These recently developed techniques are among the many innovations that have emerged from Ukraine's war with Russia, and they highlight many Ukrainians' initiative and entrepreneurial spirit. Once in the military, new soldiers reach out to friends and family back home for needed equipment, especially drones. The development of drones in Ukraine was enhanced by all the friends and family members of Ukrainian soldiers who didn’t just send their soldiers what they said they needed, but searched around on the internet, social networks, and among friends for ideas and help in developing those ideas into something useful in a combat zone.

The Ukrainian army is organized into brigades, and each brigade commander and his staff can deal directly with manufacturers to obtain new equipment or items developed by soldiers. Not just drones, but additions to combat uniforms, anti-drone nets, and anything brigade members found useful in their handmade prototypes. The brigade commander has a budget for this, which is often augmented by the friends and families of soldiers under his command. While army-wide standardization suffers, the combat gains and other brigades' ability to copy successful ideas make it all worthwhile. This is obvious when you read the internet and social networks chatter of soldiers who survived because of some civilian’s crazy idea that worked.

Ukrainian drone proliferation began when many individual Ukrainians, or small teams of civilians, designed and built drones. The drones became candidates for widespread use and mass production. This proliferation of designers and manufacturers rapidly evolved drone capabilities and uses. Those who could not keep up were less successful in combat and suffered higher losses. Each month, Ukrainian factories and home workshops build nearly 400,000 drones. Most of these workshops are informal, located in spare rooms, garages, barns, empty industrial space, or anywhere protected from the weather and aerial surveillance. Russia will hit any drone manufacturing sites they can identify.

One result of the Ukraine War was the emergence of inexpensive drones as a decisive weapon as well as a reconnaissance and surveillance system. In 2023, a year after Russia invaded Ukraine, the Ukrainians were building their own drones, often at home or in scattered workshops. By late 2024, Ukrainians were producing over 15o,000 drones a month. In 2025, Ukraine produced over 4 million drones. By buying components in bulk, thousands of Ukrainian men and women build these drones for the armed forces or for someone they know in the military. Troops at the front also build and modify drones to fit their immediate situations. For the soldiers, designing better drones is often a matter of life or death.

This competitiveness led to First Person View (FPV) drones, as well as drones guided via Fiber-Optic cable Guidance, or FOG. Electronic jamming was useless against the FOG drones. The only limitation was cable length. This meant the operator had to be at one end of the kilometers-long cable. Operators could be farther away if they had time to lay another kilometer or two of cable farther back. Ukrainian drone operators often worked in drone workshops before entering the military and were accustomed to upgrading drone-operator equipment in the combat zone. Workshop operators across Ukraine learned of successful innovations.

This is how the Ukrainians maintain a lead over the Russians in drone technology and production. The Russian government discourages, or even outlaws, individuals building drones and centralizes drone production. This gives the Ukrainians an edge in drone quantity and quality. The Ukrainians are defending their homeland, and Russia is having an increasingly difficult time justifying continued fighting and nearly two million Russians killed or disabled in Ukraine.

NATO countries are trying to adopt drone technology and use it for their own armed forces. Ukraine has received over $200 billion in military and economic assistance from NATO countries and shares their drone experience and technology with their benefactors. Drones have revolutionized warfare and are causing 70 percent of casualties in Ukraine. The war in Ukraine is a battle between industrialized countries using modern weapons. It is the war of the future, and all armed forces must adopt it to remain competitive.

Last year, Ukraine equipped its combat brigades with ground-based combat and transport robots in addition to drones. The ground robots come in different versions. Some plant and remove landmines. Other drones advance along the ground while firing remotely controlled machine guns. These systems can fire accurately at moving targets day and night. Drones also transport supplies to the front lines and carry casualties back to first aid stations and field hospitals. The growing number of Ukrainian drone systems was developed based on reports from the front-line troops. They quickly put those ideas to use because of wartime urgency.

James F Dunnigan