El 10 de septiembre, las fuerzas ucranianas\u00a0lanzaron\u00a0el mayor ataque con drones de la guerra hasta la fecha, con 144 de ellos dirigidos contra Mosc\u00fa. El ataque se sald\u00f3 con el derribo de 20 drones y varios edificios residenciales de varios pisos cerca de Mosc\u00fa fueron incendiados. Los vuelos desde los aeropuertos m\u00e1s importantes de Rusia se suspendieron temporalmente. En respuesta, Rusia lanz\u00f3 un ataque de represalia con 46 drones.<\/p>\n
On September 10, Ukrainian forces\u00a0launched<\/a>\u00a0the largest drone attack of the war to date, targeting Moscow with 144 drones. The assault resulted in 20 drones being shot down, while several multi-story residential buildings near Moscow were set ablaze. Flights from Russia\u2019s most important airports were temporarily suspended. In response, Russia launched a retaliatory strike using 46 drones.<\/p>\n The strikes from both sides highlight a now indisputable fact: drone warfare is playing a determining role in the\u00a0Ukraine war<\/a>.<\/p>\n Armed drones, or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), are pilotless aircraft used to locate, monitor, and strike targets, including individuals and equipment. Since the September 11 attacks, the United States has significantly expanded its use of UAVs for global counterterrorism missions. Drones have key advantages\u00a0over manned weapons<\/a>. They can stay airborne for over 14 hours, compared to under four hours for manned aircraft like the F-16, allowing for continuous surveillance without risking pilot safety. Additionally, drones offer near-instant responsiveness, with missiles striking targets within seconds, unlike slower manned systems, such as the 1998 cruise missile strike on Osama bin Laden, which relied on hours-old intelligence.<\/p>\n There is much discussion in the US defense establishment regarding the use of drones, drone policy and how they should be incorporated into military strategy. According to the\u00a0Marine Corps University<\/a>, in order to calculate the effectiveness of a drone strike, several factors must be considered, including Tactical Military Effectiveness (TME), Operational Military Effectiveness (OME), and Strategic Military Effectiveness (SME). TME assesses how well the drone strike achieves its immediate objective, such as neutralizing a specific target. OME evaluates the broader impact on military operations, such as troop movements or operational coordination. Lastly, SME considers the long-term consequences of drone warfare, including the effects of drone strikes on enemy leadership, public opinion, and international relations. All three factors are critical in ensuring that drone strikes align with both short-term and long-term military objectives.<\/p>\n Drones are being deployed in large numbers in the\u00a0Ukraine war<\/a>, having already played a major role in the battles between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces in Nagorno-Karabakh. They are also becoming an increasingly key platform in the\u00a0Myanmar civil war<\/a>\u00a0and conflicts across the Middle East. Advanced militaries, including the Pentagon, are closely monitoring these theaters to refine their own drone strategies. For example, recently the U.S.\u00a0released<\/a>\u00a0a \u2018drone hellscape strategy\u2019 for the defense of Taiwan, while China has been\u00a0conducting simulations<\/a>\u00a0of a\u00a0drone-only attack<\/a>\u00a0on the island. Yet even the world\u2019s most advanced militaries seem to lack a definitive approach to drone warfare. And, ironically, they continue to learn valuable lessons from underfunded and undertrained rebels in other far-flung global conflicts.<\/p>\n Drone warfare in the Myanmar civil war<\/strong><\/p>\n The Free Burma Rangers, a frontline aid group in the\u00a0Myanmar civil war<\/a>, has been reporting on the increasing incidence of drone warfare in the conflict. On September 6, 2024, a Tatmadaw drone strike resulted in the deaths of four civilians\u2014two men and two women, and one person was also wounded in the attack. Another drone dropped a handmade bomb on a civilian home in Loi Lem Lay Village, Karenni State. During the same incident, a Tatmadaw drone with six propellers experienced mechanical issues while flying over the battlefield and was subsequently captured by the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force (KNDF), a pro-democracy\u00a0ethnic army<\/a>. Taken together, these incidents underscore how drone warfare is still in its tactical infancy, with numerous failed deployments, and how payloads and weaponization are often being improvised by soldiers on the ground.