or we’re done with our 12-hour shift. So they like to move during that time. And at night time, of course, the drones, like us, can still find them with thermal imaging.”
“One of the problems is that they don’t have night vision equipped the normal infantry, so they struggle to conduct large-scale assaults. And the infantry in Ukraine on both sides are mostly just placekeepers, as a scared man in the way of any assault that might happen. Most of the killing is done by artillery and drones.”
“And if the infantry survives that back and forth bombardment until there’s a squad level at least to make an assault, they can finally move up and take what’s left of the position ahead of them. Oftentimes, those infantry men are there for a month or two, too far forward to safely move back, injured, starving, eating rats, and drinking their own piss, or a large enough force comes in and pushes with you.” Just sounds like a swell life in the Russian army, doesn’t it?
Sometimes the Ukrainian drone operator’s job is basic recon. “It begins with us setting up the drone with a new battery about two km dead reckoning to the area just outside of their jammer zone, which is in the middle of Ivanivske. And then we’ll hold a place to survey one sector of the battlefield as the commander gives us his intent. But other times we’ll have us rozvidka, which means reconnaissance, and we’ll be zooming in on different MSRs [probably Mission Support Request], different buildings that we know that are occupied. We’ll zoom in through roofs. We’ll try and find the enemy actively. But it all depends on the tasking.”
“Most of the night the movement by the Russians is limited to the very front line, the very zero line, or the very rear entering rozvidka. So if the AO [Area of Operations] is clear, we’ll be told to rozvidka, like I said, which will scan for targets rather than have a perfect view of the battlefield with overlapping surveillance, showing the commanders in the talk, the layout of the front line.”
“Once we’re given that rozvidka command, we’ll start testing the waters. We scan from MSR to MSR. We’ll scan areas with that we know that they’re hiding in the buildings and the basements underneath.”
“And we’ll even push up further into the village to see if their jammers are working. And often times, most of the time, they’re not, because they ran out of batteries and gasoline long ago. But other times, the Russians will surprise us by turning on the jammer randomly right when we’re over, even possibly for a movement, or just random, and we’ll get caught in the middle of that jamming bubble, and we’ll lose connections for minutes.”
“Sometimes we’ll lose the drone, it’ll crash into the field to the right of us. Or other times we’ll regain connection two minutes later and we’ll have to find our way back because our battery’s almost dead.”
“But it’s almost always worth the risk to look straight down on the buildings to find movement through the holes in the ceilings. This is a very typical frontline village in Ukraine…Nothing but the steel structures and a couple bricks cemented to them standing.”
“The Russians don’t move out from the basement until a plan is set. A maximum two minute run into some shelter ahead of them is what they’ll do. They’re not going to be doing large assaults two hours in the open. You’re going to die.”
You can’t just bomb every structure due to the cost and logistics. “Large drone teams like the Baba Yagas come over and bomb targets, but it’s mostly done at the very zero line where there’s a lot of action. And whenever that zero line Russian position is eliminated, a couple more from the second line, which we are watching as Mavic pilots, usually come in and replace them to keep the pressure on. It’s all about pressure and momentum. The only way to finish the war is to push. So both sides still need infantry.”
“And also the jammers do work. They they’ll work usually and they can take out very expensive large drones, which are not handed out like candy like a lot of people think.”
“You have to remember: This is one section of the front line out of thousands. And this is one night out of thousands of nights that the Ukrainian war has been going on. We have to have enough equipment and logistics to keep us going the next day. So we can’t be sacrificing everything for a couple kills.”
“So use cheap FVs, sure, but FPV teams are one of the most cumbersome units that you can have on the front line. They need like 10 bags, at least, full of batteries and drones and munitions and their own personal kit and water and food. And most of that stuff is only used once. And if you’re not careful, you can go through half of your supplies of FPVs in a single night when you’re supposed to be out there for five.”
Getting closer to the front lines for higher hit percentage is too dangerous for the drone teams. “We’re we’re 2 km away from the Russians and we survey and bomb them. Now it is separated by 10 km. The Mavic teams are pushed back 6-7 km. FPV teams similar or even 10 km. If you get closer, you’re going to be stuck there for a month or two without drones. So although it might be more effective for your hits, it’s only for a couple days and then you can lose a couple FPV operators along the way.”
“The most lethal weapon on the battlefield [is] a Chinese Mavic drone. Still today, that is the most lethal. FPV teams cannot operate without this Mavic. Artillery cannot operate without a Mavic. We do not use binoculars anymore. We have TRPs [Target Reference Point?] and the surveillance drones seen by the commanders will tell them where the enemy is at the specific moment so they can lob a couple more rounds that way.”
“Or sometimes those Mavic teams are dropping VOGs [probably VOG-17 or VOG-30 grenades] and they’ll they’ll drop one or two at a time and get multiple kills a night, and that adds up very quickly in one single deployment.”
“One of our guys had over 80 confirmed killed or wounded in just that section of the front line alone during one single deployment. And that is one team, one dude who’s the pilot. It’s insane.”
So Russia is sending two man teams in dribbles and dabs to hold positions in the front line, in the process of which getting most of them killed by drones and artillery, so they can gather enough men in one spot to take another building two minutes distance deeper into Ukraine. It seems like a slow motion strategy designed to produce maximum casualties for the most minimal territorial gains possible.
