Sign up for breaking news emails sent directly to your inbox for free, real-time
Sign up for our free news email
Sign up for our free news email
oLeksandr Yarmak has little sympathy for the Russians.
The 33-year-old is the head of research and development for Ukraine’s drone warfare, and has devised more creative ways to make the most of deadly technology.
He is also a chart topping artist who has used his years on the forefront of turning his experience into rap songs that have become national war hymns.
His forces watch the Russian counterparts on Ukrainian military feed bow, waving, curl up in fear, sometimes standing still, sometimes still, in the final seconds before the drone hits them.
Ukraine is trapped in the first 21st century war in the Western world, where small aircraft rule the battlefield and hunt individual soldiers. These are being chased by unmanned system power (USF) pilots hidden in the bunker.
Images opened in the gallery
The pilot, wearing a first-person view (FPV) headset, says that the drone’s eyes can reveal the appearance of the soldier’s face at the moment of his death. The drone pilot kills the drone by crashing into his body and tearing it apart.
The little mysterious Russian army calls these nighttime Ukrainian drones “Baba Yaga.” Generations of children fear the story of a legendary witch who flies into baskets paddled with broomsticks and into baskets that burn living babies. Now, Baba Yaga brings death by dropping bombs from flying baskets made from carbon fiber and crying plastic.
A prototype drone sits in the corner of the office where Yalmak and I meet. It can fly almost silently at night and use thermal images to find the victim in complete darkness. Carry at least four bombs.
The Ukrainian name is “Vampire.”
Images opened in the gallery
Yalmak began his military career in 2022 and signed up when Russia began a full-scale invasion. Soon, like many others, he discovered that small commercial drones could be adapted to drop hand-rena bullets and mortar bombs on the Russian army.
He proceeded to command drone units on the front line, with recent drone targets recorded on video.
One of his most famous singles, Babylon, he sings:
“People are happy to launch a Shaed (Russian UAV) in their children’s rooms.
(There is) Creation error, unfinished code.
I was given a body (born) to the world of music and theater
They pull Soviet oars. Half the world from home, brutal from birth, blood thirsty, just pure evil. ”
Images opened in the gallery
Ukraine is currently heavily dependent on drones. The country is adapted because gunfire ammunition is just as short as long-range rockets. Yalmak says 80% of enemy casualties are caused by drones.
His Ukrainian forces developed Babayaga from agricultural drones that were once used to spray fields. He is currently developing land drones, hinting at sophisticated new weapons that will be unveiled later this year. His new unit’s annual budget is reported to be around $1.3 billion.
However, the drone fight is reduced in both ways, and the accuracy of Russia causes devastation on the Ukrainian side.
Vitaly runs a makeshift battlefield medical centre that handles seriously injured soldiers on the frontlines of Ukraine. He grabs his head with both hands, as if he had been hit by a migraine.
“Drone? Ask the injured soldiers what they are. You will see a quiet fear in his eyes. The anesthesiologist in charge of the “stabilization unit” states: Masu.
Vitali estimates that 98% of the injured he treated have been hit by Russian drones. On average, his troops see around 20 soldiers per day, mainly taken to dusk, from battlefields a few miles away.
Images opened in the gallery
“I have never seen a bullet wound in a few months,” he says — most of the injured are torn from the drone by rap shotguns.
In Ukraine, Yeffen Karas, commander of the newly formed 414th Strike Drone Battalion, will work closely with Yalmak to develop and test new technologies.
Ukraine evaded air defenses and used long-range drones that attacked airfields and refineries to attack targets in Moscow and other regions within Russia.
The crow said: “We have the best systems of deep strike drones. We can fly hundreds of kilometers and cause major problems with Russian military bases, air bases… 2025 is a very good example of drone land system. I think it will be a year of great development.”
He suggests that evacuation of the battlefield with unmanned stretcher machines could save lives, and that more deadly development would become “huge.”
In the “meat grinder” conflict on Ukraine’s eastern front, Russia has made small profits at enormous costs. Several frontline officers, including the crow, all explain how the sky herds have changed Russian tactics.
Images opened in the gallery
Ukrainian soldiers do not appear to face massive armored attacks with tanks and artillery fire, as heavy machinery are so vulnerable to drone attacks.
Instead, video recordings of the reconnaissance drone show a small group of Russian infantry trying to advance.
“They climbed the road and said three of these (Russian) losers. One is killed, two go. They are sitting in the trench. Then three more, the next day. Plus. Two are killed and one reaches the trench. When there are five or six men, they attack and start moving forward like that,” explains Crows.
“In general, the hottest points on the frontline are usually battles with three or five Russian infantrymen. Russia is seriously injured. We kill more men, but more They destroy few tanks and artillery, that’s infantry, infantry, infantry,” he says.
Eugene, a former frontline drone operator who fought Russia and was injured, is currently an engineer for the program training Babayaga pilot, which can take up to three months and is part of the program.
The training team knows that they can be pushed into a large camouflaged tree line and that Russian reconnaissance drones can quietly track them.
Images opened in the gallery
“There’s no place to hide,” he says.
The key for Ukraine is that both sides compete for the use of artificial intelligence in drone warfare, moving ahead of Russian technology as they turn flying machines into autonomous executioners.
As Yalmak sings in “The Wilderness”: “I am a naturally born Cossack musician. Doom is waiting for all the wild people here…”
His music will never be forgotten, but it is the drone he is developing that he wants to become a real-world nightmare in Russia.
