37 ms·

I fought in Ukraine and here's why FPV drones kind of suck

197 points by _tk_ 1y ago

echoangle 1y ago
> They are controlled by an operator wearing virtual-reality goggles They aren't really using VR headsets, right? The FPV goggles I know are just a screen showing the camera image without any virtual reality.
- mog_dev 1y ago
  Basically its just screen yes. It's just convenient and more portable to do it this way. Small desktop screen also exist and are used to peek on what the FPV operator is seeing.
- wkat4242 1y ago
  Yeah I'd much rather use an xreal air or something. You can still see if someone (or an enemy drone) comes to kill you. AR is much better for this.
  - palata 1y ago
    Probably you want the pilot to be 100% focused on the piloting. Someone else can look around and try to keep the pilot safe. Also it's not like the pilot has to be exposed.
  - originalvichy 1y ago
    They hide in bunkers and have other infantrycwith them if that’s not the case.
  - Ancapistani 1y ago
    No, the latency is too high. There are dedicated devices for this - much lighter, external battery (same as the drones use), etc. I use a Skyzone 04X.
ggm 1y ago
You need to compare this to hit rate with mortars and attrition by counter battery fire on mortar teams. Not to detract from a sober assessment but it's hard to judge without the other parts of the story. Thr tldr would be "temper expectations"
- gpderetta 1y ago
  Yes, even a 20% success rate seems quite high.
  - palata 1y ago
    > The vast majority of first-person view drone missions can be completed more cheaply, effectively, or reliably by other assets. At this point, the question becomes the price.
- risyachka 1y ago
  This. Mortar may be 5 times cheaper but 100x easier to destroy it and its crew. Also half of the problems described are purely technical and can be easily solved with some budget. In Ukraine most drones are assembled by volunteers. So its not the reliability of drone that is an issue, its lack of proper assembly and QA.
  - FirmwareBurner 1y ago
    >So its not the reliability of drone that is an issue, its lack of proper assembly and QA Imagine what China can pull off here in case they're in a war.
    - bboygravity 1y ago
      China's fertility rate is 1. Even if they win the war, they still eventually will have lost.
      - LexGray 1y ago
TheChaplain 1y ago
The article talks about signal jammers, but as far as I know most drones there are remote controlled using fiber for exactly that reason?
- troupo 1y ago
  He talks about that in the article
- rich_sasha 1y ago
  There are... I think they aren't unproblematic - the fibre can get caught on things etc. Also I read of instances where the opposition can follow the fibre back to find the drone operators.
  - FirmwareBurner 1y ago
    Sounds like for fiber optic strikes you gotta do a "shoot and scoot".
    - orthoxerox 1y ago
      The operators usually use a cordless drill to wind back as much cable as they can after the drone is used.
      - sorcerer-mar 1y ago
        This is why it's so fascinating to read about this conflict. The back and forth innovations (some obvious, some rudimentary, some very much not) is just incredible to follow. Early on: Drones in war! Then: Ahh EW makes them useless! Then: Fiber optics defeat EW! Then: But you can follow the cable! Then: But you can try to respool the cable with a power drill! Every week it seems is a new move.
        throwawayffffas 1y ago
        Next up: Autonomous targeting. Next Next up: Decoys.
amai 1y ago
A guy from Slovakia is fighting for Ukraine? Don't tell that your prime minister and supporter of Russia Robert Fico.
- codedokode 1y ago
  Almost all Europe supports Russia by buying oil and natural gas.
  - _joel 1y ago
    Through the pipeline they shut down or thorugh the shadow fleet they've sanctioned? As it stand, Europe is moving in the right direction, not quickly enough for some, but still. Ban on new Russian gas contracts starting January 1, 2026 End of short-term contracts by June 2026 Complete phase-out by end of 2027.
- cosmicgadget 1y ago
  Are you calling him a hypocrite for disagreeing with a politician from his country?
  - amai 1y ago
    No, but I think it is suspicious that someone from a country with pro-russian politics claims that drones are bad for Ukraines war effort.
103e 1y ago
Don't drones have another advantage not mentioned here -- counter-battery against operators being more challenging?
- throwawayffffas 1y ago
  More challenging than what?
  - orthoxerox 1y ago
    More challenging than counter-battery fire against artillery, which is basically a solved problem in warfare.
    - throwawayffffas 1y ago
      But not more challenging than counter battery against teams firing Javelins or other portable anti tank weapons.Or teams using Switchblades. FPVs are man portable guided munitions, not artillery. Pretty much all existing man portable guided anti tank weapons are better than FPVs at their job. And artillery is better than any of them at it's job. While FPVs can score kills they have minimal suppression effects, when an FPV hits a friendly, everyone else is going to keep moving, because stopping will offer them no benefit from the next one, and the next one might be minutes out. When an artillery round lands everyone hits the deck.
      - 103e 1y ago
        FPVs don't seem anti-tank replacement -- they do seem to have a role against soft targets ie against massing infantry, c2 nodes or suppression of enemy mortars. In this role, from a distance, they seem harder to suppress than the alternative, ie mortars. Also these are immature tech... I suspect at least some of the issues identified will be mitigated in time.
      - koonsolo 1y ago
        > Pretty much all existing man portable guided anti tank weapons are better than FPVs at their job. Sure, but a Javelin missile costs more than $200K. You can have 200 fpv drones for that price.
deleted 1y ago
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msgodel 1y ago
Soon they'll be using CV and won't need FPV.
- palata 1y ago
  You still want someone to get the drone to a place where it can see the target, and someone to select this target. Only then can CV do the last part ("terminal engagement"). But that also means it won't go inside a hangar and find the target there.
  - bluGill 1y ago
    IF you tell it go into the hanger and find a target CV can do that. It might not be the best target in the hanger, but that doesn't matter too much if you can get in.
    - palata 1y ago
      If you add enough "if's", then surely everything is possible :-). I don't think we're anywhere near having drones that happily fly above a war zone, detect an interesting hangar, find a way to get inside and select a target inside. Currently they mostly fly FPV drones manually. The next basic step is to have "terminal engagement", where at some point they can select a target and the drone will fly autonomously to it using CV. But in order to do that, the drone will need processing power, and therefore it won't cost 500$ anymore. Would you rather go for a drone that costs 5k and can use CV for terminal engagement, or 10 drones that cost 500 and simply stay on their latest vector if no command arrives?
      - msgodel 1y ago
        How much are the controllers they're using now? It's not like computers and cameras needed to do interesting CV are all that expensive.
        pzo 1y ago
        some mid-range iphones or android would even do the trick. especially iphones have tone of processing power nad strong NPU/GPU and lots of cameras, lidar, depth sensor, and plenty of other sensors. second hand phone 13 mini would do the trick and you can get it for less than $500
neilv 1y ago
> During my time in [...], I collected statistics on the success of our drone operations. I found that [...] Assuming the writer and their allegiances are what they say, is any of the info valuable to any of their adversaries? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loose_lips_sink_ships https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loose_lips_sink_ships
- renmillar 1y ago
  The Russians likely already have similar operational data from their own drone programs and intelligence gathering.
  - ChrisRR 1y ago
    Still feels like why help them just in case they don't
- originalvichy 1y ago
  None of what he is saying is that valuable. All of these problems are something a hobbyist fpv drone pilot can share. Add to that, it’s quite old info. If the author didn’t get a chance to see fiber optic drones, they left the fray a long time ago in terms of advancement.
aqsalose 1y ago
Many of the issues sound like issues coming from using improvised civilian hobbyist tech and doctrine being in its infancy. If current FPV drones are bit lackluster, it doesn't preclude 'next generation' that are purposefully developed for military use won't be useful. Also it sounds like the designation of "FPV drone" is specific to particular family of drones specific in current day and time, which may be something quite else next year. Like, obviously the next stage is a FPV drone with some capabilities of "reusable" drone or loitering munition author complains of (capability to hover easily)? Or "reusable" drone with FPV camera?
- palata 1y ago
  > Many of the issues sound like issues coming from using improvised civilian hobbyist tech I don't think it's improvised civilian hobbyist tech. They run autopilots that also fly professional drones and can fly planes. I think it's mostly that it has to be super cheap, otherwise it doesn't bring value (because other weapons are more efficient if you have more money). If your one-way drone costs 10k dollars, maybe it's too expensive even though it can fly during the night. And then there are fundamental limitations, like flying in bad weather. > obviously the next stage is a FPV drone with some capabilities of "reusable" drone But a reusable drone won't go inside a hangar (because at this point it probably won't come out). If your drone can go somewhere, drop something and come back, doesn't it mean that another class of weapons could do this job?
  - spwa4 1y ago
