Russia is facing "huge problems" across Ukraine with Kyiv-operated first-person-view (FPV) drones, a prominent Russian military blogger has said, as Moscow makes gains in several points along the frontlines amid the ongoing war between the two countries.
FPV drones are a common and effective tool in Ukraine's uncrewed arsenal. They can be used to record dramatic battlefield footage where the drone careens towards Russian vehicles before exploding, or deployed as reconnaissance tools to guide artillery strikes.
"FPV drones have proven to be an effective weapon," Oleksandr Shtupun, former spokesperson of Ukraine's Tavria grouping of forces that covers part of the frontlines in Eastern Ukraine, told Newsweek in mid-December 2023.
Mykhailo Fedorov, Kyiv's Minister of Digital Transformation, heading up Ukraine's drone efforts against Russia, also told Newsweek at the time that "they work sometimes even more efficiently than artillery."
"The enemy is already changing frequencies and ordering industrial production with this changed parameter from foreign factories," an influential Russian military blogger wrote in a post to the Telegram messaging app on Sunday. "Our electronic warfare is not always effective against them."
Newsweek has reached out to the Russian Defense Ministry and the Ukrainian military for comment via email.
Ukrainian sources have also reported that Russia's military has moved its own FPV drones to frequencies different to those often used by Ukraine's electronic warfare (EW) systems, in particular the portable versions, Samuel Bendett of the U.S.-based think tank the Center for Naval Analyses (CNA) told Newsweek on Monday.
Both sides appear to believe the other is producing more FPV drones, but it is very difficult to discern true numbers, he added.
Ukraine had dominated FPV manufacturing in the early parts of 2023, but Russia responded by ramping up its own production programs. Kyiv, meanwhile, has run several fundraisers to keep up its supply of the cheap, but crucial, drones.
"Multiple Russian volunteer, state and affiliated manufacturing efforts have significantly ramped up FPV development and shipped large quantities to the front," Bendett previously told Newsweek, adding in mid-December that Russia was likely receiving tens of thousands of FPV drones from these efforts each month.
A Ukrainian commander said in mid-December that Kyiv's fighters had just one FPV drone for up to seven Russian FPV drones in key battleground sectors of eastern and southern Ukraine.
EW is part of how Russia and Ukraine are working to combat the other's extensive FPV fleet. EW systems can interfere with the targeting of drones, jamming the signals from satellites directing the uncrewed vehicles to their destination.
"Electronic warfare has impacted the fighting in Ukraine as much as weather and terrain," Bryan Clark of the U.S.-based think tank the Hudson Institute, told The New York Times in November 2023.
Drones and EW are part of both Moscow and Kyiv's efforts to restrain one another at several points along the frontline. Russian forces have pressed westward since its forces captured Avdiivka, a city that had weathered a decade on the frontlines in eastern Ukraine and was considered a Ukrainian stronghold, in mid-February.
It was the first major win for the Kremlin since it claimed the destroyed Donetsk city of Bakhmut, northeast of Avdiivka, and Ukraine has since withdrawn from a handful of villages west of the city.
Moscow's troops have also advanced to the west and south of the Russian-controlled city of Kreminna, including east of the village of Terny. Ukraine said on Monday that Russia had launched 11 attacks around the villages of Tabaivka and Synkivka, close to the Kharkiv city of Kupiansk.
The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a Washington-based think tank, has previously dubbed Russia's increased operations around Svatove, Kreminna and Kupiansk—a key railway hub—a "cohesive multi-axis offensive operation."
Russia is "having some success" in this sector of the frontline, the commander of the 13th Brigade of Ukraine's National Guard, told Newsweek in late February.
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About the writer
Ellie Cook is a Newsweek security and defense reporter based in London, U.K. Her work focuses largely on the Russia-Ukraine ... Read more
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