<\/p>\n Other rebel armies in the\u00a0Myanmar civil war<\/a>, particularly the People\u2019s Defense Forces (PDF), have developed their own drone units. For instance, a PDF unit reportedly\u00a0carried out<\/a>\u00a0125 drone strikes during the Battle of Loikaw in Kayah State. Another unit claims responsibility for around 80 drone strikes last year, resulting in the deaths of 80 to 100 junta troops. These forces are either\u00a0manufacturing<\/a>\u00a0their own drones or repurposing civilian models by adding deployable explosives. The drones are inexpensive, widely available, and highly effective. Even the junta, supported by China and Russia, has adopted similar tactics by attaching mortar shells to their drones, while\u00a0ethnic armies<\/a>\u00a0often use homemade explosives based on mortar shells captured from the Tatmadaw. These devices can range from 40 to 60mm, carry up to\u00a02.5 kg of explosives<\/a> and shrapnel, and are capable of killing or injuring anyone within a 100-meter radius in open terrain.<\/p>\n FPV drones a game-changer in the Ukraine war<\/strong><\/p>\n In addition to homemade and modified drones, first-person view (FPV) drones can\u00a0cost<\/a>\u00a0around $500 USD each, while reconnaissance drones equipped with advanced cameras can run into the thousands. Ukraine is deploying these drones at a rate of 100,000 per month, with\u00a0plans<\/a>\u00a0to produce one million FPV drones in 2024. For a sense of just how important drones have become in the\u00a0Ukraine war<\/a>, consider the fact that this figure far exceeds the number of artillery shells supplied by the entire European Union over the past year.<\/p>\n FPV drones, launched from improvised platforms, can fly between\u00a05 and 20 kilometers<\/a>\u00a0depending on their size, battery, and payload. Controlled by a soldier using a headset for a first-person view, with another providing guidance via maps on a tablet, these drones are often used to target vulnerable points such as tank hatches or engines. Their real-time video feed, transmitted through goggles or a headset similar to VR gaming, gives the operator precise control, especially in complex environments like urban warfare or dense terrain. FPV drones are effective for reconnaissance, targeted strikes, and even suicide missions, where they carry explosives and fly directly into a target. Unlike planes or helicopters, they are not hindered by anti-aircraft systems near the front lines. In fact, a $500 FPV drone can\u00a0target<\/a>\u00a0the open hatch of a Russian tank worth millions of dollars, demonstrating their cost-effectiveness in modern warfare.<\/p>\n The rise of counter-drone and jamming technologies<\/strong><\/p>\n As drone warfare becomes increasingly common on the battlefield, a need arises for effective drone jamming technologies. While Russian, Ukrainian, and other armies have access to jammers, ethnic armies in Myanmar lack them almost entirely. Jammers\u00a0start<\/a>\u00a0at $2,400, but many cheap, commercially available models are essentially useless due to significant design flaws. Some have fixed antennae\u00a0that point upward<\/a>, despite attacks coming from the side, and many generate excessive heat without proper cooling. This raises concerns about their effectiveness in harsh environments, such as the deserts of the Middle East or the humid jungles of Myanmar.<\/p>\n Moreover, electronic jamming devices work on specific frequencies and drone pilots are adapting by switching to less commonly used ones. To counter this, new technologies like\u00a0pocket-sized \u201ctenchies\u201d<\/a>\u00a0and backpack electronic warfare (EW) systems have emerged, jamming signals across a broader 720-1,050 MHz range, making them more effective against Russian drones. Despite Ukraine\u2019s deployment of these newer jammers, Russia\u2019s use of hunter-killer drone systems like the Orlan-10 for spotting and the Lancet for strikes, along with missile-equipped Orion drones, continue to challenge Ukraine\u2019s drone defenses.<\/p>\n In response, Ukraine has created the Unmanned Systems Force (USF), a military branch dedicated to drone warfare. Additionally, semi-autonomous\u00a0drones using AI<\/a>\u00a0are being developed to bypass jamming altogether. We remain in the nascent stages of drone warfare, where evolution is playing out in real time via innovations on the battlefield. In this sense, US defense spending in Ukraine is serving as an investment in research and development for the drone wars of tomorrow.<\/p>\n