    Sadly I think that AI will make a very large difference here. And AI hardware that can control weapons is already hundreds of dollars and dropping fast, because a cell phone can do it.
    - Nicook 1y ago
      [flagged]
  - bluGill 1y ago
    $10,000 can be cheap for a one way drone. Bombs often cost for more than that. The real question is value, if hitting the target is worth more than the cost of what you hit it with then you have a good value. Taking out a $1000 drone with a $100,000 missile is a good value if that drone is headed for a $1,000,000 building, but if the drone is headed for a cow probably not worth it.
Zextin 1y ago
[flagged]
- mensetmanusman 1y ago
  War is one of humanities oldest past times. If men can’t figure out their differences, they try to kill each other, as witnessed in the entire animal kingdom.
- subscribed 1y ago
  Unhappy that rapists and baby killers are stopped before they can commit more war crimes?
  - Zextin 1y ago
    [flagged]
- Mona4000 1y ago
  Why are his brothers invading his country?
- msie 1y ago
  Well, Slovaks don’t believe they’re Russian.
GiorgioG 1y ago
FPV drones don’t suck if you know what you’re doing. If you don’t have proper training, you’re going to suck at it.
- dewey 1y ago
  Sometimes you don’t have time and resources to train everyone to be great. Good enough will have to do. > As a result, training a highly proficient operator can take months. A standard, base-level course for Ukrainian drone pilots takes about five weeks
  - GiorgioG 1y ago
    No disagreement there, but the title states "FPV Drones Kind of Suck".
gadders 1y ago
I've seen some of these FPV videos of kills of unarmed Russian soldiers. I honestly don't know why the pilots are not prosecuted for war crimes. (and I'm sure Russia does the same to Ukraine, I just haven't seen those videos).
- troupo 1y ago
  > I've seen some of these FPV videos of kills of unarmed Russian soldiers. I honestly don't know why the pilots are not prosecuted for war crimes. An enemy combatant doesn't stop being an enemy combatant just because he dropped his weapons. War crime is executing prisoners. And there are a few videos were Russians gleefully murder prisoners
- gooseus 1y ago
  It's because killing unarmed soldiers during war is not a war crime. Rule 3. All members of the armed forces of a party to the conflict are combatants, except medical and religious personnel. https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule3 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule3 Rule 47. Attacking persons who are recognized as hors de combat is prohibited. A person hors de combat is: (a) anyone who is in the power of an adverse party; (b) anyone who is defenceless because of unconsciousness, shipwreck, wounds or sickness; or (c) anyone who clearly expresses an intention to surrender; provided he or she abstains from any hostile act and does not attempt to escape https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule47 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule47 A surprise drone attack on any Russian combatant that isn't a medic or chaplain is "lawful", even if they aren't holding a weapon at the time.
  - gadders 1y ago
    Pretty sure I've seen some that fall under Rule 47.
    - originalvichy 1y ago
      There’s regularly uploaded footage of clearly surrendering soldiers directed towards a safe zone to give up. Propaganda is propaganda, but it happens more often than we might think.
varjag 1y ago
This tracks with the earlier ~12% drone kill efficiency estimates. However drone is a mass deployment weapon. Ukraine did about 2 million frontline sorties in 2024 and aims for 5 million this year. This 1 out of 9 ratio translates into absolutely devastating damage, that artillery and airstrikes (which are also hardly "easy to use") can only dream of.
- Neil44 1y ago
  This is true, but the author also talks about cost e.g. $500 for a drone vs $100 for an artillery shell with far more effect. Surely at the point where the drone has visual on the target you can fire 5 x shells over for massively greater effect on target, and keep the drone flying for the next target, and the next.
  - varjag 1y ago
    $100 is a cost of a 60mm mortar shell. It is a hand grenade sized munition lobbed from a Pringles can sized weapon to the range of 1-2km. This is generally not the thing that comes to mind when you think of artillery strike. A 155mm (dumb, unguided) shell would set you back 5-8K USD. That's before the propellant charge, fuse and amortization of the artillery piece and its 5 man crew.
    - Neil44 1y ago
      That's interesting thankyou. It's a good google rabbit hole. Apparently we're in surge pricing right now because of Ukraine, and Russian shells are only costing them $1000. It seems they caught us sleeping, manufacturing wise.
      - varjag 1y ago
        The heavy Soivet calibre used by Russia is 152mm which translates to a slightly cheaper shell (though not 5x for sure). Russia also uses 122mm arty which is substantially cheaper: the costs follow to the cube volume. Another factor is that a lot of supplies are Iranian and North Korean old stock with what we can assume reasonable prices. Ukraine was getting Vietnam war era 155mm stock relatively cheap too, while it lasted.
paganel 1y ago
> I would, first of all, recommend ensuring that troops in the field have well-trained organic mortar support with an ample supply of ammunition. That would not be possible because it has become basically impossible to bring in vehicles close to 5-10 kms of the front-lines because of the, well, drones. And you need to carry ammunition to those mortars with something, preferably not how the Vietnamese did it in the jungle (i.e. using brute human force). Just check this snippet from a recent article in the FT: > “'At this point, you’re a lucky man if you drive 5km from the front line and your car is still operational,' a Ukrainian drone unit commander deployed in eastern Donetsk region told the Financial Times. He said his men now sometimes had to walk up to 15km at night to reach their positions... > In the past weeks, Ukrainian supply trucks have reportedly been hit by Russian drones on the road linking Kramatorsk to Dobropillia, some 30km from the fighting. On both sides of the front line, roads are being covered with anti-drone nets in an attempt to stop fibre optic drones." This comes from Ukrainian guys still fighting this war, not from a Western war-tourist like the guy who wrote this article. [1] https://x.com/RALee85/status/1937816538439991310 https://x.com/RALee85/status/1937816538439991310
- originalvichy 1y ago
  The author writes that he was not there for the fiber optic evolution. They have changed the game when it comes to these flat open terrains with heavy jamming. The quality control and cheap components issues won’t go away unless they are improved, which brings costs to a ”cheap” alternative. As I wrote in my comment above, walking/driving moving targets are still on the table, just not as feasible as in the early days without signals jamming.
  - paganel 1y ago
    > As I wrote in my comment above, walking/driving moving targets are still on the table This seems to directly contradict this direct quote from the recent FT article I linked to: > At this point, you’re a lucky man if you drive 5km from the front line and your car is still operational
    - 1y ago
time0ut 1y ago
I assume this is like a pilot in WW1 reporting how finicky and hard to use bi-planes were. No doubt a bunch of weapons manufacturers have seen this and the special operations Ukraine did in Russia and Israel did in Iran and the wheels of progress are turning and the result will be terrifying.
- palata 1y ago
  What terrifies me is that the next step may be AI swarms, where one side sends thousands of drones at the same time and let each of them autonomously choose what they want to target. It's all technically feasible up to "choosing wisely".
  - koonsolo 1y ago
    In a sense it's already happening with the Shahed drones. Maybe not smart AI, but the end result is still the same: you have no clue where they will end up.
    - FridayoLeary 1y ago
      What's eye opening about the recent iran israel conflict is how drones were used. Iran fired about 1000 drones and israel easily destroyed all but one of them. On the other hand israel used drones to devastating effect. I'm not sure what to make of that, but it's clear that drones as a primary means of warfare is simply not effective. hamas and hezbolla have no notable successes with drones, except for on october 7 where they used them to great effect to destroy specific machine gun emplacements and a couple of tanks. They will be part of the future, but never the future itself.
      - LorenPechtel 1y ago
        Israel has been serious about defending against simple weapons for a long time. And expect them to have doubled down on this since 10/7. As far as I know they are the only modern power to have done so.
  - 1y ago
palata 1y ago
I see a lot of comments saying that "but the technology will improve". Sure, maybe. Or maybe it will be like Musk announcing what Teslas will be capable of in 6 months. We don't know, and the author doesn't pretend that they do. Don't forget that drones have been used in this war for years, and the vast majority of the drone industry has already pivoted to the military because it's easier to make money there. So it's not exactly "brand new technology". But my point is that the author just says "from what I've seen, here is how it looks". And it seems like it has value.
- originalvichy 1y ago
  I agree, and I also raised more points in my comment. The terrain of the flatlands between Ukraine and Russia is the main reason for their success. The same could be said for vast parts of the Middle-East. It’s easy to operate these on farmlands that go for kilometers.
- dinfinity 1y ago
  > Don't forget that drones have been used in this war for years 3 years of usage is brand new. Neither Ukraine nor Russia have been designing and producing purpose-built FPV drones since the beginning (I assume things are well underway now). It's a bunch of consumer shit thrown together, which makes it kind of incredible that they work as well as they do. An equivalent would be something like taping an assault rifle to a small Cessna and dominating with that. And then you saying that "maybe the technology will not improve".
