August 11, 2024: The Ukraine War was started by Russian leaders who thought it would be over quickly. It wasn’t and the war is now in its third year. The fighting has led to the destruction of most modern Russian weapons. Russia lost several thousand of its best tanks in the first six months of the war. The Ukrainians were given many thousands of modern American and European portable anti-tank weapons which were used to good effect by not merely Ukrainian troops, but civilian irregulars. Russia was prepared to face a regular force, not a lot of civilians driving around in their cars, SUVs or pickup trucks with one or more of these anti-tank weapons in the back. Ukrainians were linked by their cell phones so most anyone someone who spotted a column of Russian tanks could share that information with other civilians armed with anti-tank weapons. The civilians would quietly show up dispersed where Russian tanks were and fire from a tree line or from inside a barn or next to a house. The losses inflicted by these irregulars made up a substantial portion of the 3,400 tanks Russia lost during their first year in Ukraine.

Twice as many other light armored vehicles were also lost, in addition to 2,800 towed or self-propelled artillery systems plus nearly 500 MLRS (multiple launch rocket systems), nearly 600 hundred aircraft and helicopters and over two thousand UAVs. About 5,500 trucks were lost, including fuel tankers and cargo transports of various sizes. The Ukrainian irregulars were particularly keen on destroying or capturing as many trucks as possible. Russian drivers often abandoned their trucks when their column came under fire, especially if the Ukrainian destroyed the first and last vehicle in a column. This was cue for the Russian drivers to run away and let the Ukrainians have the trucks. The captured vehicles had their Russian ID painted over and replaced with Ukrainian ones. The Russians lost so many trucks in Ukraine that by late 2023 they were requisitioning civilian trucks, vans and other commercial vehicles. These were often sent to Ukraine without receiving a new paint job indicating they were now military vehicles.

Russian troops depended on wheeled transport more than the Ukrainians because the Russians were the invaders and had to use road transport to sustain their troops. The Russian and Ukrainian railroads used the same equipment but the Ukrainians kept sabotaging stretches of Ukrainian rail lines the Russians had captured. That was easier than sabotaging roads and more difficult for the Russians to repair and keep repairing when the sabotage was repeated. There were not enough Russian soldiers available to guard the rail lines and few were assigned to provide security for equipment depots and repair teams sent out to some remote portion of track that was now inoperable.

All this transportation disruption left Russian soldiers short of weapons and munitions, or at least munitions that could be used in the weapons they did have. This led to a lot of weapons improvisation among Russian troops. Damaged BMP armored personnel carriers had their 73mm low-pressure short range cannons removed and mounted in trucks or in fixed positions. During the last year Russian soldiers have often been defending and mobile artillery was not as essential. So truck-mounted multiple tube rocket launchers were still useful when removed from the damaged truck they were mounted on. In other cases these rocket launchers could be mounted on another vehicle.

All these improvised weapons still had to deal with an unexpected innovation: UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) that fly low, slow and seek out targets. Ukrainian forces were the first to use cheap $500 quadcopter UAVs controlled by soldiers a kilometer or more away using FPV (First Person Viewing) goggles to see what the day/night video camera on the UAV can see. Adding night vision at least doubles the cost for each UAV, so not all of them have that capability. Each of these UAVs carries half a kilogram of explosives, so it can instantly turn the UAV into a flying bomb that can fly into a target and detonate. This was an awesome and debilitating weapon when used in large numbers over the combat zone. If a target isn’t moving or requires more explosive power that the UAVs can supply, one of the UAV operators can call in artillery, rocket, or missile fire, or even an airstrike. Larger, fixed wing UAVs are used for long range, often over a thousand kilometers, operations against targets deep inside Russia. Since 2022 the use of UAVs by both sides has escalated and so far, over a million UAVs have been put to work providing surveillance and attack services for both sides.

The Ukrainians pioneered modifying existing UAVs to give them new capabilities, constantly develop new designs and build them in home workshops. The Ukrainian government encouraged this and put the more successful designs into mass production. This was often done in underground facilities that were safer from Russian detection and attack.

The Russian government was more bureaucratic and less supportive of troop innovation. Russian soldiers could improvise in the combat zone, which Russian military production officials rarely visited.