Ukraine's hidden drone war
There is a new, "sharp focus" on counter-drone equipment, but "the arms race has barely begun," experts told Newsweek. Drones are everywhere in Ukraine, but there is a second frontier in the unmanned technology war, with lesser-known technologies trying to take them down. Australian-U.S. company DroneShield, CEO of DroneShield (DronesShield), Oleg Vornik, has stated that the war in Ukraine has transformed the counter-drone market into a "sharp focus" on counter-Drone equipment. The company has hundreds of anti-drones devices across global frontlines and is seeing a shift towards specialized equipment to detect and defeat drones. Ukraine has demonstrated its ability to use rifles and self-propelled anti-aircraft guns against low- and slow-flying drones, and its missile-based air-defense systems frequently take down incoming threats, including unmanned aerial vehicles. However, using missiles in expensive air defense systems does not make economic sense in the face of mass attacks or swarm, according to U.S.-based drone expert Steve Wright. Both sides have had to bolster their counter-unmanned aircraft systems technology, which is high up on U.N. military aid to Ukraine throughout the nearly 20 months of war.
Pubblicato : 2 anni fa di Ellie Cook in Tech
Drones are everywhere in Ukraine—kamikaze drones zip back and forth across the front lines, and first-person-view drones offer up eyes on the battlefield to observers on the other side of the world.
But there is a second frontier in the unmanned technology war. Drone designs are changing each and every day, but so are the lesser-known technologies trying to take them down.
There is a new, "sharp focus" on counter-drone equipment, Oleg Vornik, the chief executive of Australian-U.S. company DroneShield that has hundreds of anti-drone devices across global frontlines, told Newsweek. "We are seeing [a] realization that 'let me get out my rifle and shoot the drone down' is not an effective strategy, with specialized equipment needed to both detect and defeat," Vornik said.
"The geopolitical situation has completely transformed the counter-UAS market," added Arun Arumugam, sales director with Polish-based radar specialists Advanced Protection Systems (APS). "Everybody has realised the importance of having to step up their air-defense capability because of the threats they have seen that drones could potentially pose, as they are now in Ukraine," he told Newsweek.
The war in Ukraine "has really opened our eyes tremendously" to the importance of drones, and of detecting them, Arumugam added. Most importantly, people now have an appreciation for just how easy, and cheap, it is to get hold of a drone and make it a threat. "So I think companies like us really need to step up," Arumugam said, adding the company has "grown quite significantly" since the outbreak of all-out war in Ukraine.
There is "no single answer yet, and there probably never will be" for how to take down incoming drones, U.K.-based drone expert Steve Wright told Newsweek. "The result is that everyone on every side is improvising."
Ukraine quickly proved that it could indeed grab rifles and use them to clear the skies. Kyiv has wielded its German-provided self-propelled Gepard anti-aircraft guns and large-caliber guns to great effect against low- and slow-flying drones, and its missile-based air-defense systems frequently take down incoming threats, including unmanned aerial vehicles.
But firing missiles in expensive air-defense systems to eliminate cheap, disposable drones simply does not make economic sense in the face of a mass attack or swarm.
"The 'Beaver' attacks on Moscow were a perfect example of this," Wright said. Kyiv repeatedly targeted the Russian capital with domestically made 'Beaver' kamikaze drones this year, some of which dodged Russian air defenses to wreak havoc in the city. "The drones were clearly never going to bomb Moscow into submission, but they were very efficiently bleeding Russia of its stock of very expensive missiles intended for supersonic jet aircraft," Wright added.
Hence the importance of the counter-drone technology playing an underappreciated but crucial role in Ukraine's war effort. Just like the drones themselves, counterdrone equipment needs to be affordable, Vornik said. But it also needs to be reliable, quick to deploy and spread across wide areas, he added.
Both sides have had to bolster their counter-unmanned aircraft systems technology, and it is featured high up on U.S. military aid to Ukraine throughout the almost 20 months of war.
Among its more than $43.9 billion of security assistance since last February, Washington has sent an unknown number of VAMPIRE C-UAS systems, mobile c-UAS laser-guided rocket systems, C-UAS gun tricks and "other C-UAS equipment."
Counter-drone technology is diverse; it could mean the anti-aircraft guns mentioned above, but it could also be interceptor drones or hacking into the uncrewed vehicles as they zoom towards their targets, or rely on electronic warfare and making sure that the drones are detected in time.
Russia has frequently said its electronic-warfare systems have taken out Ukrainian drones. With thousands in Ukrainian skies each month, most of the uncrewed aerial vehicles operated by both sides will be brought down by electronic warfare, according to APS co-founder and chief executive, Maciej Klemm.
APS, which has systems like its "comprehensive" counter-drone SKY cntrl system currently operational in Ukraine, is particularly focused on identifying low, slow and small aerial targets. The technology works to help operators very quickly identify whether an object is a threat, or something far more innocuous, like a bird, Arumugam said.
Perhaps among the most notorious of Russia's drones are the Iranian-designed Shahed-131 and Shahed-136 loitering munitions. Often used by Moscow's troops in nighttime attacks, Ukraine has often used large-caliber guns to take them out of the skies.
"When you find them, you shoot them," Uzi Rubin, of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security and the Begin Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, previously told Newsweek. However, "if you don't see them, you can't shoot them. And mostly you don't see them," Rubin added.
Yet these are not the most difficult for counter-drone systems to detect, APS's Klemm told Newsweek. It is the small, commercially-bought improved explosive drones that pose the biggest challenge, he said.
This is the type of drone that is most vulnerable to electromagnetic pulses, which use a quick blast of a very powerful radio system to mess with the communications or on-board electronics of the drone, Wright added. "These rely on the fact that most drones currently just use consumer electronics with very little additional protection though," Wright said, adding that methods to counteract the counter-drone technology are already springing up.
Just as drone development is evolving every day, so are the systems devised to knock them out of the skies. Ukraine may be cultivating its "army of drones," but it is also keeping an eye on the technology designed to bat away Russia's drones.
"In short: the arms race has barely begun," Wright said.
Temi: Ukraine, Drones, Russia-Ukraine War