  - palata 1y ago
    > 3 years of usage is brand new. Usage, sure. But the technology is not. Those drones are flying smartphones. We have already had mass-produced consumer drones for more than a decade. We don't use them because they are new, we use them because they are cheap and accessible. I am not sure what you call "consumer shit" here. They go for cheap FPV drones precisely because they are cheap. But the autopilot running in them can fly a Cessna. We can make them fly longer (they will be bigger), we can use better radios, we can add thermal cameras and bigger payloads. We can add GPUs and AI capabilities. All that we have, but then it doesn't cost 500$ anymore. > An equivalent would be something like taping an assault rifle to a small Cessna and dominating with that. Or maybe you see an assault rifle and say "Look at this rifle; it's only the beginning! In a couple years it will have wings and it will drop heavy bombs before returning to base, because it will be reusable". And I'm saying: we already have fighter jets; they are just more expensive.
oersted 1y ago
I don’t understand why the author has such a narrow definition of FPV drones. He talks as if reusable drones are a completely different category, that they are all toys designed for enthusiast racers… Generally he implies that a myriad arbitrary technical details are fundamental limitations of this paradigm, it’s a strange mindset. Also, as others commenters state, isn’t a 43% success rate exceedingly high? Even if it’s 20% accounting for environmental factors and faults in manufacturing. How likely is it that a mortar does anything? Or a soldier with a rifle? Or anything else? > When I joined the team, I was excited to work with a cutting-edge tool. It sounds like he was imagining some kind of scifi adventure, but it’s always been clear that they are using cheap drones with tech that has been commonplace for a decade. And that’s completely fine, it’s intentional.
- palata 1y ago
  > Also, as others commenters state, isn’t a 43% success rate exceedingly high? Even if it’s 20% That's the whole question, and that's kind of the point that the article raises: the success rate does not matter. What matters is the cost. At the same cost, can you do more damage with other weapons or not?
  - oersted 1y ago
    Indeed that’s what I meant, it’s a good question. It sounds like the author only saw the cases where mortars or reusable drones had been successful. But I cannot imagine a mortar being more efficient even if one shot is 5x cheaper. Perhaps they are more effective at suppression, but I would be surprised if they really hit anything meaningful more than 5% of the time, similar with most artillery or bombing, or just plain infantry. What even comes close to the success rate of a drone to hit a particular moving target? And you can do it while hidden 10km away with a lightly trained operator. And manufactured cheaply, safely and quickly by unskilled labor, and easily transported to the front and hand-carried by troops. Any kind of alternative, like precision bombing or sniping, or just getting close and shooting at it, must be much more costly, particularly when you also account for the cost of the equipment used, even if it is reusable, and the training, risk and human cost.
  - 1y ago
Cockbrand 1y ago
I guess I'm missing something, but why isn't the problem of finicky steering solved by adding auto-stabilizing software? Would that take away too much of the maneuverability?
- koonsolo 1y ago
  My first reaction was the same. I have a small indoor quadcopter with 2 main modes: freestyle (like a helicopter), and an easier mode that keeps the drone hovering. My first thought was, why not use the easier mode (press forward to go forward, back to go back, etc.)? But looking at those war videos, these drones always come at an angle towards the target. And in that sense, it's easier to use the more difficult helicopter mode. What I mean is, once you know the helicopter mode, it's easier to do this kind of maneuver than using the "easy mode".
- tguvot 1y ago
  i saw ukrainian footage of drones where they switch to/from auto hover mode
avoutos 1y ago
Even if the technology improves and the economics of scale reduces the cost, I still don't buy the narrative that swarms of tiny kamikaze drones will radically change warfare. Aside from radio jamming, I have not seen an actual defense against a strong EMP. To defend against an EMP wiping out your drone swarm, you would have to invest in shielding etc which would remove them from the class of small cheap drones. Idk if anyone can speak about this, but to me this doesn't seem like a problem that these types of drones can overcome.
- lofaszvanitt 1y ago
  Maybe you should watch the countless videos DAILY, where soldiers are crippled for life.
- throwawayffffas 1y ago
  EMP weapons are expensive, and one shot. I can see the future of drone swarms, but we are a long way out.
- general1726 1y ago
  Usually the initial attack (From Ukrainian perspective) is stopped by regular military weapons like AT, Artillery, Mines and drones are used to mop up the battlefield - Burn out abandoned vehicles and hunt scattered soldiers
- CapricornNoble 1y ago
  I think you are overstating the ease of employing an EMP. https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/world-wont-end-danger-emp-attack-more-fantasy-fact-94681 https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/world-wont-end-danger...
dfedbeef 1y ago
This is kind of a 'Muskets are cool but they take too long to reload' vibe. Yeah Ukraine isn't working with the best tech; it's a doctrine of desperation rather than preparation. But they discovered something effective and it will change the way wars are fought in the future.
- throwawayffffas 1y ago
  > But they discovered something effective and it will change the way wars are fought in the future. They didn't really. TOW's are a thing from the 70s. They are essentially the same thing, but instead of electric rotors they are using a rocket motor. Switchblades existed before this conflict too, if loitering is the measure we are going with. It's a hacked together solution to a real problem they are having, lack of artillery shells and more reliable munitions. And well done to them. But a country with the benefit of time and deep pockets is going to come up with more reliable, more effective solutions. We are seeing the Russians turn to drones as well, but they also burnt their stockpiles of other weapons and are in an emergency too. And additionally they have also doubled their artillery shell production.
  - _joel 1y ago
    > TOW's are a thing from the 70s. They are essentially the same thing That's just not true. I've not seen a TOW chase around a guy in a field, well not on r/UkraineWarVideoReport at least.
    - throwawayffffas 1y ago
      Because tows are too fast. There is guidance, but the missiles fly at 200+ meters per second. If you fire it at a guy or a vehicle, you either going to hit very fast or miss very fast.
      - _joel 1y ago
        I know, it was a tongue in cheek reply ;)
originalvichy 1y ago
FPV drones for combat are a hot flash in the pan. They have had a major effect for now, but naturally as these countermeasures evolve, so weakens their effect. I keep telling people that the terrain and the strategies that Russians use is the primary reason for the effectiveness. Mortars and artillery already handle the same requirements as the author says. The reason they are effective in 2024-25 is that the drip-drip-drip of single soldiers running over vast fields / unarmoed vehicles driving over known routes is the only way Russians make progress. For a moving target they are great, but multiple moving targets would get shredded by competent artillery anyway. Most nations don’t have flat open fields where signals can reach far away drones unimpeded by line of sight for tx/rx. By far the best use of drones still is as battlefield recon/fire correction to adjust existing artillery/mortar capabilities. Source: I’m one such drone hobbyist and I’ve watched way too much footage from the front. None of what i’m writing is in absolute terms. I just don’t see the same way as commenters in the public who think they are a checkmate for any combat situation. The incompetence of the Russian forces caught everyone by surprise, but they have learned. My country’s border with Russia is heavily forested and not as flat as Russia. The drones are not able to go through the canopy. Infrared recon is a way better choice than FPV suicide drones.
- alphabettsy 1y ago
  > Most nations don’t have flat open fields where signals can reach far away drones unimpeded by line of sight for tx/rx. Citation needed.
  - originalvichy 1y ago
    Travel the world or check out your favorite map software, snd look at current hot conflicts and recent ones in the past. You have Iraq and Ukraine/Russia which are relatively flat, then you have Afghanistan or Iran on the opposite side of the spectrum. Even a flat country can have forests too thick for flying wirelessly or with fiber optics.
  - speeder 1y ago
    I saw some fascinating videos explaining that the terrain caused the war in first place. The huge border between Russia and Ukraine is completely flat grassland. This means that to Russia, Ukraine joining NATO is an unacceptable risk because that border is impossible to defend against NATO tank invasion, and the flatness go all the way to Moscow. A lot of people on internet keep poking fun at Russia inadequate tanks as "proof" Russia is stupid for invading with such crappy gear. Russia is very well aware of this, and is why they invaded in first place, they know of Ukraine joins NATO any military exchange with NATO (like what happened between Iran and Israel) would need to immediately become nuclear because their existing army can't defend the huge open flat terrain against NATO equipment.
randomNumber7 1y ago
