-
Russia and Ukraine are increasingly turning to small drones controlled by fiber optic cables.
-
Fiber optic cables from these drones are scattered across the battlefield.
-
A Ukrainian special forces member said they were forcing soldiers to act with caution.
Small, anti-jamming drones controlled by fiber optic cables have become an integral part of Russian and Ukrainian combat operations, leaving a trail of cables everywhere and turning the battlefield area into an intricate network.
Fiber-optic drones are becoming increasingly common on both sides as a means of countering widespread electronic warfare. Soldiers moved more cautiously as the battlefield was littered with cables.
“You see these little webs, but you never know — is it coming from a fiber-optic drone? Or is it part of a booby trap,” Khyzhak, a Ukrainian special operator who can only be identified by his call sign (“Predator” in Ukrainian) for security reasons, told Business Insider. Mines and traps were also prominent threats in this war.
Early in the war, first-person view (FPV) drones — small quadcopter-style drones deployed by Russia and Ukraine, often carrying explosive warheads — relied on radio frequency connections. However, both sides quickly figured out how to use signal jamming to stop them.
In response, Russia and Ukraine began developing fiber-optic FPV drones, which use long, thin spools of cable to connect to the pilot. The cable maintains a stable connection, making the quadcopter resistant to traditional electronic warfare tactics.
Soldiers’ best chance of stopping fiber-optic drones is to shoot them from the air, but that requires precision, quick reaction time, and a lot of luck.
Senior Ukrainian officials say Russia has introduced long-range fiber-optic drones to the battlefield.Kostiantyn Liberov/Libkos/Getty Images
The fiber optic cables that provide these drones their greatest advantage are also their greatest weakness, as they can become tangled in the environment and cause flight to come to an abrupt halt. Even if they don’t get tangled, the cables will still coat the battlefield after use.
Kichak was a soldier in the 4th Ranger Regiment, a Ukrainian special operations force modeled after the U.S. Army. Fiber optic cables are everywhere because more drones are being used, and they often get stuck in trees and fields, he said.
The 4th Ranger Regiment shared combat footage earlier this month showing Kizzak, two other operators and their driver narrowly avoiding an attack by a Russian fiber-optic drone as they sped back to base after completing a frontline mission.
Video showed fiber optic cables strewn across a field by the roadside and even on Kezak’s gun.
“It was everywhere,” he recalled of the September incident when a driver deftly avoided the path of a Russian drone that exploded on the side of the road.
Other video footage from the battlefield shows how fiber optic cables criss-crossed like spider webs, sometimes visible only in direct sunlight or when viewed from an angle.
Kizzak said the cables are particularly annoying during night missions because special operators don’t have access to a lot of light. He described it as a “tactical matter”.
Earlier this month, fiber optic cables could be seen on the roadside in a video shared by Ukrainian special forces.Ukrainian Special Operations Forces 4th Ranger Regiment/Screengrab via X
Soldiers can’t always tell right away whether it’s a harmless fiber optic cable or something more dangerous, like a booby trap. This forced them to carefully consider whether they should call engineers, destroy the network with explosives, stop, or move on.
That would certainly slow down the mission, Kizak said, and it would become a bigger problem the closer special operators are to the front lines or if they are working covertly in Russian-controlled territory.
Ukraine and Russia have expanded production of fiber-optic drones in the past year, with both sides racing to develop models that can fly farther on the front lines.
For example, Russia has begun using fiber-optic drones with a range of 50 kilometers (31 miles), which is beyond the range of most known models. Cable length typically limits its range to between 10 and 25 kilometers (approximately 6 and 15 miles).
In Ukraine, fiber-optic drones have become such a threat to critical supply routes that soldiers are covering roads with netting to protect vehicles from attack, although this doesn’t always guarantee their safety.
At the same time, the Ukrainian defense industry is developing new countermeasures to defend against these drones. These innovations have also attracted the attention of NATO leadership, which has been using lessons from the war to guide its own military planning.
Read the original article on Business Insider
