Hundreds of engineers and entrepreneurs met with military officials last month in the basement of a building in central Kyiv, away from the eyes of the world, to try to find new solutions to better neutralize the dangers posed by cheap drones that Russia uses to attack Western equipment. worth millions of dollars, Reuters reports.

The meeting provided a rare glimpse into the technological arms race between Moscow and Kyiv, as both countries use thousands of drones on the battlefield, and in Russia’s case, against Ukrainian cities.

“Today’s war is a technological war, technological and combat developments take place every day,” said Mykhailo Fedorov, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Digital Transformation of the Kyiv government, who was present at the meeting.

The Reuters agency, which received an exclusive invitation to attend the event, reports on the informal atmosphere in which it took place, despite the war: high-ranking Ukrainian military officers mingled with engineers and eccentric hobbyists, a man arrived in a baseball cap and shorts.

Organizers awarded $3 million in prizes to three teams of experts who recognized the best drones or electronic warfare systems to counter the Shahed unmanned aerial vehicles, which Russia receives in large numbers from Iran.

In May, Russia attacked Ukrainian cities with more than 300 Iranian drones, a record number, after attempting to use them to damage Ukraine’s energy system last winter and in the months before.

Then, after months of hesitation, Ukraine’s Western partners decided to supply Kyiv with advanced air defense systems. But shooting down a flock of drones that cost $50,000 apiece with a missile that costs a million dollars is not exactly an efficient use of military resources.

Drones used by the Russian army in attacks on cities and on the front line

“It is unprofitable, so we are forced to constantly reduce the cost of the tools we use to destroy the Shaheds,” says Fedorov. “I’m talking about detecting them with loudspeakers and other means, and actually destroying them,” he explains.

And now that the Ukrainian military has gone on the offensive, the Russians have begun using cheap homemade drones to attack and disable millions of dollars worth of Western equipment.

The Ukrainian military says Lancet drones, which are a type of “stealth munitions” — remotely piloted aircraft that can stay in the air for longer periods of time and can deliberately crash into enemy groups or military equipment — pose a growing threat on the front lines. .

Samuel Bendett, an analyst at the Center for a New American Security, explained that the Russian Ministry of Defense encouraged increased production of the Lancet as a cheap way to hit very expensive Western equipment provided to Ukraine for its counteroffensive.

Bendett noted that, according to open Russian sources, the Lancet drone costs about 3 million rubles, which is equivalent to 35 thousand dollars. By comparison, analysts estimate that one S-300 missile used by Russia costs at least several hundred thousand dollars. At the same time, the Leopard 2 tank costs several million dollars.

Conflict in Ukraine, “war of drones”

Oleksandr, one of the participants of the meeting in Kyiv last month, told Reuters that his team presented a “quadrocopter” that, in addition to the propellers that move it, has wings that allow it to fly much faster than other drones and at great distances. .

“It will be a drone that will take off vertically to intercept or overtake other drones, shoot them down or jam them electronically,” he said.

Another participant, an engineer and deputy head of a Ukrainian company, said that his team presented projects of new electronic warfare systems that will be more effective against drones used by the Russians, in particular against Iran’s Shahed.

Drones have been actively used in wars in Yemen, Syria and Nagorno-Karabakh, but nowhere as actively as in Ukraine.

“This is truly an unprecedented drone war,” Mykhailo Fedorov said, adding that Ukraine’s military-technical sector has experienced explosive growth since the start of the Russian invasion.

Ukraine wants to create an “army” of unmanned aerial vehicles

Last year, a crowdfunding project to create a “Drone Army” was launched in Ukraine, which later grew into a state program covering everything from the production of drones to the training of their operators.

“Already a few months after the start of the large-scale invasion, everyone realized that the most effective way to conduct reconnaissance from the air and destroy the enemy is unmanned aerial vehicles,” said Brigadier General Yurii Shchygol, who oversees state procurement. program.

According to him, 15,000 drones have been purchased as part of it, and the rest have been purchased directly by the Ministry of Defense, obtained from foreign partners or with the help of other volunteer programs.

“Our goal this year is to procure more than 200,000 large strike and reconnaissance drones. We will buy as much as is available on the market,” said the Ukrainian officer.

For his part, Fedorov noted that the production of drones has now begun to be distributed throughout the territory of Ukraine, despite threats from Russian aviation. He also stated that manufacturers were urged to speed up work and use bomb shelters in the production process.

Most of the drones used by Ukrainians are of domestic production

“Today we see that this approach is working, and that all manufacturers are working continuously, and that rockets [rusești] they do not enter the production lines. They (strikes) are happening, but not on a large scale,” said the Kyiv official.

He also noted that more than 80% of drones used by Ukrainian troops are domestically produced or assembled in Ukraine.

Another participant of the meeting, Anatoliy Khrapchynskyi, who works in a firm that develops electronic warfare systems, emphasized the differences in the approach of Ukraine and Russia to technological innovations.

He said that while the Russian approach is top-down and dominated by state-owned companies, the Ukrainian approach is based on the private sector and smaller companies.

“Last year, when we started this project, there were 7 companies that could sell drones to the state. Today there are 40 of them, and by the end of the year there will be 50,” said Mykhailo Fedorov.

He also noted that the partnership between the Ukrainian state and private companies helps to increase domestic production and that Ukraine has an advantage over Russia because it can exchange technology with partners and not worry about sanctions.

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