It is only a matter of time until those drones fly into their target fully autonomously with machine learning. Heck, I could build that with hugginface (I will never do that) in a few evenings if you are ok to blow up the wrong target with a single digit percentage.
- euroderf 1y ago
  So the degree of collateral damage will depend upon your AI provider.
fdye 1y ago
Interesting read. Curious how the author feels re: the attack on airbases using shipping containers/drones that was so successful? Seems to be a unique case that worked especially well for (higher end I'm sure) FPV drones. Getting artillery in on shipping containers would have a higher likelihood of detection. Similarly, the ability to 'guide' in the drones with munitions seemed to allow for greater flexibility during the attack and its effectiveness. I imagine eventually these cheap FPV's will be augmented with low-cost GPU's allowing for running smallish models and self-guided autonomy. This would seem the next evolution where a commander deploys them in bulk and overwhelms the enemy in a way that can't be jammed like radio-communication. Similarly, horrifying when you consider their eventual use in terrorism scenarios...
- literalAardvark 1y ago
  That didn't use FPV drones, they're rather difficult to control at 6000km and they didn't have operators nearby. Most likely it's the first major deployment of their semi autonomous drone tech, driven "declaratively". They've shown that stuff recently, they probably used it before showing it.
  - LorenPechtel 1y ago
    The report said they were guided remotely. I suspect reality is a combination--think RTS game. You give orders to your units but you don't babysit them.
    - literalAardvark 1y ago
      Yeah that's how I think it went down. Autonomous control, likely from a base station nearby, or one of their new carrier drones, and remote command.
  - kilimounjaro 1y ago
    Ukraine’s drones were primarily LTE/4G-connected for remote operation
smcameron 1y ago
> If this type of pre-aborted mission is included in the total, the success rate drops to between 20 and 30 percent. On the face of it, this success rate is bad ... I disagree with this premise. I suspect that 20 to 30% success rate is not at all bad, but rather excellent. Compare to artillery with shells costing a few thousand each on the low end, to $100k+ for more advanced rounds, with 100s or 1000s fired per casualty.
- rich_sasha 1y ago
  The article claims it is 20-30% in quite limited circumstances, and less if you include "we know it will fail" sorties. And seemingly entirely disabled by jammers, where available. I guess they must be working for Ukraine, or it wouldn't be buying them. But how well they scale against a competent opponent is less clear.
FridayoLeary 1y ago
The author offers no major new insights on the effectiveness of drones. His counter argument is against the maximalists who claim quadcopters are revolutionising warfare and render armour and artillery obsolete. But nobody serious ever suggested that. The same way tanks are relevant despite rpgs. They simply represent a new element in the battlefield, and a useful one as well. The fact that they are not ideally suited for dropping bombs doesn't matter. They are great for surveillance and giving units situational awareness, and the fact that they can occasionally be used to attack targets that otherwise would be impossible simply augments their usefulness. The article is interesting, but it's attacking a straw man. I have a great respect for the ukrainian armed forces but to be perfectly honest their combat effectiveness is not exactly world beating. The suggestion that NATO should be taking lessons from how Ukraine is fighting Russia is odd.
markandrewj 1y ago
It is interesting hearing feedback from the frontline. Even with the issues, I think it is clear drones are changing modern warfare when you have companies like Anduril. What most people think is coming next is autonomous drones, although I don't morally agree with it. Sorry you had to have this experience, I wish this war would end, too many lives have been lost and it is senseless.
- ashoeafoot 1y ago
  The is also a sort of autonomous targetting for jammers available ? The grandfather of the shaheed was intended to guide itself towardsrrrussian radar aka em sources, so i guess a modern drone should be similar capable on connection loss to rech the disturbing em source.
tim333 1y ago
They may kind of suck but even so they are still transforming the war in Ukraine. A month or so ago FPV drones took out much of Russia's nuclear bomber fleet (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44150789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44150789), something like 80% of battlefield casualties are due to drones, neither side pretty much can use tanks because they get taken out by drones. It's a huge change in war fighting. One stat: "In May alone, Ukrainian drones destroyed over 89,000 Russian targets" https://www.newsweek.com/robert-brovdi-ukraine-russia-war-drones-2090785 https://www.newsweek.com/robert-brovdi-ukraine-russia-war-dr... They've recently promoted the 'Birds of Madyar' guy to run the newly formed Unmanned Systems Forces and are moving to a unified drone line defence the whole way along the frontline. Update on that: https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/2073811/russia-army-ukraine-drones-robert-brovdi https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/2073811/russia-army-ukr... Also re drones not having the effect of artillery, fair enough but Ukraine has been using FPV drones to destroy Russia's artillery. Here's footage of one of it's most modern being taken out https://youtu.be/DMOjOJnAd8A?t=161 https://youtu.be/DMOjOJnAd8A?t=161 It's kind of asymmetric - the artillery can't similarly take out the drones because they are too small and replaceable.
- Mars008 1y ago
  [dead]
- mike_hearn 1y ago
  The article addresses this in the first few paragraphs. The author argues that whilst the 80% may or may not be accurate, they're using a definition of drone that encompasses many kinds of machine and not just FPV drones which is what he's talking about. He also says the number is highly misleading because most of his FPV drone missions were double-taps where the target had already been taken out by more traditional military assets, and that commanders used drones mostly because they were given them rather than because that was the best military strategy.
moonshotideas 1y ago
I don’t agree with the conclusions he draws from his own analysis - almost all the issues and shortcomings he points out are related to technological shortcomings he admits - are already being addressed by the new systems - or are primarily issues with how drones are being used in the field - i.e. tactical combat decisions. These are not inherently valid arguments regarding the effectiveness of drones as a new weapons platform - but with the current state of the technology and with the decisions on the battlefield It’s early days, the technology will improve and the tactics will be standardized with time and drones will prove to be a dangerously effective tool - which has the additional scary bonus of being cheap and easy to mass produce and deploy
xoatic 1y ago
International volunteer? I think mercenary sh*t would be more appropriate.
aubanel 1y ago
One of the key points of the article is "I feel FPV drones to be mostly a failure because their success rate is low" Why is that a failure? If one 500$ drone has even only 10% success rate, if the target is a 1M$ equipment it's still a win!
xg15 1y ago
> Drones also operate in a cluttered segment of the electromagnetic spectrum. First-person view drones use unencrypted analog radio signals, and in hot parts of the front, as many as a dozen drone teams may be competing for use of a handful of frequencies (a consequence of using cheaper components). This results in the need for sophisticated de-confliction procedures that, quite simply, do not always work. Even when de-confliction works, sometimes a team must wait as long as half an hour for a frequency to become available before takeoff. If it does not work and two drones find themselves in the air on the same channel at the same time, they will interfere with each other’s signals, usually resulting in a crash. On top of that, the enemy’s drones also fly on the same frequencies, which can also result in interference and a crash. This gave me the somewhat macabre image of Ukrainian and Russian drones doing automated frequency coordination with each other, so they can orderly proceed in bombing each other's soldiers. I don't think that's what happens though. But I'm surprised flying drones in the same area as enemy operators is even possible. Wouldn't both sides try to jam or take over each other's signals, deliberately blocking channels, etc - so that in the end, no one could control anything? Or, if the signals are really unencrypted, what keeps anyone from setting up a radio beacon that just spams the "detonate now" signal on all channels at maximum power. Instant drone-free zone?
- dzhiurgis 1y ago
  I suspect jamming and spoofing isn't that trivial and requires lots of gear that needs to be on while giving out its location...
nurumaik 1y ago
Most of the problems the article describes are due to using civilian fpv drones on the battlefield or using untrained pilots: bad controls, narrow channel, faulty parts Most of them would not apply when military finally catches up, starts producing war fpv drones and make good drone pilot training programs
anovikov 1y ago
How many artillery shells one needs to expend to hit anything? I bet more than 10. And they are pricier AND endanger people who use them, more. Mortar shells (80mm class) are cheaper, but mortars need to be compared to drone-dropped munitions, not artillery shells - because mortars' range is way shorter than that of an FPV drone and is comparable to the artillery - a good FPV drone - although not the $500 one - can cover about the median artillery firing range of this war (16km). Drones bring about more casualties and are used wider exactly because they are more cost-efficient.

