The SBU used small numbers of vehicles on many fronts, and by late 2022 had deployed them to Bahmut, site of Europe’s bloodiest siege since World War II. FPV drones weren’t perfect. Like any aircraft, it can be grounded due to weather. They flew one aircraft at a time with a few minutes between sorties, so rapid fire was not possible. But once deployed on a large scale, they can thwart Russian mechanized attacks, detonate explosives against people in trenches, search for artillery and supply vehicles behind enemy lines, and communicate between soldiers and commanders. He gained followers as well. “Bahmut is not the first place where kamikaze drones were used,” said one of the SBU’s first drone team leaders. He uses the name Babai, a boogeyman from Slavic folklore who kidnaps his victims at night. “But that was the first place they were commonly used.” Artillery shells were in short supply due to political infighting in Washington, so weaponized toys were replenished.
Thanks to FPV drones, Ukraine managed to defend Bakhmut until mid-2023, inflicting heavy casualties on Russian attackers for several months. In Fedorenko’s unit alone, he said, drone teams killed 210 mercenaries from a private military company known as the Wagner Group, wounded another 360, and destroyed 23 self-propelled howitzers and other heavy equipment. It is said that it was destroyed.
All it took for FPV to break out was for the public and politicians to catch up. A few months after the siege, Serhii Sternenko, a young Ukrainian lawyer, prominent YouTuber, and passionate drone advocate, visited a regrouped surviving brigade of Ukrainian soldiers. It happened. There they shared accounts of “shell starvation” so severe that an entire brigade received only 11 shells a day to fight endlessly supplied waves of invaders. Sternenko, an activist who fought in Kiev street brawls in 2014, was raising money to supply his troops with FPV drones. He wanted feedback on how they were working. The stories he heard were both shocking and enlightening. The rationing of artillery shells forced Ukraine to turn to kamikaze drones as its main means of defense. When forced into service, they produced astonishing results. “We found that 90% of the Russian equipment destroyed by Ukraine was destroyed by drones,” Sternenko said of the siege. The survival of the country, he thought, had become dependent on drones.
Driving back, Sternenko recorded a YouTube video for his roughly 2 million subscribers. He expressed grave concerns at the outset. “I won’t give you specific numbers so as not to depress you, but I will say this: We have very few shells in our country,” he said. “And when I say ‘very few,’ I mean they’re in critical front-line areas where they’re needed the most, where the enemy is conducting active attacks.” Effectiveness and relative cost ($320-$600 per drone, $3,200+ per shell) “In many places, our country’s defenses are maintained thanks to these drones,” he said. He warned that Russia is emulating Ukraine’s success and deploying its own FPV drones and could soon surpass Ukraine in usage.
Mr. Sternenko pleaded. “I would like to take this opportunity to publicly address the Minister of Defense, all relevant officials and, most importantly, the President of Ukraine, as we have a large audience and many people will watch this video. “I would like to give a speech on the occasion,” he said. “Raise the issue of providing FPV drones to the Ukrainian defense forces to the maximum, highest level. Make it a priority. If we cannot solve the shortage of shells now, let’s find an alternative,” he said. “Whoever wins the drone race will also win this war,” he said.