197 points by _tk_ 1y ago

> They are controlled by an operator wearing virtual-reality goggles They aren't really using VR headsets, right? The FPV goggles I know are just a screen showing the camera image without any virtual reality.

mog_dev 1y ago
Basically its just screen yes. It's just convenient and more portable to do it this way. Small desktop screen also exist and are used to peek on what the FPV operator is seeing.
wkat4242 1y ago
Yeah I'd much rather use an xreal air or something. You can still see if someone (or an enemy drone) comes to kill you. AR is much better for this.
- palata 1y ago
  Probably you want the pilot to be 100% focused on the piloting. Someone else can look around and try to keep the pilot safe. Also it's not like the pilot has to be exposed.
- originalvichy 1y ago
  They hide in bunkers and have other infantrycwith them if that’s not the case.
- Ancapistani 1y ago
  No, the latency is too high. There are dedicated devices for this - much lighter, external battery (same as the drones use), etc. I use a Skyzone 04X.

ggm 1y ago

You need to compare this to hit rate with mortars and attrition by counter battery fire on mortar teams. Not to detract from a sober assessment but it's hard to judge without the other parts of the story. Thr tldr would be "temper expectations"

gpderetta 1y ago
Yes, even a 20% success rate seems quite high.
- palata 1y ago
  > The vast majority of first-person view drone missions can be completed more cheaply, effectively, or reliably by other assets. At this point, the question becomes the price.
risyachka 1y ago
This. Mortar may be 5 times cheaper but 100x easier to destroy it and its crew. Also half of the problems described are purely technical and can be easily solved with some budget. In Ukraine most drones are assembled by volunteers. So its not the reliability of drone that is an issue, its lack of proper assembly and QA.
- FirmwareBurner 1y ago
  >So its not the reliability of drone that is an issue, its lack of proper assembly and QA Imagine what China can pull off here in case they're in a war.
  - bboygravity 1y ago
    China's fertility rate is 1. Even if they win the war, they still eventually will have lost.
    - LexGray 1y ago

TheChaplain 1y ago

The article talks about signal jammers, but as far as I know most drones there are remote controlled using fiber for exactly that reason?

troupo 1y ago
He talks about that in the article
rich_sasha 1y ago
There are... I think they aren't unproblematic - the fibre can get caught on things etc. Also I read of instances where the opposition can follow the fibre back to find the drone operators.
- FirmwareBurner 1y ago
  Sounds like for fiber optic strikes you gotta do a "shoot and scoot".
  - orthoxerox 1y ago
    The operators usually use a cordless drill to wind back as much cable as they can after the drone is used.
    - sorcerer-mar 1y ago
      This is why it's so fascinating to read about this conflict. The back and forth innovations (some obvious, some rudimentary, some very much not) is just incredible to follow. Early on: Drones in war! Then: Ahh EW makes them useless! Then: Fiber optics defeat EW! Then: But you can follow the cable! Then: But you can try to respool the cable with a power drill! Every week it seems is a new move.
      - throwawayffffas 1y ago
        Next up: Autonomous targeting. Next Next up: Decoys.

amai 1y ago

A guy from Slovakia is fighting for Ukraine? Don't tell that your prime minister and supporter of Russia Robert Fico.

codedokode 1y ago
Almost all Europe supports Russia by buying oil and natural gas.
- _joel 1y ago
  Through the pipeline they shut down or thorugh the shadow fleet they've sanctioned? As it stand, Europe is moving in the right direction, not quickly enough for some, but still. Ban on new Russian gas contracts starting January 1, 2026 End of short-term contracts by June 2026 Complete phase-out by end of 2027.
cosmicgadget 1y ago
Are you calling him a hypocrite for disagreeing with a politician from his country?
- amai 1y ago
  No, but I think it is suspicious that someone from a country with pro-russian politics claims that drones are bad for Ukraines war effort.

103e 1y ago

Don't drones have another advantage not mentioned here -- counter-battery against operators being more challenging?

throwawayffffas 1y ago
More challenging than what?
- orthoxerox 1y ago
  More challenging than counter-battery fire against artillery, which is basically a solved problem in warfare.
  - throwawayffffas 1y ago
    But not more challenging than counter battery against teams firing Javelins or other portable anti tank weapons.Or teams using Switchblades. FPVs are man portable guided munitions, not artillery. Pretty much all existing man portable guided anti tank weapons are better than FPVs at their job. And artillery is better than any of them at it's job. While FPVs can score kills they have minimal suppression effects, when an FPV hits a friendly, everyone else is going to keep moving, because stopping will offer them no benefit from the next one, and the next one might be minutes out. When an artillery round lands everyone hits the deck.
    - 103e 1y ago
      FPVs don't seem anti-tank replacement -- they do seem to have a role against soft targets ie against massing infantry, c2 nodes or suppression of enemy mortars. In this role, from a distance, they seem harder to suppress than the alternative, ie mortars. Also these are immature tech... I suspect at least some of the issues identified will be mitigated in time.
    - koonsolo 1y ago
      > Pretty much all existing man portable guided anti tank weapons are better than FPVs at their job. Sure, but a Javelin missile costs more than $200K. You can have 200 fpv drones for that price.

deleted 1y ago

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msgodel 1y ago

Soon they'll be using CV and won't need FPV.

palata 1y ago
You still want someone to get the drone to a place where it can see the target, and someone to select this target. Only then can CV do the last part ("terminal engagement"). But that also means it won't go inside a hangar and find the target there.
- bluGill 1y ago
  IF you tell it go into the hanger and find a target CV can do that. It might not be the best target in the hanger, but that doesn't matter too much if you can get in.
  - palata 1y ago
    If you add enough "if's", then surely everything is possible :-). I don't think we're anywhere near having drones that happily fly above a war zone, detect an interesting hangar, find a way to get inside and select a target inside. Currently they mostly fly FPV drones manually. The next basic step is to have "terminal engagement", where at some point they can select a target and the drone will fly autonomously to it using CV. But in order to do that, the drone will need processing power, and therefore it won't cost 500$ anymore. Would you rather go for a drone that costs 5k and can use CV for terminal engagement, or 10 drones that cost 500 and simply stay on their latest vector if no command arrives?
    - msgodel 1y ago
      How much are the controllers they're using now? It's not like computers and cameras needed to do interesting CV are all that expensive.
      - pzo 1y ago
        some mid-range iphones or android would even do the trick. especially iphones have tone of processing power nad strong NPU/GPU and lots of cameras, lidar, depth sensor, and plenty of other sensors. second hand phone 13 mini would do the trick and you can get it for less than $500

neilv 1y ago

> During my time in [...], I collected statistics on the success of our drone operations. I found that [...] Assuming the writer and their allegiances are what they say, is any of the info valuable to any of their adversaries? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loose_lips_sink_ships https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loose_lips_sink_ships

renmillar 1y ago
The Russians likely already have similar operational data from their own drone programs and intelligence gathering.
- ChrisRR 1y ago
  Still feels like why help them just in case they don't
originalvichy 1y ago
None of what he is saying is that valuable. All of these problems are something a hobbyist fpv drone pilot can share. Add to that, it’s quite old info. If the author didn’t get a chance to see fiber optic drones, they left the fray a long time ago in terms of advancement.

aqsalose 1y ago

Many of the issues sound like issues coming from using improvised civilian hobbyist tech and doctrine being in its infancy. If current FPV drones are bit lackluster, it doesn't preclude 'next generation' that are purposefully developed for military use won't be useful. Also it sounds like the designation of "FPV drone" is specific to particular family of drones specific in current day and time, which may be something quite else next year. Like, obviously the next stage is a FPV drone with some capabilities of "reusable" drone or loitering munition author complains of (capability to hover easily)? Or "reusable" drone with FPV camera?

palata 1y ago
> Many of the issues sound like issues coming from using improvised civilian hobbyist tech I don't think it's improvised civilian hobbyist tech. They run autopilots that also fly professional drones and can fly planes. I think it's mostly that it has to be super cheap, otherwise it doesn't bring value (because other weapons are more efficient if you have more money). If your one-way drone costs 10k dollars, maybe it's too expensive even though it can fly during the night. And then there are fundamental limitations, like flying in bad weather. > obviously the next stage is a FPV drone with some capabilities of "reusable" drone But a reusable drone won't go inside a hangar (because at this point it probably won't come out). If your drone can go somewhere, drop something and come back, doesn't it mean that another class of weapons could do this job?
- spwa4 1y ago
  Sadly I think that AI will make a very large difference here. And AI hardware that can control weapons is already hundreds of dollars and dropping fast, because a cell phone can do it.
  - Nicook 1y ago
    [flagged]
- bluGill 1y ago
  $10,000 can be cheap for a one way drone. Bombs often cost for more than that. The real question is value, if hitting the target is worth more than the cost of what you hit it with then you have a good value. Taking out a $1000 drone with a $100,000 missile is a good value if that drone is headed for a $1,000,000 building, but if the drone is headed for a cow probably not worth it.

Zextin 1y ago

[flagged]

mensetmanusman 1y ago
War is one of humanities oldest past times. If men can’t figure out their differences, they try to kill each other, as witnessed in the entire animal kingdom.
subscribed 1y ago
Unhappy that rapists and baby killers are stopped before they can commit more war crimes?
- Zextin 1y ago
  [flagged]
Mona4000 1y ago
Why are his brothers invading his country?
msie 1y ago
Well, Slovaks don’t believe they’re Russian.

GiorgioG 1y ago

FPV drones don’t suck if you know what you’re doing. If you don’t have proper training, you’re going to suck at it.

dewey 1y ago
Sometimes you don’t have time and resources to train everyone to be great. Good enough will have to do. > As a result, training a highly proficient operator can take months. A standard, base-level course for Ukrainian drone pilots takes about five weeks
- GiorgioG 1y ago
  No disagreement there, but the title states "FPV Drones Kind of Suck".

gadders 1y ago

I've seen some of these FPV videos of kills of unarmed Russian soldiers. I honestly don't know why the pilots are not prosecuted for war crimes. (and I'm sure Russia does the same to Ukraine, I just haven't seen those videos).

troupo 1y ago
> I've seen some of these FPV videos of kills of unarmed Russian soldiers. I honestly don't know why the pilots are not prosecuted for war crimes. An enemy combatant doesn't stop being an enemy combatant just because he dropped his weapons. War crime is executing prisoners. And there are a few videos were Russians gleefully murder prisoners
gooseus 1y ago
It's because killing unarmed soldiers during war is not a war crime. Rule 3. All members of the armed forces of a party to the conflict are combatants, except medical and religious personnel. https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule3 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule3 Rule 47. Attacking persons who are recognized as hors de combat is prohibited. A person hors de combat is: (a) anyone who is in the power of an adverse party; (b) anyone who is defenceless because of unconsciousness, shipwreck, wounds or sickness; or (c) anyone who clearly expresses an intention to surrender; provided he or she abstains from any hostile act and does not attempt to escape https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule47 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule47 A surprise drone attack on any Russian combatant that isn't a medic or chaplain is "lawful", even if they aren't holding a weapon at the time.
- gadders 1y ago
  Pretty sure I've seen some that fall under Rule 47.
  - originalvichy 1y ago
    There’s regularly uploaded footage of clearly surrendering soldiers directed towards a safe zone to give up. Propaganda is propaganda, but it happens more often than we might think.

varjag 1y ago

This tracks with the earlier ~12% drone kill efficiency estimates. However drone is a mass deployment weapon. Ukraine did about 2 million frontline sorties in 2024 and aims for 5 million this year. This 1 out of 9 ratio translates into absolutely devastating damage, that artillery and airstrikes (which are also hardly "easy to use") can only dream of.

Neil44 1y ago
This is true, but the author also talks about cost e.g. $500 for a drone vs $100 for an artillery shell with far more effect. Surely at the point where the drone has visual on the target you can fire 5 x shells over for massively greater effect on target, and keep the drone flying for the next target, and the next.
- varjag 1y ago
  $100 is a cost of a 60mm mortar shell. It is a hand grenade sized munition lobbed from a Pringles can sized weapon to the range of 1-2km. This is generally not the thing that comes to mind when you think of artillery strike. A 155mm (dumb, unguided) shell would set you back 5-8K USD. That's before the propellant charge, fuse and amortization of the artillery piece and its 5 man crew.
  - Neil44 1y ago
    That's interesting thankyou. It's a good google rabbit hole. Apparently we're in surge pricing right now because of Ukraine, and Russian shells are only costing them $1000. It seems they caught us sleeping, manufacturing wise.
    - varjag 1y ago
      The heavy Soivet calibre used by Russia is 152mm which translates to a slightly cheaper shell (though not 5x for sure). Russia also uses 122mm arty which is substantially cheaper: the costs follow to the cube volume. Another factor is that a lot of supplies are Iranian and North Korean old stock with what we can assume reasonable prices. Ukraine was getting Vietnam war era 155mm stock relatively cheap too, while it lasted.

paganel 1y ago

> I would, first of all, recommend ensuring that troops in the field have well-trained organic mortar support with an ample supply of ammunition. That would not be possible because it has become basically impossible to bring in vehicles close to 5-10 kms of the front-lines because of the, well, drones. And you need to carry ammunition to those mortars with something, preferably not how the Vietnamese did it in the jungle (i.e. using brute human force). Just check this snippet from a recent article in the FT: > “'At this point, you’re a lucky man if you drive 5km from the front line and your car is still operational,' a Ukrainian drone unit commander deployed in eastern Donetsk region told the Financial Times. He said his men now sometimes had to walk up to 15km at night to reach their positions... > In the past weeks, Ukrainian supply trucks have reportedly been hit by Russian drones on the road linking Kramatorsk to Dobropillia, some 30km from the fighting. On both sides of the front line, roads are being covered with anti-drone nets in an attempt to stop fibre optic drones." This comes from Ukrainian guys still fighting this war, not from a Western war-tourist like the guy who wrote this article. [1] https://x.com/RALee85/status/1937816538439991310 https://x.com/RALee85/status/1937816538439991310

originalvichy 1y ago
The author writes that he was not there for the fiber optic evolution. They have changed the game when it comes to these flat open terrains with heavy jamming. The quality control and cheap components issues won’t go away unless they are improved, which brings costs to a ”cheap” alternative. As I wrote in my comment above, walking/driving moving targets are still on the table, just not as feasible as in the early days without signals jamming.
- paganel 1y ago
  > As I wrote in my comment above, walking/driving moving targets are still on the table This seems to directly contradict this direct quote from the recent FT article I linked to: > At this point, you’re a lucky man if you drive 5km from the front line and your car is still operational
  - 1y ago

time0ut 1y ago

I assume this is like a pilot in WW1 reporting how finicky and hard to use bi-planes were. No doubt a bunch of weapons manufacturers have seen this and the special operations Ukraine did in Russia and Israel did in Iran and the wheels of progress are turning and the result will be terrifying.

palata 1y ago
What terrifies me is that the next step may be AI swarms, where one side sends thousands of drones at the same time and let each of them autonomously choose what they want to target. It's all technically feasible up to "choosing wisely".
- koonsolo 1y ago
  In a sense it's already happening with the Shahed drones. Maybe not smart AI, but the end result is still the same: you have no clue where they will end up.
  - FridayoLeary 1y ago
    What's eye opening about the recent iran israel conflict is how drones were used. Iran fired about 1000 drones and israel easily destroyed all but one of them. On the other hand israel used drones to devastating effect. I'm not sure what to make of that, but it's clear that drones as a primary means of warfare is simply not effective. hamas and hezbolla have no notable successes with drones, except for on october 7 where they used them to great effect to destroy specific machine gun emplacements and a couple of tanks. They will be part of the future, but never the future itself.
    - LorenPechtel 1y ago
      Israel has been serious about defending against simple weapons for a long time. And expect them to have doubled down on this since 10/7. As far as I know they are the only modern power to have done so.
- 1y ago

palata 1y ago

I see a lot of comments saying that "but the technology will improve". Sure, maybe. Or maybe it will be like Musk announcing what Teslas will be capable of in 6 months. We don't know, and the author doesn't pretend that they do. Don't forget that drones have been used in this war for years, and the vast majority of the drone industry has already pivoted to the military because it's easier to make money there. So it's not exactly "brand new technology". But my point is that the author just says "from what I've seen, here is how it looks". And it seems like it has value.

originalvichy 1y ago
I agree, and I also raised more points in my comment. The terrain of the flatlands between Ukraine and Russia is the main reason for their success. The same could be said for vast parts of the Middle-East. It’s easy to operate these on farmlands that go for kilometers.
dinfinity 1y ago
> Don't forget that drones have been used in this war for years 3 years of usage is brand new. Neither Ukraine nor Russia have been designing and producing purpose-built FPV drones since the beginning (I assume things are well underway now). It's a bunch of consumer shit thrown together, which makes it kind of incredible that they work as well as they do. An equivalent would be something like taping an assault rifle to a small Cessna and dominating with that. And then you saying that "maybe the technology will not improve".
- palata 1y ago
  > 3 years of usage is brand new. Usage, sure. But the technology is not. Those drones are flying smartphones. We have already had mass-produced consumer drones for more than a decade. We don't use them because they are new, we use them because they are cheap and accessible. I am not sure what you call "consumer shit" here. They go for cheap FPV drones precisely because they are cheap. But the autopilot running in them can fly a Cessna. We can make them fly longer (they will be bigger), we can use better radios, we can add thermal cameras and bigger payloads. We can add GPUs and AI capabilities. All that we have, but then it doesn't cost 500$ anymore. > An equivalent would be something like taping an assault rifle to a small Cessna and dominating with that. Or maybe you see an assault rifle and say "Look at this rifle; it's only the beginning! In a couple years it will have wings and it will drop heavy bombs before returning to base, because it will be reusable". And I'm saying: we already have fighter jets; they are just more expensive.

oersted 1y ago

I don’t understand why the author has such a narrow definition of FPV drones. He talks as if reusable drones are a completely different category, that they are all toys designed for enthusiast racers… Generally he implies that a myriad arbitrary technical details are fundamental limitations of this paradigm, it’s a strange mindset. Also, as others commenters state, isn’t a 43% success rate exceedingly high? Even if it’s 20% accounting for environmental factors and faults in manufacturing. How likely is it that a mortar does anything? Or a soldier with a rifle? Or anything else? > When I joined the team, I was excited to work with a cutting-edge tool. It sounds like he was imagining some kind of scifi adventure, but it’s always been clear that they are using cheap drones with tech that has been commonplace for a decade. And that’s completely fine, it’s intentional.

palata 1y ago
> Also, as others commenters state, isn’t a 43% success rate exceedingly high? Even if it’s 20% That's the whole question, and that's kind of the point that the article raises: the success rate does not matter. What matters is the cost. At the same cost, can you do more damage with other weapons or not?
- oersted 1y ago
  Indeed that’s what I meant, it’s a good question. It sounds like the author only saw the cases where mortars or reusable drones had been successful. But I cannot imagine a mortar being more efficient even if one shot is 5x cheaper. Perhaps they are more effective at suppression, but I would be surprised if they really hit anything meaningful more than 5% of the time, similar with most artillery or bombing, or just plain infantry. What even comes close to the success rate of a drone to hit a particular moving target? And you can do it while hidden 10km away with a lightly trained operator. And manufactured cheaply, safely and quickly by unskilled labor, and easily transported to the front and hand-carried by troops. Any kind of alternative, like precision bombing or sniping, or just getting close and shooting at it, must be much more costly, particularly when you also account for the cost of the equipment used, even if it is reusable, and the training, risk and human cost.
- 1y ago

Cockbrand 1y ago

I guess I'm missing something, but why isn't the problem of finicky steering solved by adding auto-stabilizing software? Would that take away too much of the maneuverability?

koonsolo 1y ago
My first reaction was the same. I have a small indoor quadcopter with 2 main modes: freestyle (like a helicopter), and an easier mode that keeps the drone hovering. My first thought was, why not use the easier mode (press forward to go forward, back to go back, etc.)? But looking at those war videos, these drones always come at an angle towards the target. And in that sense, it's easier to use the more difficult helicopter mode. What I mean is, once you know the helicopter mode, it's easier to do this kind of maneuver than using the "easy mode".
tguvot 1y ago
i saw ukrainian footage of drones where they switch to/from auto hover mode

avoutos 1y ago

Even if the technology improves and the economics of scale reduces the cost, I still don't buy the narrative that swarms of tiny kamikaze drones will radically change warfare. Aside from radio jamming, I have not seen an actual defense against a strong EMP. To defend against an EMP wiping out your drone swarm, you would have to invest in shielding etc which would remove them from the class of small cheap drones. Idk if anyone can speak about this, but to me this doesn't seem like a problem that these types of drones can overcome.

lofaszvanitt 1y ago
Maybe you should watch the countless videos DAILY, where soldiers are crippled for life.
throwawayffffas 1y ago
EMP weapons are expensive, and one shot. I can see the future of drone swarms, but we are a long way out.
general1726 1y ago
Usually the initial attack (From Ukrainian perspective) is stopped by regular military weapons like AT, Artillery, Mines and drones are used to mop up the battlefield - Burn out abandoned vehicles and hunt scattered soldiers
CapricornNoble 1y ago
I think you are overstating the ease of employing an EMP. https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/world-wont-end-danger-emp-attack-more-fantasy-fact-94681 https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/world-wont-end-danger...

dfedbeef 1y ago

This is kind of a 'Muskets are cool but they take too long to reload' vibe. Yeah Ukraine isn't working with the best tech; it's a doctrine of desperation rather than preparation. But they discovered something effective and it will change the way wars are fought in the future.

throwawayffffas 1y ago
> But they discovered something effective and it will change the way wars are fought in the future. They didn't really. TOW's are a thing from the 70s. They are essentially the same thing, but instead of electric rotors they are using a rocket motor. Switchblades existed before this conflict too, if loitering is the measure we are going with. It's a hacked together solution to a real problem they are having, lack of artillery shells and more reliable munitions. And well done to them. But a country with the benefit of time and deep pockets is going to come up with more reliable, more effective solutions. We are seeing the Russians turn to drones as well, but they also burnt their stockpiles of other weapons and are in an emergency too. And additionally they have also doubled their artillery shell production.
- _joel 1y ago
  > TOW's are a thing from the 70s. They are essentially the same thing That's just not true. I've not seen a TOW chase around a guy in a field, well not on r/UkraineWarVideoReport at least.
  - throwawayffffas 1y ago
    Because tows are too fast. There is guidance, but the missiles fly at 200+ meters per second. If you fire it at a guy or a vehicle, you either going to hit very fast or miss very fast.
    - _joel 1y ago
      I know, it was a tongue in cheek reply ;)

originalvichy 1y ago

FPV drones for combat are a hot flash in the pan. They have had a major effect for now, but naturally as these countermeasures evolve, so weakens their effect. I keep telling people that the terrain and the strategies that Russians use is the primary reason for the effectiveness. Mortars and artillery already handle the same requirements as the author says. The reason they are effective in 2024-25 is that the drip-drip-drip of single soldiers running over vast fields / unarmoed vehicles driving over known routes is the only way Russians make progress. For a moving target they are great, but multiple moving targets would get shredded by competent artillery anyway. Most nations don’t have flat open fields where signals can reach far away drones unimpeded by line of sight for tx/rx. By far the best use of drones still is as battlefield recon/fire correction to adjust existing artillery/mortar capabilities. Source: I’m one such drone hobbyist and I’ve watched way too much footage from the front. None of what i’m writing is in absolute terms. I just don’t see the same way as commenters in the public who think they are a checkmate for any combat situation. The incompetence of the Russian forces caught everyone by surprise, but they have learned. My country’s border with Russia is heavily forested and not as flat as Russia. The drones are not able to go through the canopy. Infrared recon is a way better choice than FPV suicide drones.

alphabettsy 1y ago
> Most nations don’t have flat open fields where signals can reach far away drones unimpeded by line of sight for tx/rx. Citation needed.
- originalvichy 1y ago
  Travel the world or check out your favorite map software, snd look at current hot conflicts and recent ones in the past. You have Iraq and Ukraine/Russia which are relatively flat, then you have Afghanistan or Iran on the opposite side of the spectrum. Even a flat country can have forests too thick for flying wirelessly or with fiber optics.
- speeder 1y ago
  I saw some fascinating videos explaining that the terrain caused the war in first place. The huge border between Russia and Ukraine is completely flat grassland. This means that to Russia, Ukraine joining NATO is an unacceptable risk because that border is impossible to defend against NATO tank invasion, and the flatness go all the way to Moscow. A lot of people on internet keep poking fun at Russia inadequate tanks as "proof" Russia is stupid for invading with such crappy gear. Russia is very well aware of this, and is why they invaded in first place, they know of Ukraine joins NATO any military exchange with NATO (like what happened between Iran and Israel) would need to immediately become nuclear because their existing army can't defend the huge open flat terrain against NATO equipment.

randomNumber7 1y ago

It is only a matter of time until those drones fly into their target fully autonomously with machine learning. Heck, I could build that with hugginface (I will never do that) in a few evenings if you are ok to blow up the wrong target with a single digit percentage.

euroderf 1y ago
So the degree of collateral damage will depend upon your AI provider.

fdye 1y ago

Interesting read. Curious how the author feels re: the attack on airbases using shipping containers/drones that was so successful? Seems to be a unique case that worked especially well for (higher end I'm sure) FPV drones. Getting artillery in on shipping containers would have a higher likelihood of detection. Similarly, the ability to 'guide' in the drones with munitions seemed to allow for greater flexibility during the attack and its effectiveness. I imagine eventually these cheap FPV's will be augmented with low-cost GPU's allowing for running smallish models and self-guided autonomy. This would seem the next evolution where a commander deploys them in bulk and overwhelms the enemy in a way that can't be jammed like radio-communication. Similarly, horrifying when you consider their eventual use in terrorism scenarios...

literalAardvark 1y ago
That didn't use FPV drones, they're rather difficult to control at 6000km and they didn't have operators nearby. Most likely it's the first major deployment of their semi autonomous drone tech, driven "declaratively". They've shown that stuff recently, they probably used it before showing it.
- LorenPechtel 1y ago
  The report said they were guided remotely. I suspect reality is a combination--think RTS game. You give orders to your units but you don't babysit them.
  - literalAardvark 1y ago
    Yeah that's how I think it went down. Autonomous control, likely from a base station nearby, or one of their new carrier drones, and remote command.
- kilimounjaro 1y ago
  Ukraine’s drones were primarily LTE/4G-connected for remote operation

smcameron 1y ago

> If this type of pre-aborted mission is included in the total, the success rate drops to between 20 and 30 percent. On the face of it, this success rate is bad ... I disagree with this premise. I suspect that 20 to 30% success rate is not at all bad, but rather excellent. Compare to artillery with shells costing a few thousand each on the low end, to $100k+ for more advanced rounds, with 100s or 1000s fired per casualty.

rich_sasha 1y ago
The article claims it is 20-30% in quite limited circumstances, and less if you include "we know it will fail" sorties. And seemingly entirely disabled by jammers, where available. I guess they must be working for Ukraine, or it wouldn't be buying them. But how well they scale against a competent opponent is less clear.

FridayoLeary 1y ago

The author offers no major new insights on the effectiveness of drones. His counter argument is against the maximalists who claim quadcopters are revolutionising warfare and render armour and artillery obsolete. But nobody serious ever suggested that. The same way tanks are relevant despite rpgs. They simply represent a new element in the battlefield, and a useful one as well. The fact that they are not ideally suited for dropping bombs doesn't matter. They are great for surveillance and giving units situational awareness, and the fact that they can occasionally be used to attack targets that otherwise would be impossible simply augments their usefulness. The article is interesting, but it's attacking a straw man. I have a great respect for the ukrainian armed forces but to be perfectly honest their combat effectiveness is not exactly world beating. The suggestion that NATO should be taking lessons from how Ukraine is fighting Russia is odd.

markandrewj 1y ago

It is interesting hearing feedback from the frontline. Even with the issues, I think it is clear drones are changing modern warfare when you have companies like Anduril. What most people think is coming next is autonomous drones, although I don't morally agree with it. Sorry you had to have this experience, I wish this war would end, too many lives have been lost and it is senseless.

ashoeafoot 1y ago
The is also a sort of autonomous targetting for jammers available ? The grandfather of the shaheed was intended to guide itself towardsrrrussian radar aka em sources, so i guess a modern drone should be similar capable on connection loss to rech the disturbing em source.

tim333 1y ago

They may kind of suck but even so they are still transforming the war in Ukraine. A month or so ago FPV drones took out much of Russia's nuclear bomber fleet (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44150789 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44150789), something like 80% of battlefield casualties are due to drones, neither side pretty much can use tanks because they get taken out by drones. It's a huge change in war fighting. One stat: "In May alone, Ukrainian drones destroyed over 89,000 Russian targets" https://www.newsweek.com/robert-brovdi-ukraine-russia-war-drones-2090785 https://www.newsweek.com/robert-brovdi-ukraine-russia-war-dr... They've recently promoted the 'Birds of Madyar' guy to run the newly formed Unmanned Systems Forces and are moving to a unified drone line defence the whole way along the frontline. Update on that: https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/2073811/russia-army-ukraine-drones-robert-brovdi https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/2073811/russia-army-ukr... Also re drones not having the effect of artillery, fair enough but Ukraine has been using FPV drones to destroy Russia's artillery. Here's footage of one of it's most modern being taken out https://youtu.be/DMOjOJnAd8A?t=161 https://youtu.be/DMOjOJnAd8A?t=161 It's kind of asymmetric - the artillery can't similarly take out the drones because they are too small and replaceable.

Mars008 1y ago
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mike_hearn 1y ago
The article addresses this in the first few paragraphs. The author argues that whilst the 80% may or may not be accurate, they're using a definition of drone that encompasses many kinds of machine and not just FPV drones which is what he's talking about. He also says the number is highly misleading because most of his FPV drone missions were double-taps where the target had already been taken out by more traditional military assets, and that commanders used drones mostly because they were given them rather than because that was the best military strategy.

moonshotideas 1y ago

I don’t agree with the conclusions he draws from his own analysis - almost all the issues and shortcomings he points out are related to technological shortcomings he admits - are already being addressed by the new systems - or are primarily issues with how drones are being used in the field - i.e. tactical combat decisions. These are not inherently valid arguments regarding the effectiveness of drones as a new weapons platform - but with the current state of the technology and with the decisions on the battlefield It’s early days, the technology will improve and the tactics will be standardized with time and drones will prove to be a dangerously effective tool - which has the additional scary bonus of being cheap and easy to mass produce and deploy

xoatic 1y ago

International volunteer? I think mercenary sh*t would be more appropriate.

aubanel 1y ago

One of the key points of the article is "I feel FPV drones to be mostly a failure because their success rate is low" Why is that a failure? If one 500$ drone has even only 10% success rate, if the target is a 1M$ equipment it's still a win!

xg15 1y ago

> Drones also operate in a cluttered segment of the electromagnetic spectrum. First-person view drones use unencrypted analog radio signals, and in hot parts of the front, as many as a dozen drone teams may be competing for use of a handful of frequencies (a consequence of using cheaper components). This results in the need for sophisticated de-confliction procedures that, quite simply, do not always work. Even when de-confliction works, sometimes a team must wait as long as half an hour for a frequency to become available before takeoff. If it does not work and two drones find themselves in the air on the same channel at the same time, they will interfere with each other’s signals, usually resulting in a crash. On top of that, the enemy’s drones also fly on the same frequencies, which can also result in interference and a crash. This gave me the somewhat macabre image of Ukrainian and Russian drones doing automated frequency coordination with each other, so they can orderly proceed in bombing each other's soldiers. I don't think that's what happens though. But I'm surprised flying drones in the same area as enemy operators is even possible. Wouldn't both sides try to jam or take over each other's signals, deliberately blocking channels, etc - so that in the end, no one could control anything? Or, if the signals are really unencrypted, what keeps anyone from setting up a radio beacon that just spams the "detonate now" signal on all channels at maximum power. Instant drone-free zone?

dzhiurgis 1y ago
I suspect jamming and spoofing isn't that trivial and requires lots of gear that needs to be on while giving out its location...

nurumaik 1y ago

Most of the problems the article describes are due to using civilian fpv drones on the battlefield or using untrained pilots: bad controls, narrow channel, faulty parts Most of them would not apply when military finally catches up, starts producing war fpv drones and make good drone pilot training programs

anovikov 1y ago

How many artillery shells one needs to expend to hit anything? I bet more than 10. And they are pricier AND endanger people who use them, more. Mortar shells (80mm class) are cheaper, but mortars need to be compared to drone-dropped munitions, not artillery shells - because mortars' range is way shorter than that of an FPV drone and is comparable to the artillery - a good FPV drone - although not the $500 one - can cover about the median artillery firing range of this war (16km). Drones bring about more casualties and are used wider exactly because they are more cost-efficient.